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Active: 30276 users

Can the human mind create something it has never s

Blogs > mAKiTO
Post a Reply
mAKiTO
Profile Blog Joined December 2002
Colombia4171 Posts
Last Edited: 2014-10-27 20:50:09
October 27 2014 20:49 GMT
#1
If the mind can create something it has never seen before then I cannot find an example. if you say unicorns etc well that's a horse and a variation of a horn all of which the mind has seen before and know about. All the mind did was put the pieces together and the same goes for any mythical creatures.


same goes for a car, it was a better horse carriage, along those lines

like the human has to see something and get insipartion to créate, instead of having pure from 0 creation?


*
No quiero soñar mil veces las mismas cosas
ZigguratOfUr
Profile Blog Joined April 2012
Iraq16955 Posts
October 27 2014 21:09 GMT
#2
Shouldn't you cite sources if you are just copying and pasting ted forum conversation topics? http://www.ted.com/conversations/5114/can_the_human_mind_create_some.html
Striker.superfreunde
Profile Joined May 2010
Germany1119 Posts
October 27 2014 21:24 GMT
#3
ohoh, busted! But interesting question nonzheless.
Visit us in the high thread!
'Your ak is pretty... uhm... dank!'
LaNague
Profile Blog Joined April 2010
Germany9118 Posts
Last Edited: 2014-10-27 21:29:22
October 27 2014 21:26 GMT
#4
gods



or any scientific breaktrough like:

guns, wheel, farming, transistor, everything in math etc
Yorbon
Profile Joined December 2011
Netherlands4272 Posts
October 27 2014 21:34 GMT
#5
"the mind can create something it has never seen before"
You've just now created it. Or doesnt that count?

If you're looking for something material, I think I wouldn't be able to describe it properly, because I'll be limited to a description consisting of a combination of objects I know you would know. That's limited to objects we both have seen or can see, and that rules the object out by definition.
Deleuze
Profile Blog Joined December 2010
United Kingdom2102 Posts
Last Edited: 2014-10-27 22:05:27
October 27 2014 22:03 GMT
#6
Abstract mathematical concept, like non-Eucliddeam geometry, a hypercube, abstract art, the future?

Edit: I hate typing on my phone
“An image of thought called philosophy has been formed historically and it effectively stops people from thinking.” ― Gilles Deleuze, Dialogues II
Chairman Ray
Profile Blog Joined December 2009
United States11903 Posts
October 27 2014 22:20 GMT
#7
On October 28 2014 06:09 ZigguratOfUr wrote:
Shouldn't you cite sources if you are just copying and pasting ted forum conversation topics? http://www.ted.com/conversations/5114/can_the_human_mind_create_some.html


Looks like OP couldn't create a post he hasn't seen before =P
MysteryMeat1
Profile Blog Joined June 2011
United States3291 Posts
October 27 2014 23:48 GMT
#8
On October 28 2014 07:20 Chairman Ray wrote:
Show nested quote +
On October 28 2014 06:09 ZigguratOfUr wrote:
Shouldn't you cite sources if you are just copying and pasting ted forum conversation topics? http://www.ted.com/conversations/5114/can_the_human_mind_create_some.html


Looks like OP couldn't create a post he hasn't seen before =P


REkt
"Cause ya know, Style before victory." -The greatest mafia player alive
hp.Shell
Profile Blog Joined April 2010
United States2527 Posts
October 28 2014 00:11 GMT
#9
Television, telephone, etc
Please PM me with any songs you like that you think I haven't heard before!
ninazerg
Profile Blog Joined October 2009
United States7291 Posts
Last Edited: 2014-10-28 02:10:23
October 28 2014 02:09 GMT
#10
I think you might be asking the wrong question. The human imagination can produce a seemingly-infinite array of concepts. That imaginative power is not limited to the perceptible but to the imperceptible as well, such as sub-atomic particles, ultra-violet light, and pitches of sound that our ears do not pick up. We can imagine these things despite the fact that we cannot see them, or have not yet developed the means to do so. However, to think of something that does not exist, the thing would have no concept either. How can you conceptualize that which has no categorical concept?

Edit:

+ Show Spoiler [answer] +

Theoretical physics, aw yeah.
"If two pregnant women get into a fist fight, it's like a mecha-battle between two unborn babies." - Fyodor Dostoevsky
Xyik
Profile Blog Joined November 2009
Canada728 Posts
October 28 2014 02:23 GMT
#11
Humans have to evolve somehow. It's not like humans had any concept of electricity or computers thousands of years ago.
-Kaiser-
Profile Blog Joined November 2011
Canada932 Posts
October 28 2014 02:46 GMT
#12
Short answer: Yes.

Proofs: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impossible_colors

The brain can perceive colours that can not physically exist. That answers your question almost exactly. It can create an image of a colour that it has not seen.
3 Hatch Before Cool
lichter
Profile Blog Joined September 2010
1001 YEARS KESPAJAIL22272 Posts
Last Edited: 2014-10-28 03:15:58
October 28 2014 03:15 GMT
#13
i think i imagined jyp winning a pvt once
AdministratorYOU MUST HEED MY INSTRUCTIONS TAKE OFF YOUR THIIIINGS
ninazerg
Profile Blog Joined October 2009
United States7291 Posts
October 28 2014 04:30 GMT
#14
On October 28 2014 11:23 Xyik wrote:
Humans have to evolve somehow. It's not like humans had any concept of electricity or computers thousands of years ago.


Electricity is a natural phenomenon, and we didn't have to imagine something new to make it usable.
"If two pregnant women get into a fist fight, it's like a mecha-battle between two unborn babies." - Fyodor Dostoevsky
nunez
Profile Blog Joined February 2011
Norway4003 Posts
Last Edited: 2014-10-28 11:06:39
October 28 2014 11:05 GMT
#15
what about this:

think of a point. stop thinking about that point.
wait a bit.
think of a regular tetrahedon, while keeping the distance
in time between the regular tetrahedon
and the initial point constant.

now connect the two by gradually shrinking the tetrahedon
into the past: a tetrahedral hyperpyramid.
conspired against by a confederacy of dunces.
3FFA
Profile Blog Joined February 2010
United States3931 Posts
October 28 2014 12:45 GMT
#16
Years ago Star Craft was not seen before, and yet it was created. How would you explain that? The art for multiple applications were not seen before the artist drew them, often created in their mind first, and then it was seen.

There is no answer other than yes imo.
"As long as it comes from a pure place and from a honest place, you know, you can write whatever you want."
Paljas
Profile Joined October 2011
Germany6926 Posts
October 28 2014 15:35 GMT
#17
On October 28 2014 12:15 lichter wrote:
i think i imagined jyp winning a pvt once

i imagined being touched by jyp once
TL+ Member
Grumbels
Profile Blog Joined May 2009
Netherlands7031 Posts
October 28 2014 17:54 GMT
#18
On October 28 2014 21:45 3FFA wrote:
Years ago Star Craft was not seen before, and yet it was created. How would you explain that? The art for multiple applications were not seen before the artist drew them, often created in their mind first, and then it was seen.

There is no answer other than yes imo.

Starcraft is directly based on some Warhammer 40k concepts, which are based on the novel Starship Troopers. Not sure where the author, Robert Heinlein, got his inspiration from though.

You can play this game forever, I do think. Every work of art has its predecessors. I read something the other day where an artist talked about not wanting to create a school, because in art you had to find your own unique language and expression instead of just copying others. But despite this, most 20th century classical music would have been unthinkable in earlier centuries. In rock music you see this evolution as well. It starts with basic rockabilly, which is based on blues which is based on folk music etc., then it develops by incorporating new instruments, classical, folk and jazz influences. At some point people said that rock music was dead because the new rock bands would only draw inspiration from previous rock bands and therefore the music was too incestuous to offer anything of value.
Well, now I tell you, I never seen good come o' goodness yet. Him as strikes first is my fancy; dead men don't bite; them's my views--amen, so be it.
FunkyLich
Profile Blog Joined August 2010
United States107 Posts
October 28 2014 19:00 GMT
#19
So I was about to go on a rant saying this is a perfectly common philosophical intuition that anyone can come up with on their own, and that we should give the OP the benefit of the doubt. But holy similarity index batman, that is some plagiarism if I've ever seen any.

Anyways, since everyone's just trying to write this idea off, I'll try to paint a better picture, as I've been pretty interested in it for some time.

Basically, if you've ever tried to come up with an idea for a monster, or any fantasy creature, you will probably realize that developing completely novel attributes and features is extremely difficult. First of all you have to start with some kind of template, and mutate it. The mutations you come up with are just going to come from things you've seen before. Start with a blob, give it a horn, give it an eye, so on and so forth. You'll find whatever mutation you give it will be describable ultimately in terms of your past experiences with real life, or watching a movie, or looking at pictures in your D&D book, or any other previous imaginings. Now to be fair, I can only honestly speak for myself, but I think this is true for everyone. None of the creative people I know would discount the importance of practice and experience, which is the essence of what I'm talking about. That, and all the great musicians and artists always seem to have inspirations. If this is true of everyone, it could cause us to redefine what it means to be creative: A person is perceived as creative when they are able to seed very granular details from their experiences and combine them in unique and interesting ways.

In the interest of generalizing, the same can be said for music. If you want to learn to do jazz improv for example, you have to listen to jazz. And a lot of it. The more jazz you've heard the more complex you're phrasing can be. If you've never heard jazz before, you would have nothing to build off of.

tldr; Creativity is a process. It's not magic, and it's not spontaneous. It just seems that way because creative people are seeding from experiences that are more vast and better understood than your own.

On October 28 2014 11:46 -Kaiser- wrote:
Short answer: Yes.

Proofs: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impossible_colors

The brain can perceive colours that can not physically exist. That answers your question almost exactly. It can create an image of a colour that it has not seen.


I'm not sure I understand this article correctly. But I don't think it's saying that the brain is imagining a novel color that it has never sensed. In fact you can sense these impossible colors, it's just that the image is caused by how your eyeball handles it's inputs before a signal is even sent to the brain. The brain is just taking what it's given.

The brain can perceive lots of things that can't physically exist, as in dreams and hallucinations. The question is not whether our experiences necessarily align with what's physically possible. It's about whether our conceptions are ultimately bound in our perceptions/senses, whatever those perceptions happen to be.

On October 28 2014 11:09 ninazerg wrote:
I think you might be asking the wrong question. The human imagination can produce a seemingly-infinite array of concepts. That imaginative power is not limited to the perceptible but to the imperceptible as well, such as sub-atomic particles, ultra-violet light, and pitches of sound that our ears do not pick up. We can imagine these things despite the fact that we cannot see them, or have not yet developed the means to do so. However, to think of something that does not exist, the thing would have no concept either. How can you conceptualize that which has no categorical concept?

Edit:

+ Show Spoiler [answer] +

Theoretical physics, aw yeah.


It's challenging to apply this to theoretical physics and abstract mathematics. With physics you are saying we can imagine all these things that are imperceptible. But I think that is a pretty loose usage of the word "imagine". When I "imagine" atoms for example, I'm picturing little colored spheres in my head spinning around each other in clearly drawn orbits. Scientifically, I recognize that I am only imagining a model, and that model's purpose is to relate the behavior of subatomic particles to real world objects. In spite of their size rendering them imperceptible, I can still understand their sizes relative to each other, and I can picture the molecular bindings as a graph of nodes and edges. But that's all they are to my imagination.

Sound waves and other phenomena where we have a perceptible spectrum with the rest imperceptible can also be understood this way. You are not really imagining those sounds, you're just inferring that sound waves exist at higher and lower frequencies. Imagine someone created an experimental piano, that could go ten octaves above the standard range. Each additional key triggers finer and finer strings, until the string is so fine that it produced supersonic sound. Now if you traversed the piano straight up, would you be able to produce this sound in your head? thus imagining it? I honestly don't know, but let's suppose you could. It would still be undeniable that you can't possibly internally hear this sound without recognizing a pattern in the progression that built up to it. In this way you're ability to imagine the sound depends on your memory of lower tones.



As a general rule, my understanding of one thing is limited by my ability to relate them with other things that I understand. My understanding of those other things is limited by my ability to relate to still more things. And the regression continues until the buck stops at sense experience.

As for abstract ideas, like mathematics and all that, that is getting pretty lofty. Actually, I think much of it can be known a priori (aka sans experience, but that doesn't mean you are actually imagining anything, they are just logically verifiable insights).
ahswtini
Profile Blog Joined June 2008
Northern Ireland22208 Posts
October 29 2014 15:27 GMT
#20
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impossible_colors

Something about that page makes my eyes/head feel uncomfortable
"As I've said, balance isn't about strategies or counters, it's about probability and statistics." - paralleluniverse
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