Written by: Theodore Scaltsas
Abstract: BrainMining is a theory of creative thinking that shows how we should exploit the mind’s spontaneous natural disposition to use old solutions to address new problems – our Anchoring Cognitive Bias. BrainMining develops a simple and straightforward method to transform recalcitrant problems into types of problems which we have solved before, and then apply an old type of solution to them. The transformation makes the thinking lateral by matching up disparate types of problem and solution. It emphasises the role of emotive judgements that the agent makes, when she discerns whether a change of the values or the emotions and feelings in a situation, which would expand the space of solutions available for the problem at hand, would be acceptable or appropriate in the situation. A lateral solution for an intractable problem is thus spontaneously brainmined from the agent’s old solutions, to solve a transformed version of the intractable problem, possibly involving changes in the value system or the emotional profile of the situation, which the agent judges, emotively, will be acceptable, and even appropriate in the circumstances.
Keywords: BrainMining; creative thinking; lateral thinking; emotive thinking; cognitive bias; anchoring bias; emotions; feelings; Kahneman; Tversky; Ariely