curiosity and creativity jump-start

content/post/2021/10/collective-creativity.md

@@ -35,4 +35,4 @@ Conclusion? Heterogeneous communicating geniuses are better than a bunch of indi
 
 _Dream Work Makes The Team Work_. Or was it the other way around?
 
-This is part one of my creativity story. Be sure to also read [part 2: constraint-based creativity](/post/2021/11/constraint-based-creativity/) and [part 3: creative critical thinking](/post/2021/11/creative-critical-thinking/).
+This is part one of my creativity story. Be sure to also read [part 2: constraint-based creativity](/post/2021/11/constraint-based-creativity/), [part 3: creative critical thinking](/post/2021/11/creative-critical-thinking/), and [part 4: from curiosity to creativity](/post/2021/11/from-curiosity-to-creativity/).

content/post/2021/11/constraint-based-creativity.md

@@ -46,4 +46,4 @@ The end result of a process influenced by constraints is always very progressive
 Remember that next time you're forced to work with legacy Visual Basic code. 
 
 
-This is part two of my creativity story. Be sure to also read [part 1: collective creativity](/post/2021/10/collective-creativity/) and [part 3: creative critical thinking](/post/2021/11/creative-critical-thinking/).
+This is part two of my creativity story. Be sure to also read [part 1: collective creativity](/post/2021/10/collective-creativity/), [part 3: creative critical thinking](/post/2021/11/creative-critical-thinking/), and [part 4: from curiosity to creativity](/post/2021/11/from-curiosity-to-creativity/).

content/post/2021/11/creative-critical-thinking.md

@@ -42,4 +42,4 @@ Grove Street Games' reliance on creative but imperfect AI tech, probably combine
 Creative thinking alone is not enough: both _creative_ and _critical_ thinking are requirements to be genuinely creative. Critical thinking to validate or reject ideas, to make timely adjustments to the creative process, to ask for and correctly interpret feedback, and to overcome the many cognitive biases formed in our heads. 
 
 
-This is part three of my creativity story. Be sure to also read [part 1: collective creativity](/post/2021/10/collective-creativity/) and [part 2: constraint-based creativity](/post/2021/11/constraint-based-creativity/).
+This is part three of my creativity story. Be sure to also read [part 1: collective creativity](/post/2021/10/collective-creativity/), [part 2: constraint-based creativity](/post/2021/11/constraint-based-creativity/), and [part 4: from curiosity to creativity](/post/2021/11/from-curiosity-to-creativity/).

content/post/2021/11/from-curiosity-to-creativity.md

@@ -0,0 +1,48 @@
+---
+title: From Curiosity To Creativity
+date: 2021-11-29T13:23:00+01:00
+categories:
+  - education
+  - learning
+tags:
+  - creativity
+  - history
+---
+
+The never-ending murmur of the scouring sand that spans the ancient Egyptian desert has little effect on the traveler's mood. Equipped with nothing but a walking stick and a light backpack, the stranger defies turbulent seas, sandy deserts, and dusty roads, only to arrive at yet another half-deserted village. He calmly rests his walking stick against a palm tree, shakes off the sand from his clothing, and without hesitating, strikes up a conversation with a local. After a long chat and a shared but meager meal, he unrolls a partially finished manuscript and starts writing, beginning with the iconic words: "I was told that...". 
+
+That man was Herodotus, and he was on a mission: to record the history of the world. his work _Histories_ is now regarded as one of the first meticulously detailed investigations in cultural, geographical, and historical events, in particular the Greco-Persian wars. Herodotus is the world's first true fearless historians, willing travel long and far, whatever the risks. _Histories_ records not just the world view from the viewpoint of his beloved Greece, but also from the Persian Empire, where he was born. 
+
+Herodotus' curiosity about what is happening to ordinary inhabitants of his era combined with his wit and keen senses sprouted literature that was considered essential reading material---and nowadays still should be. Three hundred years later, Cicero called Herodotus "The Father of History". Technically speaking, Thucydides came first, although Thucydides's writing isn't steeped in anthropological questions and answers.
+
+Twenty centuries later, the chaotic but everyday maelstrom of masts creaking, sailors yelling, and waves sloshing indicates a boat is about to set sail. The _Beagle_, under the command of Royal Navy officer and scientist Robert FitzRoy, was tasked with charting the coastline of South America. A twenty-two years old Brit managed to persuade FitzRoy to join the crew as a naturalist. That young man was called Charles Darwin. 
+
+The captain sent Darwin ashore to investigate the local geology while the _Beagle_ itself continued surveying and charting the coasts. Darwin's curiosity wasn't limited to geology: it was the perfect excuse for him to explore and collect samples of local fauna and flora, making extensive notes while back on the ship---not only in what he saw, but also on theoretical speculations.
+
+Darwin wasn't an expert in biology: he only knew a little bit about geology and had the odd beetle collection back home. He was a novice at pretty much all other areas, but his curiosity wasn't diminished because of it: perhaps exactly the opposite happened. Despite suffering from prolonged periods of seasickness, he still managed to write down anything that piked his interest---which was almost _everything_. 
+
+In 1836, the _Beagle_ finally returned to Plymouth, after a journey of five years. Six months after the grand adventure, Darwin slowly but surely started connecting the dots. His extensive notes, reworked into papers and his _Journal_, revealed that "one species does change into another". His seminal work, _On the Origin of Species_, eventually published in 1859, would still be a long way off (23 years!), first requiring several more essays, conversations with befriended scientists, more revisions, and very long thought walks.
+
+![](../beagle.jpg "Robert Taylor Pritchett's 1890 drawing of the HMS Beagle in Chile. Image public domain.")
+
+One hundred and sixty years later, the sizzling of molten tin accompanied with small circles of smoke fill a small office space in Colindale, London. The floor is littered with DIY-printed circuit boards and unscrewed _Tetris_ Game Boy cartridges. A couple of software and electronics engineers are hacking together a Game Boy development kit by reverse-engineering _Tetris_. 
+
+Jez San, founder of British video game developer Argonaut Games, crossed paths with Nintendo's Game Boy during an electronics fair in 1989. The lovingly "little" Gray Brick immediately attracted his attention. Once back home, San decided to direct programming efforts from the Spectrum and Amiga to Nintendo's ecosystems. Only, Nintendo was very stingy at handing out official development kits, especially outside of Japan. The solution? Build one yourself by connecting wires from a cartridge to chips on a home-made circuit board. 
+
+New programming recruit Dylan Cuthbert was tasked with the development of Aronaut's first Game Boy game that would become _X_, or _Ekkusu_. San thought it would be cool to develop a 3D space simulator for the Game Boy---something they had already achieved on other platforms with the _Starglider_ series. Only, the Game Boy houses a variant of the Z80 CPU, running at `3.5 MHz`. Even worse, it can only display four shades of ~~drab~~ gray. Luckily, Cuthbert proved to be up for the task. The fully 3D-rendered meshes in the game even impressed Nintendo, inviting the team over to Japan. 
+
+_X_ would be the beginning of a shared history between Argonaut Games and Nintendo. Nintendo's interest in British boldness got Argonaut and Cuthbert heavily involved in the development of the _Super FX_ RISC co-processor, powering _Yoshi's Island_, the _DOOM_ Super Nintendo port, and of course, _Star Fox_, also developed by Argonaut. Cuthbert's 3D hardware experience eventually landed him a job at Sony, helping developers unlock the power of the first two PlayStation generations. He eventually started his own company Q-Games, well-known for the _PixelJunk_ series.
+
+---
+
+What is the greatest common divisor between Herodotus' herculean effort to meet people and write down their story, Charles Darwin's extensive notes on geology and biology, and Argonaut Games' soldering hack to peek inside a _Tetris_ cartridge? All three examples showcase a great curiosity: for the tales of others and the history of empires, for the evolution of nature and the origin of species, and for the inner workings of a piece of hardware. 
+
+It it weren't for the curiosity and persistence of these people, we would have lost even more ancient Greek and Persian knowledge, we would still have no idea how nature evolves when sea life crawled upon land, and a _Super FX_ chip might never have been released on time to prolong the life of the Super Nintendo.
+
+Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi's interviewed geniuses attribute _curiosity_ and _perseverance_ as the two most important personality traits for their creative success. Without curiosity, there is little motivation to learn or build something. Without perseverance, there is little chance of effectively finishing the work. Creativity is not creativity without the initial curiosity that gets everything started. 
+
+As Charles Darwin proved: the best kind of curiosity is an all-encompassing curiosity. Don't limit the intent to the domains you're very familiar with! 
+
+
+This is part four of my creativity story. Be sure to also read [part 1: collective creativity](/post/2021/10/collective-creativity/),  [part 2: constraint-based creativity](/post/2021/11/constraint-based-creativity/), and [part 3: creative critical thinking](/post/2021/11/creative-critical-thinking/).
+