Creative Thinking

Claude Shannon, speaking at Bell Labs on March 20, 1952, argues that creative research depends on three things: training and experience, a fairly high level of intelligence, and motivation, which he describes as curiosity, constructive dissatisfaction, and enjoyment of finding answers. He says that very few people produce most of the important ideas, and cites Isaac Newton, who had produced enough science by age 25 to make 10 or 20 men famous. Shannon then describes problem-solving techniques that he says good researchers use unconsciously, including simplification, seeking similar known problems, restating a problem in many forms, and generalization.