Paper summary - The Philosophy of Creativity, by Berys Gaut

What I read

In this paper, Gaut describes a variety of psychological approaches to the theory of creativity, and the relationship, or lack of relationship, of these approaches to building a philosophical theory and framework (and definition) of creativity.

Gaut’s analysis is broken into several parts.

First, in the Introduction, Gaut describes that psychologists have a long history of exploring and defining creativity (while philosophers do not.) She offers four examples to make this case.

The first example presents, and both challenges and champions a fairly common notion—that creativity is a virtue, and is something we should strive for. The example used to counter this is Gregory Feist’s argument that, while creative people are open to new ideas, they often tend to be stand-offish and self-centered: their focus is internal, often aimed at their own work, and their behavior is impulsive rather than planned. These traits are considered less virtuous (or not virtuous at all) and so creativity is not something we should always champion. The example used to support a virtuous approach is that of Teresa Amabile, who describes that creativity is enhanced by being extrinsically focused (although there’s not a clear connection made between extrinsic rewards and virtue.)

The second example identifies the role of being rational while being creative. This discussion primarily focuses on rationality vs. irrationality, which manifests as a psychological disorder. Jon Elster explains rationality in the context of constraints: that maximizing artist’s value comes from behaving within those constraints, which is a rational activity.

The third example describes creativity as something opposite of the norm or tradition. By considering creativity as either a rejection of norms or embracing norms, it becomes a social idea—one has to know the norms (which are normal because they are part of society or culture) in order to reject or conform to them.

The last example is focused on a Darwinian theory of creativity, which implies that there’s almost a natural selection to idea generation, where “good ideas” emerge in the same way that “good transformations for survival” emerge in humans over time (and “bad” transformations—defects—are eliminated because the host dies.) Dutton is referenced as an example supporting a non-Darwinian approach to art, as sketches or preliminary thinking artifacts are often considered just as good as final output (particularly for a famous artist, like Picasso.) But an essential part of the argument for a Darwinian approach is that ideas, like mutations, are random, and this is challenged for many artists who create ideas purposefully. Campbell is cited as referencing a worrisome tautology – that discovery can’t occur if one knows where one is going, but to not be random, one must know where one is going.

Next, in a section called “Some Philosophical Issues”, Gaut explores another four common ideas discussed in psychological literature related to creativity.

The first idea focuses on the ability for someone to explain creativity as a process (or the process one is going through as they are being creative.) If creative activities are unbounded by norms, and break new ground, there is no precedent from which to draw for an explanation or way of describing what is happening and why it is happening, because it is only rational after the fact.

The next idea describes a computational approach to creativity, which seems to be discussing rigid and methodical ways of being creative (as compared to a literal take on computation.) Margaret Bowden is cited as explaining that creativity can be combinational, exploratory, or transformational. This is a rigid structure, in that it positions creativity as only these activities, and that these activities can be repeated. This is juxtaposed to “radical creativity” which breaks the boundaries of all three of these approaches to idea generation and form giving. This section is focusing on the ability to articulate the rules of creativity, and if those rules can be formally enumerated or not (with a brief reference to artificial intelligence.)

Next, Gaut explores the idea of if creativity is the same in all fields and disciplines. The disciplines of science and art are compared. Some, like Weisberg, feel that both fields are aimed at solving problems, and problem solving is a rational activity (and the methods and approaches would be the same.) But others are cited as showing art to be indeterministic and strictly exploratory, and if it is exploratory, it is fundamentally different than science. Put another way, scientists only discover, and to discover means that the thing being discovered already exists (and isn’t created at all.)

Last in the series of four, Gaut discusses that focus has been placed in literature on originality (or, as referenced here, artistic and aesthetic in value.) Some argue that being original gives creative output a significant place in history, but being historically significant is not enough to give it artistic value, and without artistic value, the output can’t be seen as creative. Achievement is referenced in the context of this aesthetic value exploration—if something is considered by others to be an achievement, it has value, and making must offer value to be considered as creative.

In the next section, Gaut defines creativity, or references how others have defined it. Gaut explains that there is a consensus in the field (at least in psychology) that creativity has to be original and valuable. Some feel that creative output must also be surprising; others indicate that the output must be positive for the world, and not negative, such as the “creativity” of planning and conducting a terrorist attack. The phrase “ingeniously destructive” is offered by Novitz as a way of capturing this form of dark creativity.

Gaut also shows how some have framed creativity as something only a mature human can do and be, as compared to nature (a tree) or an animal, or a child. Additionally, the creativity must be “on purpose” – simply knocking over a can of paint and making something beautiful “doesn’t count.” This is Gaut’s contribution to the survey of work presented: that creativity, in addition to being original and valuable, also must come through agency.

Gaut’s next section works to support this new introduction of agency. This argument becomes philosophical, rather than psychological or cultural. The tautology of a prior knowledge is presented as problematic; to be purposeful, creativity has a purpose, and so is a means to an end. But that means the end is known, in which case nothing is actually made that is new. Gaut is referencing this argument in order to write it away and further justify the idea of agency, for it is not only the end, but also the means, that contains or presents creativity. It is the process of making, not the thing that is made, and so the thing that is made can be known ahead of time.

Additionally, Gaut rejects the tautology by explaining that some of, but not all of, the output can be known, and the creative activity works to suppose the some of part.

Gaut goes on to question if creativity must involve skill; no conclusion is offered, except to say that a definition that includes agency does not imply the creative process must be skill based.

The last part of Gaut’s analysis focuses on imagination as a part of creativity. This is a way of exploring ideas that isn’t deterministic, and that simply is, or might be for fun, as a cat may imagine a ball of twine to be a mouse, knowing it isn’t. This means imagining that something exists that doesn’t yet exist, and Kant is referenced as describing this as an “aesthetic idea.”

The role of exploratory play is explored, with reference and citation to Peter Carruthers, who indicates that play as a child influences play as an adult. Again, the notion of human-specific creativity is discussed, with Carruthers coming to the conclusion that play-driven creativity is only something that a human can do.

The last part of this section describes passive creativity: that ideas spring suddenly to someone, not through a process but perhaps randomly or through invisible synthesis. Imagination drives purposeful creativity, but does not account for this passive generation of newness. The synthesis is the formation of new connections, either purposefully or serendipitously.

What I learned and what I think

I found the most interesting part of this work to be the ability for some of those cited to make sweeping claims (at least as presented by Gaut), that I can inductively write away as wrong, because I consider myself and my work and my discipline to be creative. For example, I have seen new products or features or capabilities come to life through all of the methods described, and also through none of the methods described, and also through a combination of methods described. The attempt to define only one of these (or only several of these) puts a boundary around something that, perhaps, is boundless. That doesn’t mean it can’t be defined, although perhaps it means it shouldn’t be defined.

I also question and take some issue with the idea that creativity needs to be new. While I understand the root of the word (“to create”) implies that something wasn’t there, and then something is there, the process of creativity as an exploratory one often generates things that are new to me, but are not new to the world. During nearly every workshop I’ve ever run, someone has come up with something that rocked their world and made them feel as if they were creative, but exists in some form or another.

Those ideas can be implemented, and deemed as valuable, and generally accepted as creative by industry, even if they already exist. And in fact most design work is replication and refinement of work that already exists. Art and design are different, but because design isn’t considered in Gaut’s work (only art and science are referenced), that distinction doesn’t come to life.

I also see that this paper summarizes for nearly 90%, and then addition to the larger conversation (the reference on agency.) I don’t know if that’s a normal way to write or if it is a convention in academic writing, but we’ll see.