Image: David Palumbo
In Brief
- Scientists long thought that early humans were stuck in a creative rut until some 40,000 years ago, when their powers of innovation seemed to explode.
- But archaeological discoveries made in recent years have shown that our ancestors had flashes of brilliance far earlier than that.
- These findings indicate that the human capacity for innovation emerged over hundreds of thousands of years, driven by both biological and social factors.
More In This Article
Unsigned and undated, inventory number 779 hangs behind thick glass in the Louvre's brilliantly lit Salle des États. A few minutes after the stroke of nine each morning, except for Tuesdays when the museum remains closed, Parisians and tourists, art lovers and curiosity seekers begin flooding into the room. As their hushed voices blend into a steady hivelike hum, some crane for the best view; others stretch their arms urgently upward, clicking cell-phone cameras. Most, however, tilt forward, a look of rapt wonder on their faces, as they study one of humanity's most celebrated creations: the Mona Lisa, by Leonardo da Vinci.
Completed in the early 16th century, the Mona Lisa possesses a mysterious, otherworldly beauty quite unlike any portrait that came before it. To produce such a painting, Leonardo, who once famously wrote that he wished “to work miracles,” developed a new artistic technique he called sfumato, or “smoke.” Over a period of several years he applied translucent glazes in delicate films—some no more than the thickness of a red blood cell—to the painting, most likely with the sensitive tip of his finger. Gradually stacking as many as 30 of these films one on top of another, Leonardo subtly softened lines and color gradations until it seemed as if the entire composition lay behind a veil of smoke.
This article was originally published with the title The Origins of Creativity.
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9 Comments
Add CommentWe assume man invented the wheel and it has been said that nature does not produce a wheel.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf it were not for natures wheel we and every thing we know would not exist!
Wouldn't it be Aw some to change the world for the better with just two sheets of rolled up paper!
LETS DO IT! -- Take one sheet and role it up making a tube (just tiny pieces of tape to hold). At the center of the tube start marking small arrows away from you at an angle spiraling to the end (mark that end south. Go back to center and in the same direction start marking arrows to the other end (mark that end north.
Do the same with the other sheet but make it a bit bigger so one will fit inside the other. You have just made two pretend bar magnets!
Taking the two magnets insert the north pole into the other north pole. Note the arrows are clashing (repelling). Now insert the north pole into the south pole and the arrows are melding (attracting). This is where it gets real interesting! Looking at the north pole end, the arrows show the direction of magnetic force to be counter clock wise. Turning it around the south pole shows the arrows or force to be clock wise. Now "what is this" one direction has turned into two directions at the same time! yes but, yes but you say Its just how you look at it Two directions at the same time indeed.
OK lets bend one around (horse shoe) and look at both ends at the same time.
Don't miss any thing here because this is how the world works. Note that the forces meld into a figure eight and that is how every thing in this world is held together.
There are known-knowns, known-unknowns, and unknown-unknowns. Humans have barely scratched the surface of all that exists and is completely unknown...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisToday over 100 billion gallons a year of fresh water is turned into toxic fracking fluid. The technology to transform it back to drinkable water does not exist. And, even if it did, where will we put all the radioactive substances we capture from it? This figure will double in the next five years if this crazy policy continues
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWe need a united nations ban on turning fresh water into fracking fluid now.
The gas millionaires will have nothing to spend their money on because they are drowning our green earth with fracking fluid.
Jesus turned the water into wine but Satan turns it into fracking fluid.
If you can help to get this message out please do.
How long will it take to turn all the fresh water on Planet Earth into Toxic Fracking fluid, its just a matter of time.
Crazy or what?
The united nations have made a resolution that everyone is entitled to fresh drinking water and sanitation Fracking contradicts this resolution and must be stopped now before its too late.
All information confirmed by a prize wining ecologist.
Mankind is the most stupid person on the planet nobody else would screw up this planet
The above comments will reach young people in pursuit of an education.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEducation taught is what will be needed to advance or secure a comfortable financial future.
The internet is what was needed and the likes of the above comments are not to disrupt an education but meant to prod people into the capability of changing things of our world for the better.
Knowing the truth of what is taught through Education and Science will allow this.
Comments 1, 6, 9, 17, 19, 22, 28, 30, 33, 34, 38
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=living-in-a-quantum-world
It so much easier to use something that has already been invented than it is to create something new and useful.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisCreating something entails conceptualizing, fabricating, trial and error, change and validation of usefulness.
It is also easier to modify an existing innovation than it is to create something new.
Also accidental designs might occur without conceptualizing. Throwing rocks by a hominid might lead the hominid to identify the best type of rock to throw and then lead him to fabricate best rocks. Through trial and error over a long time this might lead to an evolution of projectiles.
Using weapons and tools is evidence of learning which most animals don't do. I can think of hominids as intelligent animals but they weren't expert designers.
It would be interesting to study the lack of creativity in some modern people and determine why they only have basic tools and weapons. In spite of their apparent mental capacity they have not been on a course of innovation. Is this a lack of ability or a lack of motivation?
How does knowing the truth through science and education allow you to call something better or worse? Why do you try to impose your imagined morals on other people? (I'm asking this because you said that we should prod people into changing things in our world for the better) Better for whom? Better for you?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDiscovering that a patent sets piracy in motion. I suggest (if your not wealthy) spending approximately one hundred and fifty dollars to initiate a patent. Once you receive your file # abandon the patent thus saving lots of money that you didn't have anyway. This will protect you of Law suits from the pirates.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSit back and wait. If your invention is brilliant it won't be long before a pirate (that has lots of money) improves or changes your idea and files his own patent.
Millions have now been spent bringing your invention to fruition and you can easily (with all that free advertising) go out and sell your improved prototypes.
As an example
SKATE WALKERS --- Canada patent file #2,116,091
To raise money I contacted a large sport firm to sell them this patent. I was ignored and a year later came across my invention all improved in nice packaging with patent pending retailing for fifteen dollars.
Well my heart sank and I really needed a cup of coffee.
I rationalized it this way. They have spent mega bucks on dies, production, packaging etc. I will sit back and wait till these become popular then re approach these people to buy my patent advising them that I could produce my prototype like pop corn and put them in 7 ELEVEN retailing at $3.75 a pr.
It seems to me that most inventions are created by individual people or teams of people, but the inventions are controlled (owned) by corporations. Inventors not only need to design and fabricate their invention but they also need to know how to work through the legal issues of innovation.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis is almost certainly by congressional design.
Hi Heather.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI have only just read your article. I was wondering if you have ever read any books by the science writer John McCrone. He wrote " The ape that spoke" and "the myth of irrationality". Implicit in you article is the conclusion many scientist and philosophers have come to, many, including Charles Darwin.
" Language is the catalyst that has propelled and accelerated human evolutiom.
Could it be that with the forming of larger groups the requirement for a more complex communication between the members (names etc), propelled language, which in turn propelled more abstract thinking, which propelled more inventiveness, that propelled the success of the group.
Brain size is not ad important as the development of complex social structures and language. After all, from the fossil records, Neanderthal with a bigger brain and more robust physique, than us weakling. Small brained homo-sapiens, should have been the more successful of the two species. But they lived in small groups and did not need complex language that go with larger social structures.
Sincerely
Terrence Austin