There is growing recognition of the vital importance of technology to our future. We constantly search for the innovative application of automation. There is wide dispute about how we can find the next great invention.
We've had several posts discussing the need to understand coding. Computer coding teaches many important logical principles. But creativity and innovation come from many different sources.
This article in Forbes gives another point of view. "To Foster Your Creativity, Don't Learn to Code; Learn to Paint" by Alex Knapp stresses the importance of the arts to original ideas. He builds on the ideas of Samuel Arbesman in Wired.
My own view is somewhere in between. I think it is important to learn to code in order to help you understand how a computer thinks. I also think that the author is right about the need to learn about new ideas constantly and consistently in order to find unexpected areas of intersection. This excerpt is quite incisive:
The key to being creative, in any field, be it scientific, technical, or business, in the 21st century requires a certain comfort level in technology. But the best way to harness the power of computers doesn't reside in coding--it resides in letting computers do the grunt computational work that humans are bad at, so that humans can focus on the creative, problem solving work that computers are bad at.
He further argues that while the link between arts and creativity is not well understood, it could be because of similarities between artists and scientists:
An artist might sketch and tweak before finalizing the drawing that will become the basis of a painting. A novelist produces a number of rough drafts before finding the one that works. Similarly, the essence of the scientific method is hypothesizing, testing, tweaking the hypothesis, forming new hypotheses, testing again, etc. Engineers design, test, toss out drafts, test, toss out more drafts, etc. So even in the practice of one’s chosen art, a scientist or engineer is still practicing the essential skills she needs to be successful in her primary profession.
When was the last time you sketched something out? Maybe it's time to work on it....
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