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How many Creatives here know of De Bono - lateral thinking? PO?

ZeroZero

Senior Member
I feel among creatives here. They can handle my creative Patwa.

For the unintiated. De Bono was a sixties figure in what camp might be gathered under a phrase "Creative Educationalists". I think of him in the same buttercup fields as the great experiential thinker Carl Rogers. De Bono always wore suits in my dreams, whereas Rogers was a hippy.

WIKI : The originator of the term 'Lateral Thinking', de Bono wrote 85 books with translations into 46 languages.

De Bono nailed how to control absurdity and how to, use it as a creative tool to discover new angles of thought, then return to rationality with different frames of reference. He taught specific techniques to train creative thought - where required. Sometimes there are advantages, some are strong.



When De Bono had a minute he wrote another book, they are all slants on the same doctrine of lateral thinking. I think his "Magnam Opus" is Beyond Yes and No. This gave him a good income but it has muddied his legacy.

Does anyone know this man's work today?

Here's my point. Although the term "lateral thinking" entered the universal dialogue, I dont think the word "Po" did. That's very tragic for common creativity. Lateral thinking has come to loosely mean any sideline avenue but true De Bono lateral thinking is a set of specific intellectual techniques. They are intended to break logic, go fishing, then restore logic.

Can anyone here PO? PO!
 
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I can't remember PO, but I recall to have used De Bono's six "thinking hats" in a workshop with my students at uni some years ago. They responded pretty good to it, and came up with some ideas (I used it to make them come up with ideas for scientific dissemination in their fields).

His thinking hats is basically a simple categorization system, where you color code some roles, and attribute a concept to each of them, and facilitate people to think within those frames one at the time, to systemize their creative work.

I found it useful for workshops, especially with newer students who were struggling to think for themselves who needed a little methodological support to break out of their culturally programmed habits.

It can help to stimulate creativity in the wider sense, that the system helps to produce ideas you otherwise wouldn't. You can put the theory to a number of good uses. Today there are a number of those types of methods, but Bono was definitely a pioneer in that line of work back in the day.
 
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It’s in between creative and logical thought that’s the point. Yes there were thinking hats and it seems to me you well understood the concept. To Po is to go beyond yes and no, true and false. Initiates can have Po discussions and will consider the whole of music as a Po arena
Can we use Po musically? I think we can
 
Yeah, sounds like PO is about avoiding dichotomies, exceed black and white thinking. Not either-or, but both-and.

That helps to expand your vocabulary and break out of the box.

Like trying to use a minor harmony in a happy function, minor can be both- sad -and happy. Happy-sad.

Or not either classical or modern, but classical and modern = Neo-classical.

Very typical De Bono methodology. Works well. We already do that a lot in contemporary works, and culture.. well, except for places like YouTube and social media LOL
 
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It is interesting that this is actually to some extent related to my research topic (I work on team process). De Bono is famous in this field. I've also read his book "six thinking hats", while there are many instances and interpretations he made which take a lot of space in the book, the fundamental idea is great, just as explained by @ GtrString. Although when I read the book I tended to focus more on the group work process (e.g., it is a good way to avoid endless negative confronts and facilitate/improve the group discussion from different perspectives), it seems also good for individual thinking.
 
@qawv agree, the method works very well to facilitate groups to be more efficient with their purpose.

I'd imagine De Bono's method could work well for like a band doctor, to support bands to listen more to each other and develop their parts further

Or in studio workshops for producers as well

Many uses for it, and it's pretty easy to read up and design sessions with
 
Yeah, sounds like it is about avoiding dichotomies, exceed black and white thinking. Not either-or, but both-and.

That helps to expand your vocabulary and break out of the box.

Like trying to use a minor harmony in a happy function, minor can be both- sad -and happy. Happy-sad.

Or not either classical or modern, but classical and modern = Neo-classical.

Very typical De Bono methodology. Works well. We already do that a lot in contemporary works, and culture.. well, except for places like YouTube and social media LOL
Thumbs up. I think music has a very similar function to De Bono thought. It is essentially managed chaos. We go from order to disorder and return. In a controlled way.
I recently came across a piece by Philip Glass. This piece is a performance which takes over 600 years to perform. Recently it had a chord change, the next is in two years. This is an example of Po Music.
 
Thumbs up. I think music has a very similar function to De Bono thought. It is essentially managed chaos. We go from order to disorder and return. In a controlled way.
I recently came across a piece by Philip Glass. This piece is a performance which takes over 600 years to perform. Recently it had a chord change, the next is in two years. This is an example of Po Music.
Holy moly !

What is the this Philip Glass piece called ?
 
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