” fits” harmoniously within the existing Rule-set of the expert’s field. If it does fit, the Vertical thinker usually can correct any mistaken aspects and take the concept far beyond what the Horizontal thinker had even realized to be possible.
It is this cognitive partnership that is driving human progress.
In Part III. we examine evidence that the combination of Horizontal and Vertical thinking is the catalyst of human insight.
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Stuart Berman:
April 27th, 2005 at 11:50 pm
Very nice – keep it coming!
It brings to mind some questions:
Is the term Renaissance Man a good synonym for horizontal thinker? (Visionary seems a bit more broad)
In order to think horizontally must one be relatively free from the strong bonds of ‘group think’? (You seem to risk ruffling the feathers of orthodoxy and losing status within a group.)
How would you rate Velikovsky? (Mark – with your training as a historian this may cause stomach upset – since it seems that the field banished him – but that may also be a hallmark of horizontal thinkers.)
Dan tdaxp:
April 28th, 2005 at 3:10 am
Great articles!
I particularly like the Boyd analogy in the last post. The “horizontal” exchange between thoughts on vertical/horizontal thinking and fourth generation struggles are pretty interesting!
I was reading an article from Dissent that claimed part of the left’s failures in recent years were a lack of “general intellectuals.” I have some thoughts on how v/h thinking, 4GW, and politics work together, but I’d love to hear your thoughts!
Chris Meserole:
April 28th, 2005 at 12:43 pm
I’d buy that, although I’d use the term associative cognition instead of horizontal thinking. What you’re really talking about is a conceptual process which invents new vocabularies (typically linguistic but occasionally numerical, like Einstein) by drawing from older ones. That process is inherently associative insofar as it relates past cognitive forms to a newly created conceptual space.
Admin:
October 4th, 2005 at 2:44 am
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