<p>Just heard a report that Americans are becoming less and less creative.</p>
<p>So here’s my question. Do you think that you are creative? and if so, why?</p>
<p>No, I believe my left side of my brain does almost all the thinking. Hence my major in mathematics and physics. </p>
<p>I also think Americans are less creative due to the fact that they do less creative thinking in general such as the transition from books to television/movies.</p>
<p>^Creativity is actually pretty essential in math and science. When you come across a problem that you don’t know how to solve, you must be creative to solve it. Math geniuses are really all creative geniuses. </p>
<p>I think a good part of college is learning how to produce instead of simply consuming. We consume information all the time, but we must be creative and find ways to produce something out of that information. So aren’t we all creative?</p>
<p>^ I agree with you, but of course some people are simply more creative than others, regardless of whether we’re “all creative” or not. And creatively is expressed differently in all fields - in the arts its about unique ideas and how you can manipulate a medium, in science/engineering creativity is needed to develop new tools, come up with new ideas/experiments or solve problems, in humanities it can be writing something very stimulating or in an individualistic way, etc…</p>
<p>I think I used to be fairly creative. When I attended architecture school, my professors would often say I was innovative in problem-solving and design in my evaluations. But I think I’m less creative now. Sometimes my science profs say I take an unusual or creative approach to experimental design or problem-solving too, but I don’t hear this that often.</p>
<p>Yeah, I am–being competitive helps, too. For example, we had to write a 10-page paper on symbolism in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest in AP Lit. When we were picking symbol themes, everyone was like sexuality! Drugs! Machinery! Christianity! Birds! All clearly have many examples about which much can be written, but that’s the thing–they’re clear and obvious. I was like screwwww thattttt I am doing A NEW SYMBOLISM THEME! I had sort of noticed the prevalence of the color white before, but then I was like “O Wait I have an idea!” It took me a bit of muddling about, but then I managed to sort of cohere “whiteness” and “cold imagery” together into one theme of symbolism (austerity, perhaps?) Poof! Creative paper, because nobody else noticed the whiteness and cold enough to write about it.</p>
<p>And durnit, I am still proud of that paper. It’s one of the two assignments I think may actually be useful during college. (The other being a self-made guide to the philosophers of the Enlightenment.)</p>
<p>I’m not creative in the least. But I’m a good artist…of sorts. I can replicate precisely and I know how to work with colors and shadow.</p>
<p>I’m defined to be creative by the gifted & talented track I was on in K-12; I think I still retain a lot of the reason that I got in in the first place, but I have less places to showcase it as an engineering major than I did in high school and earlier.</p>
<p>I can’t draw pictures to save my life straight from my brain. I’m good at replication like Pandora said, though.</p>
<p>I was tested twice when I was a little kid to be placed in our school districts creative program. I think it was called Quest. Wasn’t approved either time.</p>
<p>Overall, I wouldn’t consider myself to be particularly creative. I have my occasional MacGuyver moments here and there, but for the most part, I stick to the conservative, tried and true path.</p>
<p>Yes. I’m a potter and sculptor, so I’d say I’m pretty creative.</p>