The Act of Creation: A Study of the Conscious and Unconscious in Science and Art

I have come back to this book over the decades, and at various points in life have found reasons to admire its insights. What Koestler does so well is to effortlessly bring together so many disciplines - science, anthropology, spirituality, philosophy, history, and art. Koestler does this without ever overreaching or forcing his point. His wide-ranging learning and thought is astounding, and his writing is consistently brilliant.

He wrote this book at a time when it was still possible to refer to Freud objectively, neither dismissively nor uncritically. His essential thesis is that the spark of artistic creation arises in the friction between "previously unconnected frames of reference." It is this "bisociative thinking" which allows us show more to experience reality on several planes at once, providing the essential spark that leads to all things creative, from humor to religious insight. A classic. show less

Il libro non si giova molto del suo titolo (nemmeno nell'originale inglese), che fa pensare a qualcosa di "divino" e svia potenzialmente il lettore dal vero contenuto del testo, cioè la creatività.È lo stesso Koestler a chiarirlo: «L'atto creativo non è un atto di creazione nel senso del Vecchio Testamento. Non crea dal nulla: discopre, seleziona, mescola, combina, sintetizza fatti, idee capacità, tecniche già esistenti. Tanto più le parti sono familiari, tanto più il nuovo tutto sarà sorprendente.» (pp.109-110)Questa è l'idea chiave del libro, esemplificata da uno schema che mette in relazione tre figure apparentemente distanti, il comico, lo scienziato e l'artista, dimostrando che ciò che li unisce è esattamente la show more creatività, intesa come interazione fra matrici di percezione e sistemi di riferimento e ragionamento diversi. Nel caso del comico, vi è una collisione che conduce al riso; nel caso dello scienziato una fusione che porta a una scoperta; nel caso dell'artista un confronto (metaforico) che porta all'opera d'arte. Per il resto, il libro dimostra molta erudizione sui tre fronti, soprattutto quello scientifico (la parte sul "saggio" occupa molto più spazio di quello sul "buffone" e sull'artista). show less

Koestler puts forward his theory of the shared mental processes that take place in the successful artistic, scientific, and comedic mind, which he calls bisociation. He discusses how discovery of a new beauty or truth relies on the appropriate perception of an idea within two or more previously incompatible or distinct frames of reference. There are lots of examples and stories from the history of science and invention, and these are interesting to read in their own right.
Despite the fact that these associations often spring from the subconscious, they only tend to be made by the most intelligent minds – those which possess the capacity to understand ideas and their connections to other ideas, and the relevance of these connections to show more the solution of problems.
The artistic and scientific revolutionary are often viewed in quite different ways, but Koestler makes a case that the nature of their general intelligence has a lot in common, despite them being gifted in different specific areas.
This is a very accessible and readable work, and should be of interest to the general academic, the artist, the psychologist, or the scientist. It isn't deeply technical or precise, so I would not class it as a completely serious work of philosophy, but it excels as an inspiring popular work for the non-specialist reader. show less

Interesting to think about the idea of creativity and humour have connections with bringing together different perspectives. I liked the continuum of human endeavours, showing biology is closer to the humanities.

I read this book when it was first published and it is indeed about the act of creation, about how creative insight occurs when two disparate planes of thought intersect. The example of the Greek physicist Archimedes (c. 287-212 B.C.) is used to illustrate; he had a problem on his mind at the same time he took his bath. The problem was how to calculate the amount of gold in the king's crown without melting it down. The solution occurred to him as he lowered himself into his bath and observed the water level rise as the water was displaced by his body. Suposedly he cried, "Eureka!" at the moment of his discovery, which is why we still describe this sort of discovery as a "eureka moment".

> Arthur Kœstler, Le cri d’Archimède, traduit de l’anglais par G. Fradier, i vol. in-8° raisin, 16 x 24 cm, 456 p., Calmann-Lévy, Paris, 1965. Prix : 27,15 F.
Se reporter au compte rendu de René BOIREL
In: Les Études philosophiques, Nouvelle Série, 21e Année, No. 2, SCIENCE ET POLITIQUE (AVRIL-JUIN 1966), pp. 280-281… ; (en ligne),
URL : https://drive.google.com/file/d/1zt3kNK49Ua4x3NYfWBZ3iggXuwGcLkMe/view?usp=shari...