How to be ingenious

[How to be wise]

I’m very interested in how I can increase my ingenuity for solving problems in science. I found that this was a lot harder than creativity for artistic works. I’ve researched it online, but have found very little advice. Is there anyone who knows of techniques or ways to increase your ingenuity. 

@Leo Gura I’m hoping you might have some tips or information. 

[Ibn Sina]

I am no problem solver in science but I do have great admiration for them and have read about quite a few of them so that I could find out how they did what they did. What made them successful in science. 

The number 1 characteristic that I have found in these 'geniuses', is a ridiculous amount of focus. You look at Newton, Einstein Feynman,  Malphigi,  , Tesla, Edison , Leibniz any great scientist,you find them working on science 24/7. Newton basically worked on science through out his life, from the time he woke up to the time he slept. Einstein thought about gravity , all the time. Same with Feynman. In their biographies you do not find much dispersion of energies, which is the case for most people. People are interested in the news, in video games, movies, so many things at the same time. 

The 2nd character is, they  not only worked on science 24/7, but they were doing it  basically from the time they were 5-6 years. There is no difference  in the work ethic of 6 year old Newton, Feynman, Einstein, then when they were at their 60. Which means a ridiculous amount of commitment, almost a  spiritual God like passion for science. 

The 3rd character is not something that you would like that much, which is that they were genius. Feynman was winning competitions after competitions in physics and maths through out his teenage years. By the time he was 18, he was independently deriving theorems in maths and science which were already discovered by scientists 200 years ago, but he was  doing them independently.  The way we usually solve physics problems is by thinking in equations and doing it  slowly and steadily, Feynman would solve them at a subconscious level. He arrived at physics answers at fraction of a second. He had devoured the entire quantum physics of Dirac by the time he was 18. (John Nash discovered Nash equillibrium at 18).  But he was bad at languages, and so was Einstein. 

Einstein used to fail in his language classes, but there is an anecdote that once he arrived 20 mins late at a physics exam and went out 20 mins early.   He scored highest. He was writing some sophisticated physics paper like - A heuristic approach to solving  x(  forgot the name), while very young like 12, 13. While very young his knowledge of Maxwell's physics was up to date The guy was a genius but he was lucky too.  Maxwell had just died. The ether theory wasn't working. Mathematicians were studying non-euclidean geometry.Planck was chilling around, relativity was in the air and he discovered it while day dreaming in his patent office.

I think I can skip Newton, because all that is necessary to say about him is that he discovered things out of thin air. Descartes did have a bit of influence, but 90% of Newton is - he just sat around, kept a problem before himself, thought about it, solved it. You make him think about falling apples, he comes up with the theory of gravity. You give him a prism, he gives you optics. You make him think about moving objects, he gives you lawsof motion and precise set of equations to predict them. Look at his book Principia mathematica, the dude  could mathematize literally everything you name it. From tap water, rotating buckets of water, lever, pulleys,cannons, etc and he was doing it every single day, Once a friend gave him a hard mathematical problem. After a few days he returned it with the solution. Friend asked "How did you do it?" , Newton replied " I used calculus." Friend " What is calculus? How did you find about calculus?" Newton- "I discovered it". People like newton come only once in a thousand years .

But discoveries aren't necessary always made due to ingenuity,  many discoveries come from simply 'staying around.' Anatomists like Vesalius, Malphigi, Lewenhoek did nothing more than cut and open, or look at the microscope and write. It's just that they were  lucky enough  to have been in that situation. Microscope was recently discovered and only few people had it, hence Malphigi and Lewenhoek made so much discoveries, Malphigi used it to study tissues while Lewenhoek look at microorganisms. Vesalius did nothing more than cut open bodies, draw and write. (Though that is not a simple task, it takes a genius level IQ to do even that). 

And most of discoveries in science is not big bursts of creativity. Science is a knowledge making machine. Every day, pages and pages of scientific facts are added to the annals of science. Many many minute discoveries are going on continuously. Theses are not made by great scientists, but simply scientists working  in their lab. Knowledge is being manufactured like chocolates are manufactured in a factory. That is what has led to our modern age, not big discoveries like Relativity etc, though such discoveries change the entire directionality of science.

So my answer may not tell you 'how to increase ingenuity to solve problems' but still it might give you an understanding of the history of how scientific progresses are made and make you look at your question in a new  light.

Edited June 3, 2018 by Ibn Sina

[How to be wise]

@Ibn Sina But what really mattered about those scientists are the insights that they achieved in science. How do you ‘come up’ with those insights?

[sarapr]

29 minutes ago, How to be wise said:

@Ibn Sina But what really mattered about those scientists are the insights that they achieved in science. How do you ‘come up’ with those insights?

Ingeniousness to that level is just not sth you can have if your not born with it. It's a brain structure that not everyone has.

With these great geniuses what we see repeatedly is that they showed their ingenious from very early age. The only thing you can conclude from that is they were born with it.

If you just want to reach your own highest potential there are ways but it all depends on your potential 

[sarapr]

@Ibn Sina einstien spoke three languages and he learned English at 54 which is hard. I don't understand why they say his language abilities were low.

Maybe he had problems with grammer exams which is totally ridiculous in every language 

[LastThursday]

In my opinion everyone has ingenuity 'built in'. How else do you explain the fact that a baby learns to walk without being told or explicitly shown how to do it? The same with picking up language. It takes ingenuity to cordinate the movements of the rib cage, tongue, larynx, jaw, lips and other facial muscles - all without being told explictly how to do it.

So how do you direct the ingenuity? One way is to have mastery of the field you want to be ingenious in. Not to be too cheesy, you have to learn to walk before you can run a marathon. You have to run many marathons before you can use your ingenuity - maybe you invent a new running style or way of breathing that nobody else thought of before.

Another way is to constantly force yourself to think outside the box. To be a mismatcher - some people are natural at this, others not. But it can be learnt. This allows you to be free to make connections between things that are not normally connected to each other, i.e. ingenuity.

Problem solving of any type is conducive to ingenuity. Build a problem solving habit!

Lastly plain old inspiration. Kekule and his benzene dream, Einsten riding a beam of light, Newton and his apple.  The stuff that plain comes out of nowhere.