Random Concepts and Ideas

Melding of ideas that seem to be incompatable can open a world of possibilities. Original ideas happen when you create new sets of patterns in your mind.

You will ideas where none existed before when you force yourself to see relationships between dissimilar things.

From a combination of objects, can emerge new properties(new qualities or trait) that were not evident in the individual stand alone objects. Concepts and ideas work in the same way. A study was done by Gregory Murphy of the University of Illinois, where people had to rate how true certain properties (qualities/traits) were of individual concepts and their combinations. One set of concepts consisted of the words store and empty and the combination of the words to create "empty store". The study showed that individuals recognized that "empty store" related to "losing money", where as, "store" in general did not. The meaning of words changes when we combine concepts, and the more novel the combination, the more novel the meaning. Creative individuals often combine unrelated objects, goods, ideas and services to create something unique.

Uncommon combinations: the melding of two or more unlikely products/objects together have created:
- Swiss Army knife...knife, scissors, screw driver etc.
- Peanut butter cup...chocolate and peanut butter
- Wine Coolers...wine and soda
- chips coated with sour cream and onion flavored dip
- peanut butter and jelly - swirled together in same jar

In the world of art and invention, it is common to put objects together which have no obvious connection. New ideas and thoughts can be provoked by this unfamiliar pairing of dissimilar objects or ideas. Forcing these dissimilar connections will open your mind to ideas you probably never could have imagined otherwise. The human brain will eventually make a connection between two separate objects or ideas and the two objects or ideas will eventually wind around each other and become connected even though they are not related at all. The trick is to look for the connection or relationship between the two unrelated objects or ideas. Once you become aware of the many creative options that will arise from using this technique, you will begin to routinely see connections between dissimilar things.