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Creativity is not a trait that we inherit in our genes or a blessing bestowed by the angels. It's a skill.

Jonah Lehrer

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Jonah Lehrer
Age: 43
Born: 1981
Born: June 25
Author
Journalist
Scientist
LA
California
Blessing
Bestowed
Skills
Inherit
Creativity
Trait
Traits
Genes
Angels
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Angel

More quotes by Jonah Lehrer

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People assume that they perceive reality as it is, that our senses accurately record the outside world. Yet the science suggests that, in important ways, people experience reality not as it is, but as they expect it to be.
Jonah Lehrer
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Creativity is a catchall term for a variety of distinct thought processes.
Jonah Lehrer
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The imagination is unleashed by constraints. You break out of the box by stepping into shackles.
Jonah Lehrer
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Knowledge can be a subtle curse. When we learn about the world, we also learn all the reasons why the world cannot be changed. We get used to our failures and imperfections. We become numb to the possibilities of something new
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The one reality science cannot reduce is the only reality we will ever know.
Jonah Lehrer
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While human nature largely determines how we hear the notes, it is nurture that lets us hear the music.
Jonah Lehrer
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The vocational approach at NOCCA (New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts) helps build grit in students. It teaches them how to be single-minded in pursuit of a goal, to sacrifice for the sake of a passion. The teachers demand hard work from their kids because they know, from personal experience, that creative success requires nothing less.
Jonah Lehrer
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Harlow would later write, If monkeys have taught us anything, it's that you've got to learn how to love before you learn how to live.
Jonah Lehrer
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Just because an idea is true doesn't mean it can be proved. And just because an idea can be proved doesn't mean it's true.
Jonah Lehrer
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If you're trying to be more creative, one of the most important things you can do is increase the volume and diversity of the information to which you are exposed.
Jonah Lehrer
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there simply is no way to describe the past without lying. Our memories are not like fiction. They are fiction.
Jonah Lehrer
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A lie told well is just as good as the truth.
Jonah Lehrer
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In fact, the only way to remain creative over time--to not be undone by our expertise--is to experiment with ignorance, to stare at things we don't fully understand.
Jonah Lehrer
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It is ironic but true: the one reality science cannot reduce is the only reality we will ever know. This is why we need art. By expressing our actual experience, the artist reminds us that our science is incomplete, that no map of matter will ever explain the immateriality of our consciousness.
Jonah Lehrer
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I want to give people theories, I want to expose them to scientific stories that force them to re-evaluate the way they use these three pounds of meat inside their head.
Jonah Lehrer
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The answer will only arrive after we stop looking for it.
Jonah Lehrer
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Like a work of art, we exceed our materials. Science needs art to frame the mystery, but art needs science so that not everything is a mystery. Neither truth alone is our solution, for our reality exists in plural
Jonah Lehrer
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...new ideas are merely several old thoughts that occur at the exact same time.
Jonah Lehrer
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When we venture beyond the edge of our knowledge, all we have is art.
Jonah Lehrer
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It's a hard thing to describe. It's just this sense that you got something to say.
Jonah Lehrer