As If By Design: How Creative Behaviors Really EvolveThe eureka moment is a myth. It is an altogether naïve and fanciful account of human progress. Innovations emerge from a much less mysterious combination of historical, circumstantial, and accidental influences. This book explores the origin and evolution of several important behavioral innovations including the high five, the Heimlich maneuver, the butterfly stroke, the moonwalk, and the Iowa caucus. Such creations' striking suitability to the situation and the moment appear ingeniously designed with foresight. However, more often than not, they actually arise 'as if by design.' Based on investigations into the histories of a wide range of innovations, Edward A. Wasserman reveals the nature of behavioral creativity. What surfaces is a fascinating web of causation involving three main factors: context, consequence, and coincidence. Focusing on the process rather than the product of innovation elevates behavior to the very center of the creative human endeavor. |
Contents
| 3 | |
Previewing the Vignettes | 13 |
Dick Fosburys High Jump Was No Flop | 21 |
Shedding Fresh Light on the History of | 28 |
Jockeying for Position | 39 |
Riding AceyDeucy | 49 |
One Singular Sensation | 55 |
Millions Have Been Saved | 65 |
Advancing Hygiene through Data Visualization | 133 |
Taking Mental Floss to Dental Floss | 152 |
A Very Close Shave | 162 |
ARTS ENTERTAINMENT AND CULTURE | 171 |
Art for Arts Sake? | 173 |
Genius Puppeteer | 192 |
And More Mundane Modes of Moving | 199 |
Play on Words | 212 |
Effective Treatment for Clubfoot Only 2400 Years in the Making | 77 |
The Heimlich Maneuver | 88 |
The Lifesaving Contribution of Stanley Dudrick | 97 |
Whats in a Drug Name? | 106 |
SelfMedication by People and Animals | 112 |
The End of TrialandError Treatment? | 121 |
HYGIENE | 131 |
Cuatro Festivales Españoles | 223 |
Puzzles of the Pathétique | 241 |
The Rise and the Demise of the Iowa Caucus | 259 |
If I Write It They Will Build It | 276 |
Are We Just Making It Up as We Go Along? | 309 |
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acey-deucy actually Adams's Ambam American anesthesia animals Ansel Adams Apgar Score Armbruster artist babies baseball Basil Twist beards behavioral innovation breaststroke Brill bulls Burke butterfly stroke castells celebration clubfoot Colacho creative Dick Fosbury Dodgers Dordt University drug Dudrick especially evolution evolutionary experience festival Field of Dreams film final Florence Nightingale Fosbury Flop Fosbury's Glenn Burke hair Herbert High Five high jump Hospital human towers Ignoramus Iowa Caucus Iowa's jockey Journal Kekulé's Kinsella later Law of Effect learning license plate luthiers Malaprop melody monkey crouch musical National natural selection newborns novel Olympic origin Pamplona Parmly patients personalized medicine photograph play Ponseti puppeteers racing reported Retrieved October 19 riding robot Sanfermines self-medication Semmelweis Shoeless Joe sound-hole story style success swimming Tchaikovsky technique teeth tion Tod Sloan Tomatina trial-and-error University of Iowa vignettes violins Virginia Apgar walking Wasserman Westrope Westrope's word York