Thinking books · Creativity · Steven Johnson, 2010

Where Good Ideas Come From — the big ideas

A study of the environments that produce innovation, rather than the people.

Free — no account needed to read

The big ideas

The adjacent possible: at any moment only certain next steps are reachable, which is why the same invention appears in several places at once and why being early is usually being wrong.

Slow hunches — partial ideas held for years — combine with other people’s partial ideas. That argues for writing them down and for talking to people outside your field.

Error and unintended reuse produce more breakthroughs than focused effort does, which makes tolerance for both an environmental design question.

Practise it — no need to have read it

Write down three half-formed ideas you have been carrying. Then find one person outside your field to describe them to.

A hint: The point is the collision, not the polish.

Where it shows up in real life

• Innovation
• Designing how a team works
• Keeping a notebook worth having

Described in our own words with the source named — never quoted, and not a substitute for reading the book.