It's been months now since I wrote my last post and I admit to feeling less squirrely and more pensive—more like the educational neuropsychologist that I am. Technically, my PhD (obtained in 2007 at age 61) is in "Special Studies in Education" but that says little other than that it was granted from the School of Education (of Capella University, a fully accredited online school). This major was intended for those of us who wanted to take our non-required courses outside of the School of Education. I took all of mine from the School of Psychology.
Since a PhD is a research degree leading to the dissertation—the student's first "real" research study—its topic becomes one's academic pursuit. Mine was about film, specifically commercial, fictional cinematic stories and how they could (and should) be used for educational (rather than entertainment) purposes. It's interesting how I chose this topic but I'll leave that story for another time.
My "soup" for today is made from a left brain, academic recipe that evolved from thinking about thinking—specifically two different styles that I've dubbed "stovepipe thinking" and "lateral thinking." So, why should you care one fig about such a thing? Because both styles relate to the polarized political landscape we find ourselves in. Don't you wonder why the left-leaning and right-leaning voters think and behave as they do? If so, then dear friend, read on!
Think of two pipes. One is vertical and goes up and down. The other is horizontal and runs "along the ground." Now think about these pipes containing "plugs" of different stuff, up and down, or along the ground, depending on their orientation. Now, consider these plugs to consist of bits of information—facts, opinions, or even feelings. Now assume that it takes more energy to move from one piece of information in the vertical pipe than it does between the different plugs in the horizontal pipe, because of gravity. Although it is easier to go down in the vertical pipe, it takes more energy to move back up. Still with me? Good! Also, assume that distance doesn't eat up energy when moving along the horizontal pipe. Not being a "hard" scientist, I don't know whether it does or not, so let's just assume that it doesn't, for the sake of argument.
For the "stovepipe" thinker, it is easy to stuff new bits of information (or plugs) on the top of what's there, but when it comes to linking bits already in the pipe to the new information, it takes a lot of energy to move from the relevant older information to the new information just added. Often, this thinker doesn't bother to expend this energy. However, for the "lateral" thinker, whose information pipe is horizontal, it's comparatively easy to zip from one bit of information in the pipe to another, located elsewhere. Do you begin to see where I'm going with this analogy? Great!
As a lateral thinker of the liberal persuasion, I'm often—as you, too, may be—amazed at the frequency of hypocrisy I find amongst the conservative right wing. "How could he/she say "x" when only a year ago he/she said "y?" What a hypocrite! But as a stovepipe thinker, this conservative person simply is not used to relating their various information bits to each other because of energy requirements and their desire to "conserve." Therefore, relevant bits remain intrinsically separated in the pipe—at least until a strong enough motivation comes along to invest the energy necessary to look for a link. But when this happens, often this conservative feels so embarrassed that they didn't bother to search their pipe to find out, that they make up (often silly) excuses for the discordance, even denying there is one at all. And that makes lateral thinkers absolutely nuts!
The next question is what makes someone into either a stovepipe or a lateral thinker. But since this post is getting awfully long, I'll leave that answer for another "academic soup" day!
