possibly noteworthy wrote:
Allison Arieff:

This is a relentless age we’re living in, a time when innovative solutions — or any solutions, for that matter — to our seemingly infinite problems seem in short supply.

So how do we come up with new ideas? How do we learn to think outside of normal parameters? Are the processes in place for doing so flawed? Do we rely too much on computer models? On consultants? On big-idea gurus lauding the merits of tribes and crowds or of starfish and spiders? On Twitter?

At the risk of sounding like a big-idea guru myself, I can’t help thinking that we’re all so mired in it that we’ve forgotten how to get out of it — how to daydream, invent, engage with the absurd.

The problem that people seem unwilling to face is that there may simply not be a solution. Period. If you look through history, you don't see anything having systemically changed about humanity. Sure, our society has changed. Our technology has improved. But we are still creatures that react on fear and selfishness. I don't see anything on the horizon or in any thought experiment that changes that. So how you approach "innovation", what methodology you use to incite it, is irrelevant unless you are attacking that problem in and of itself.