Those Eureka Moments

Phoe6 writes "If you're one of those insufferable people who can finish the Saturday New York Times crossword puzzle, you probably have a gift for insight. The puzzles always have an underlying hint to solving them, but on Saturdays that clue is insanely obtuse. If you had all day, you could try a zillion different combinations and eventually figure it out. But with insight, you'd experience the usual clueless confusion, until--voilà--the fog clears and you get the clue, which suddenly seems obvious. The sudden flash of insight that precedes such "Aha!" moments is characteristic of many types of cognitive processes besides problem-solving, including memory retrieval, language comprehension, and various forms of creativity. Although different problem-solving strategies share many common attributes, insight-derived solutions appear to be unique in several ways. PLoS Biology explains the Neural Basis of Solving Problems with Insight. The Complete Research Article is here."

Comments

For nerds, this is not news.

[Anonymous Coward]

When coding and gaming frenzy kicks in, we all know that personal hygeine suffers. The "You Reek!" moments happen at times like these.

Re:Taking a break

[Anonymous Coward]

I find the best thing to do is spend a few minutes on Slashdot whenever I'm stuck with something. It reminds me that there are people out there even stupider than myself, and that gives me hope to press on.

Re:Eureka is overrated

[indigeek]

But would you run naked around the town shouting "Thats funny" ?