We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
To save content items to your account,
please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies.
If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account.
Find out more about saving content to .
To save content items to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected]
is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings
on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part
of your Kindle email address below.
Find out more about saving to your Kindle.
Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations.
‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi.
‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.
This interdisciplinary work offers a comprehensive analysis of paradoxes and paradoxical thinking, exploring their manifestations in philosophy, societal dynamics, personality, and neuroscience. Demonstrating various methods for the augmentation of creativity and improved performance, this book uniquely integrates theoretical perspective with case studies and practical applications. As such it elucidates the theory and mechanisms of transforming the apparently impossible into the possible, illustrated by cases of social innovators successfully addressing insurmountable challenges. Aimed at graduate and postgraduate social science students and scholars, with over 500 bibliographical references, the text remains accessible to a broader audience due to its engaging language. Emphasizing the significance of paradoxes and paradoxical thinking in both professional and everyday contexts, it provides a nuanced exploration of paradoxical phenomena, making it a valuable resource for academic and general readers alike.
Our minds, when confronted with paradoxes, react differently. In some cases, they benefit from paradoxes. Being open to paradoxes is a trait called paradoxicality. Embracing contradictions is one of the paths for paradoxicality, especially that embracing contradictions can enhance the creativity of individuals and teams. Similarly, conceptual blending is a method of generating new ideas by combining two concepts. It involves cognitive processes that combine words, images, and ideas within a mental network to create meaning. Contemporary perspectives indicate that the tensions between opposing ideas can be constructive (differing from the Festinger’s belief that the tension between contradictions is unpleasant and the mind tends to reduce it). An example is Janusian thinking, drawing inspiration from Janus, an ancient Roman god with two faces looking in opposite directions. Niels Bohr, for example, believed that by holding opposites together, the mind can reach a new level where traditional convergent thinking is suspended. Paradoxical thinking refers to an individual’s internal contradictions and posits that limitations arise from an individual’s limited frame of reference, particularly when avoiding internal paradoxes. Paradoxical thinking is understood here as a cognitive process marked by contradictions.
Recommend this
Email your librarian or administrator to recommend adding this to your organisation's collection.