Chaos Project

General => Chat => Intelligent Debate => Topic started by: Blizzard on August 01, 2012, 07:12:18 am

Title: Thinking outside the box or not
Post by: Blizzard on August 01, 2012, 07:12:18 am
Inspired by this comic (http://somethingofthatilk.com/comics/357.jpg), a colleague at work asked an interesting question: What would be the difference between thinking "outside the box" and thinking "without the box".
Title: Re: Thinking outside the box or not
Post by: Vell on August 01, 2012, 12:31:45 pm
Thinking without the box is akin to having never experienced the box at all. In my opinion, since I am not a licensed professional in anything nor am I referring to any professional's work, it would be similar to a situation where you went into the past and took someone from then into the present. Assuming "the past" is sufficiently long ago that society has changed to a point where that person's "box" (or rather, social expectations and predictions) is no longer relevant then you would have a person who was unaffected by society's current "box."

It may also include the concept of eliminating all expectation and bias about the world from yourself and seeing things as they are without the influence of society's subtle conditioning. If you take this as the interpretation, it would probably explain the character's expression of wonder as he says "whoa"
Title: Re: Thinking outside the box or not
Post by: Blizzard on August 01, 2012, 01:58:20 pm
Interesting. I have a simpler view. The box represents the situation you are currently in. In order to improve the situation you can try to do something. Now if you think inside the box, you are obviously trying to improve it only using the limited circumstances given by the situation itself. If you are thinking outside the box, you don't allow the actual situation to limit your possibilities and hence you can do something by using external resources (which may include thought processes completely out of context).

Now, if we change the perspective on this and see the situation itself as the problem, then removing the problem would be the simple solution, hence thinking without a box (which is the situation/problem) would be a completely different approach. Instead of trying to improve the situation, we realize that the situation itself is actually the problem and we solve it by removing it entirely.

Example: Person A has a romantic relationship with Person B. B cheats on A and A finds out soon enough. After a fight, A and B make up and B forgives A. Now suddenly the relationship starts deteriorating. Even though B has forgiven A because B loves A a lot, B doesn't realize that A is bad for him/her and B still wants to save the relationship. If we apply the concepts of the box, the three scenarios here would be:

Inside the box - B tries things to ignite the passion again and tries to save the relationship by basically pushing more relationship stuff into it.

Outside the box - B tries alternative solutions thinking that the relationship can be saved only if some underlying problems are being solved which the actual cause of the problems in the relationship. He/she can basically look at the whole situation objectively and understand that pushing harder for the relationship directly may be counterproductive so he/she's trying to find a solution that has nothing to do with the actual relationship.

Without the box - B realizes that the relationship itself is the problem and breaks up. If he/she isn't respected and the relationship only creates more bad emotions and drama, the relationship itself becomes the problem. Funny enough the solution becomes incredibly simple at this point (just stop it, cut it off, break up), yet people mostly refuse to accept this kind of solution or remain willingly ignorant of it.

So there is a similar element of revelation like you described. In this I concur with you, thinking without the box kind of allows you to view things as they truly are and hence you can apply an unbiased point of reference to everything. Of course this opens up the question whether objective reality truly exists, but let's leave that for another discussion.
Title: Re: Thinking outside the box or not
Post by: winkio on August 01, 2012, 04:04:53 pm
I don't know if I'm just making this up, but I always thought the 'box' was a toolbox, where the tools in the box were metaphors for the ideas you usually use to solve problems.  So thinking 'outside the box' was trying an idea that you don't normally use.  While I dislike the meaningless bastardization of the phrase, I see thinking without a box as starting from scratch, disregarding all the old tools/ideas and building from the ground up.
Title: Re: Thinking outside the box or not
Post by: Blizzard on August 01, 2012, 04:43:06 pm
IDK, I always thought of the box as the environment and context around you. So the box would be the context of the problem or situation and if you try to solve it conventionally, you'd be thinking within the boundaries of the box, whereas trying to solve it unconventionally and using something out of context, you'd be thinking outside the box.
Title: Re: Thinking outside the box or not
Post by: ForeverZer0 on August 01, 2012, 05:32:00 pm
Quote from: Blizzard on August 01, 2012, 04:43:06 pm
IDK, I always thought of the box as the environment and context around you. So the box would be the context of the problem or situation and if you try to solve it conventionally, you'd be thinking within the boundaries of the box, whereas trying to solve it unconventionally and using something out of context, you'd be thinking outside the box.


My idea of it is similar to this. I perceive "thinking outside the box" as looking at something uniquely, and not using the "normal" and conventional thoughts/ideas that one would expect.

ex. Problem: Microwave cooks things too slow.
     Inside Box: Increase wattage.
     Outside Box: Reshape the emitter and inner shell to disperse waves in patterns that maximize efficiency.

I know, stupid example, but something along those lines is my perception of it.
Title: Re: Thinking outside the box or not
Post by: Vell on August 02, 2012, 01:08:41 am
And yet the basic ideas behind both ideas here mean such similar things that they're not really separate things at all.

In regards to context vs tools
Title: Re: Thinking outside the box or not
Post by: Ryex on August 02, 2012, 09:18:41 pm
Heh,  funny thing. I'm always told I think out side the box. to which my favorite response (since I made it the first time I heard the phrase) was "What box?"

as my life as gone on I have realized that I do think with out the box but in the since I still think with a box, it's just not everyone else's box it bigger, more complex in some ways, and does a lot of reshaping.

if I had to rewrite the phrase to what I think people should do it would be "thinking with a indefinite box"
Title: Re: Thinking outside the box or not
Post by: EntropyUSB on October 18, 2013, 07:27:49 pm
Quote from: Blizzard on August 01, 2012, 07:12:18 am
Inspired by this comic (http://somethingofthatilk.com/comics/357.jpg), a colleague at work asked an interesting question: What would be the difference between thinking "outside the box" and thinking "without the box".


Let's narrow this down in another view...

Without the box would be being a virgin
Outside the box would be being a re-virgin

For example, to think outside the box would be to question if you really lost your virginity and if you can "start fresh" all over again. To think without the box at all would be to have never had sex, but constantly have it on your mind.

Or something like that... maybe I'm just full of shit and I haven't a clue what I'm saying; that sounds like the best answer thus far.