“Archimedes’ tale can illustrate the very foundations of the creative realm”

Archimedes was the man in classical antiquity. But there is one story we have all heard at least once during our school years. The tale of 'Archimedes and the king's crown'. Or maybe you remember it as 'Archimedes and the bathtub'. Perhaps you just remember the 'Eureka!' part of that story. No matter which part is your favorite, you probably found it a little bit absurd to be true. This piece of writing will indulge Archimedes' tale further and try to prove not only that the story makes total sense, but that it can also illustrate the very foundations of the creative realm.

Archimedes who?

Lets first remind ourselves about what it is that people talk about Archimedes. Word on the street is that he was a big shot scientist back in the days of Ancient Greece. Born in 287 BC he is considered one of the greatest mathematicians of all times, being among the first few to include math into the physical phenomena. His theories and conclusions shaped the way we understand the world around us until this date. But however great he and his ideas were, there is one anecdote that stuck in our history and is still being told at schools around the globe.

Once upon a time …

… there was a king with a pickle to solve. King Hiero had just received a crown he himself had ordered to be made using the purest gold his kingdom could afford. Being as suspicious as a king can be, before donning the crown upon his beautiful royal skull, he asked Archimedes to determine whether some impure kind of metal was mixed into that crown. God forbid there was a single inch of silver in it! But Archimedes couldn't just melt the thing in order to figure out its volume. He had to come up with a more creative approach. Very well.

On that fateful hot summer day in Ancient Greece, Archimedes were preparing his bath while pondering on life's biggest dilemmas. Or maybe not. Maybe he was just thinking about dinner. What really matters is that when he stepped into the bath he noticed that the water level rose. Archimedes "suddenly" understood that the volume of water displaced must be equal to the volume of the part of his body he had submerged. Realizing that he could use the same principle to measure the volume of other irregular objects — such as a golden crown for example — he then starts running around naked screaming "EUREKA! EUREKA!" like any crazy, shameless and smart scientist would do.

Great for Archimedes! He could now go back to King Hiero and vouch for the goldsmith's honest skills, who would keep his head safely above his neck. Why, I guess that was great for the goldsmith too!

Behold the Creative System

“Any novel idea or real innovation aiming to take place in this world needs to be immersed in the Creative System”

Ok,ok. All that is fine. However, people usually get distracted by the naked scientist running around screaming ‘EUREKA!’ and don’t give much attention to what really matters in that story. Lets try to dissect this tale by looking at it through the creative lens. More specifically, lets borrow the Creative System concept from the famous psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi — yes, that guy behind the concept of Flow — to analyze Archimedes achievements.

Mihaly uses empirical evidence collected through years of studies and adds some amazingly well crafted arguments — which you can all read for yourselves in here — to show us that any novel idea or real innovation aiming to take place in this world needs to be immersed in the Creative System, which is configured by three elements: Domain, Field and Person.

• Domain is a group of symbolic rules and procedures inserted in a specific culture. Music is a domain, for example. In music we get all the theory and practice that culminates in a very rich Domain. However, it is important to notice that Domains are in constant evolution. Music itself was once part of a bigger Domain where theater, dance and other art forms were integrated together. In time, new rules and contributions made music evolve into its own Domain.
• The Field is made of individuals who act like the gatekeepers of a Domain. Still in the music analogy, we can say that music critics, teachers and producers are part of the music Field, since they are responsible for curating and selecting what novel ideas and artists should be considered relevant in the music Domain.
• Person is, well, the creative person in the flesh. They are the ones who internalize a certain Domain to create new rules and combinations of rules resulting in new and novel ideas. These novel ideas will then be selected by the Field, added to that Domain and other people will start playing with them to create new rules and ideas. Yes, some Inception stuff right there for you.

Now, lets travel to Ancient Greece right back into Archimedes' tale of discovery. But now, we will use what we have just learned about the Creative System to see if we can dig a little bit further into what really happened inside that bathtub.

Eureka reloaded

First of all, Archimedes would had never figured any of that out if there was no Domain for him to be a smart ass about in the first place. He needed the physics, chemistry and math Domains to be already a thing in order to go there and show off. He depended on the inventions and ideas of previous fellow scientists to be able to learn the old tricks and come up with new ones.

"King Hiero knew exactly who to call when it came to solving his problem."

Second, Archimedes had already built a reputation for himself inside the Field and had the right social network in place so that he could be considered relevant to that Domain. He was not randomly chosen for the task. King Hiero knew exactly who to call when it came to solving his problem. And talking about the problem, Archimedes' 'Eureka!' would had never existed if there wasn't someone asking him the big question. King Hiero is as important as Archimedes in this tale, because he was responsible for cooking the problem and serving it to Archimedes.

Last but not least, remember how Archimedes "suddenly" understood that water volume behavior thing? Remember how I used quotation marks around the word suddenly? That is because he did not suddenly learned physics, math and chemistry all at once by jumping into his bath. Archimedes — the creative Person — devoted years of hard work and studies in order to internalize those Domains before being able to connect the dots and scream 'Eureka!'.

In conclusion

"Creativity is nothing more than a social endeavor."

Every time I am facilitating a workshop or giving a lecture about innovation— the hottest subject of this century, apparently — I start by taking some time to approach the creative elephant in the room. Because of the repressive way our schools and businesses have been historically treating creativity, we grew up to be scared of it. Archimedes' anecdote helps us understand that creativity is nothing more than a social endeavor. Moreover, once we understand the creative system, we learn to take the pressure off the creative person by acknowledging that other players and external forces have an equal — if not higher— part to play when it comes to creativity and innovation.

About the author

Guilherme is a Brazilian designer, currently living in São Paulo, who works as a consultant and freelancer for a variety of projects and clients. Keep track of his latest work at https://guibova.carbonmade.com/.