Robot squirrels with chainsaws for hands: rediscovering creativity in engineering design
It was ten o’clock on a Tuesday morning and we had just finished sitting through an hour of AC circuits. Amidst the rows of fold-down seats, several students were gathering their things and preparing to leave. They didn’t belong to any privileged group that had earned a break from the dark, humid confines of the lecture hall. They were just hightailing it off-site before the start of the dreaded weekly product design lecture.
I was surprised that more people hadn’t left. The product design course was surely useless. It didn’t cover any material that could appear on an exam, and stole precious time that could have been used for releasing some steam from the pressure cooker that is any undergraduate engineering course (or for football). It was a shame that some of the brightest minds in the world were burdened with the task of explaining the intricacies of product design, a topic that was obviously more trivial and less stimulating than fluid mechanics or semiconductors.
The main focus of the day was fixation, the idea that creativity could be hindered by dismissing alternative problems, solutions, or processes. The lecturer proposed that fixation can happen because people tend to defend their own ideas instead of coming up with new ones. He then engaged us in a brainstorming challenge - shout out your ideas for cracking walnut shells without damaging the nut inside.
Thoughts about air pressure popped up, and eventually developed into a vacuum chamber fit for an industrial-scale operation of brutalizing walnut shells. Not too surprising, considering the engineering inclinations of the group. But stunningly, our process consisted of the exact same steps as the lecturer’s own example, revealed after the fact. He had proven his point about the power of unfettered thinking.
But alongside the elegant and practical solution of our collective consciousness, another thread of thought had emerged. What if we used the natural talents of squirrels? How about robot squirrels for better scalability and control? Even better, robot squirrels with chainsaws for hands. Unlike the others, each one of these ideas was greeted with modest laughter (okay, the last one sounds a lot like a certain meme). The end result was something out of a childhood fantasy. But aside from the other, objectively better solution that was present, what was intrinsically wrong with mechanized blade-wielding rodents as a way to get the job done?
Maybe this is the exact reason that we need courses teaching design. It’s not just a stubbornness about being right that inhibits creativity. It’s also the fear of having a bad idea associated with your name - it is the fear of being made a fool of. We become drawn to think with the crowd to stop ourselves from getting hurt. Although it is to our detriment, this fear of ridicule becomes ingrained for many of us. Unfortunately, I’ve come to the realization that, after years of being told what to do and how to do it, the robot squirrel with chainsaws for hands that once lived inside my imagination has been beaten, murdered, and disassembled for parts.
The silver lining to this tragedy might be the dawning realization that it exists. In order to solve the problems facing the world and to change it for the better, we can’t afford to think like it. To all of you who still have robot squirrels with chainsaws for hands or other equally majestic beings in your care - please nurture them. I, for one, am going to set out to find a new one that can call my mind home.
