Towards a science of ideas: An inquiry into the emergence, evolution and expansion of ideas and their translation into action

Guido Enthoven · Seweryn Rudnicki · Rico Sneller

ago 2022 · Vernon Press

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Ideas are the basic building blocks that construct the world we live in. Yet despite the abundance of literature on creativity and innovation, there has been little reflection on ideas as such, their nature and their working mechanisms. This book provides foundations for a reflection focused specifically on ideas - what they are, how they emerge, develop, interact, gain acceptance and become translated into actions. In doing so the book moves beyond the mainstream approaches, offering new, promising theoretical angles, presenting original findings and initiating a research agenda for a science of ideas. This book provides a fresh perspective on how to conceptualize and study ideas and their working mechanisms by treating ideas as the main object of the study and by bringing together a group of original thinkers, scholars, and philosophers to move beyond the mainstream academic discourse on creativity and innovation.

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Guido Enthoven graduated in Law at the University of Leiden. His PhD was an investigation on information between government and parliament (University of Tilburg, 2011). He is the author of around 100 articles about interaction, innovation, democracy and information published in journals, magazines and newspapers. Guido Enthoven co-founded the National Ideas Line in 1991 and shortly thereafter founded the Institute for Social Innovation (IMI). As the director of IMI, he advises dozens of ministries and municipalities on dialogues, participation and innovation. At IFKAD 2018, he held a keynote ‘Towards a Science of Ideas’ and he wrote a Dutch historical novel on the topic.

Seweryn Rudnicki (AGH University of Science and Technology) is an assistant professor in sociology and a co-founder and partner at Hearts & Heads, a creativity and innovation consultancy. His main academic interests are related to the use of social scientific knowledge in different areas of practice, design and creativity studies.

Rico Sneller is a lecturer of philosophy at the Mandeville Academy and the Jungian Institute. Previously, he taught continental philosophy and ethics at the Leiden Faculty of Humanities, Institutes for Philosophy & Religious Studies, and the Technical University of Eindhoven. He is the Vice President of the global think tank and network organisation, Alternative Perspectives & Global Concerns (AP-GC), and responsible for strategic planning and policy-making for the network as a whole. He is active on various boards, both nationally and internationally. His current research focuses on exceptional states of consciousness in relation to philosophy. Among others, he published 'Perspectives on Synchronicity, Inspiration, and the Soul' (Cambridge Scholars 2021) and 'Wild Beasts of the Philosophical Desert. Philosophers on Telepathy and Other Exceptional Experiences' (Cambridge Scholars 2014, with Hans Gerding and Hein van Dongen). Together with Mahmoud Masaeli (Ottawa University), he edited a series of books on global ethics, development, and spirituality.