Kreativität, morphologisches Weltbild und Erfindungsalgorithmus. Zur transnationalen Emergenz von Kreativitäts- und Ideenfindungstechniken während der Nachkriegszeit und des Kalten Krieges

Creativity and ideation techniques are being part of many occupational and scientific concepts and practises today. Techniques such as mind maps, brainstorming, so-called morphological methods, or complex invention algorithms as TRIZ (theory of inventive problem solving) can be found for instance within design, engineering, artistic research or educational science. Despite their popularity in practical application, from a scientific point of view, they often carry the stigma of the popular or pseudo-scientific. They are only rarely viewed as being historically conditioned – especially with regard to the post-war period and Cold War. During and directly following the end of World War II, one can observe that loads of techniques pop up for systematic stimulation, (re)discovery, and visualization of “ideas”. The project of exploring and assisting creative processes and potentials was shaped by virulent contemporary occurrences and its debates, such as the Sputnik Crisis, the constant nuclear threat, or the debate on the two scientific cultures. (Snow, 1959). In my text I want to highlight this transnational dimension of creativity debates and techniques using the examples of first morphological methods, and second the invention algorithm TRIZ. Morphological methods were mainly developed and promoted by Swiss born astrophysicist Fritz Zwicky (1898–1974), professor at California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, after the end of World War II. In my second example I will introduce a theory of inventive problem solving called TRIZ, developed by the Russian engineer, inventor and author Genrich S. Altschuller (1926–1998). I will contextualize the two mentioned examples against the historical and cultural background of the post-war period and Cold War. As a result I will try to correlate them with regard to noticeable patterns and motives of argumentations referring to time and cultural specific conceptions of creativity, innovation and invention.