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=                      Thinking outside the box                      =
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                            Introduction
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Thinking outside the box (also thinking out of the box or thinking
beyond the box and, especially in Australia, thinking outside the
square) is a metaphor that means to think differently,
unconventionally, or from a new perspective.  This phrase often refers
to novel or creative thinking. The term is thought to derive from
management consultants in the 1970s and 1980s challenging their
clients to solve the "nine dots" puzzle, whose solution requires some
lateral thinking. This phrase can also be found commonly in dance, as
encouragement to move creatively, beyond simple, geometric box steps
and their basic variations, to literally step outside the box into
more complex patterns of expression.

The catchphrase, or cliché, has become widely used in business
environments, especially by management consultants and executive
coaches, and has been referenced in a number of advertising slogans.
To think outside the box is to look further and to try not thinking of
the obvious things, but to try thinking of the things beyond them.


                              Analogy
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A simplified definition for 'paradigm' is a habit of reasoning or a
conceptual framework.

A simplified analogy is "the box" in the commonly used phrase
"thinking outside the box". What is encompassed by the words "inside
the box" is analogous with the current, and often unnoticed,
assumptions about a situation. Creative thinking acknowledges and
rejects the accepted paradigm to come up with new ideas.


                          Nine dots puzzle
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The notion of something outside a perceived "box" is related to a
traditional topographical puzzle called the 'nine dots puzzle'.

The origins of the phrase "thinking outside the box" are obscure; but
it was popularized in part because of a nine-dot puzzle, which John
Adair claims to have introduced in 1969. Management consultant Mike
Vance has claimed that the use of the nine-dot puzzle in consultancy
circles stems from the corporate culture of the Walt Disney Company,
where the puzzle was used in-house.

The nine dots puzzle is much older than the slogan. It appears in Sam
Loyd's 1914 'Cyclopedia of Puzzles'.  In the 1951 compilation 'The
Puzzle-Mine: Puzzles Collected from the Works of the Late Henry Ernest
Dudeney', the puzzle is attributed to Dudeney himself.  Sam Loyd's
original formulation of the puzzle entitled it as "Christopher
Columbus' egg puzzle."  This was an allusion to the story of Egg of
Columbus.

The puzzle proposed an intellectual challenge�to connect the dots by
drawing four straight, continuous lines that pass through each of the
nine dots, and never lifting the pencil from the paper.  The conundrum
is easily resolved, but only by drawing the lines outside the confines
of the square area defined by the nine dots themselves.  The phrase
"thinking outside the box" is a restatement of the solution strategy.
The puzzle only seems difficult because people commonly imagine a
boundary around the edge of the dot array. The heart of the matter is
the unspecified barrier that people typically perceive.

Telling people to "think outside the box" does not help them think
outside the box, at least not with the 9-dot problem. This is due to
the distinction between procedural knowledge (implicit or tacit
knowledge) and declarative knowledge (book knowledge). For example, a
non-verbal cue such as drawing a square outside the 9 dots does allow
people to solve the 9-dot problem better than average.

The nine-dot problem is a well-defined problem. It has a clearly
stated goal, and all necessary information to solve the problem is
included (connect all of the dots using four straight lines, without
removing the pen from the paper once you start drawing). Furthermore,
well-defined problems have a clear ending (you know when you have
reached the solution). Although the solution is "outside the box" and
not easy to see at first, once it has been found, it seems obvious.
Other examples of well-defined problems are the Tower of Hanoi and the
Rubik's Cube.

In contrast, characteristics of ill-defined problems are:
*not clear what the question really is
*not clear how to arrive at a solution
*no idea what the solution looks like
An example of an ill-defined problem is "what is the essence of
happiness?" The skills needed to solve this type of problem are the
ability to reason and draw inferences, metacognition, and epistemic
monitoring.


The single straight line solution
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Another well-defined problem for the nine dots starting point is to
connect the dots with a single straight line. The solution involves
looking outside the two-dimensional sheet of paper on which the nine
dots are drawn and coning the paper three-dimensionally aligning the
dots along a spiral, thus a single line can be drawn connecting all
nine dots - which would appear as three lines in parallel on the
paper, when flattened out.

If solving the four line solution is called 'lateral thinking', then
solving the one line solution could well be called 'orthogonal
thinking', as it requires two distinct phases: drawing the line and
assembling the line.


The Nine Dots Prize
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The Nine Dots Prize is a competition-based prize for "creative
thinking that tackles contemporary societal issues." It is sponsored
by the Kadas Prize Foundation and supported by the Cambridge
University Press and the Centre for Research in the Arts, Social
Sciences and Humanities at the University of Cambridge. It was named
in reference to the nine-dot problem. Annie Zaidi, an Indian writer
won this $100,000 prize on May 29, 2019.


                              Metaphor
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This flexible English phrase is a rhetorical trope with a range of
variant applications.

The metaphorical "box" in the phrase "outside the box" may be married
with something real and measurable � for example, perceived budgetary
or organizational constraints in a Hollywood development project.
Speculating beyond its restrictive confines the box can be both:

* (a) positive� fostering creative leaps as in generating wild ideas
(the conventional use of the term); and
* (b) negative� penetrating through to the "bottom of the box." James
Bandrowski states that this could result in a frank and insightful
re-appraisal of a situation, oneself, the organization, etc.

On the other hand, Bandrowski argues that the process of thinking
"inside the box" need not be construed in a pejorative sense. It is
crucial for accurately parsing and executing a variety of tasks �
making decisions, analyzing data, and managing the progress of
standard operating procedures, etc.

Hollywood screenwriter Ira Steven Behr appropriated this concept to
inform plot and character in the context of a television series.  Behr
imagined a core character:



The phrase can be used as a shorthand way to describe speculation
about what happens next in a multi-stage design thinking process.


                     Sherlock Holmes reference
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An older reference to thinking outside the box appears in Sir Arthur
Conan Doyle's, 'The Hound of The Baskervilles'.  In chapter 3, "The
Problem", Holmes is telling Watson under what circumstances that he
thinks best: "...It is a singular thing, but I find that a
concentrated atmosphere helps a concentration of thought. I have not
pushed it to the length of getting into a box to think, but that is
the logical outcome of my convictions..."

One interpretation can be framed as a reaction to criticism (and
off-base imitation) of Holmes since Doyle had killed him off in the
previous novel five years earlier.  Holmes is not a purely logical
machine, simply running algorithms to deduce answers. But rather, he
uses abductive reasoning to find creative solutions.  His "outside the
box" solutions, (and more than a little luck) account for his high
rate of success.


                              See also
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* Egg of Columbus
* Einstellung effect
* Eureka effect
* 'Kobayashi Maru'
* Gordian Knot
* Lateral thinking
* Buzzword
*Functional fixedness


                          Further reading
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*   (more solutions to the nine dots problem - with less than 4
lines!)
*
*


                           External links
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* [http://www.phrases.org.uk/bulletin_board/29/messages/1149.html
Out-of-the-box vs. outside the box] citing Oxford Advanced Learners
Dictionary (OALD), Word of the Month


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