From: Blunderov (squooker@mweb.co.za)
Date: Fri May 21 2004 - 16:23:58 MDT
rhinoceros
Sent: 21 May 2004 11:17 PM
<snip>
Solution 2 gives me a sense of "satisfaction" while Solution 1 gives me a
feeling that I didn't really understand "why" this was the answer. Can you
offer any explanations for this feeling?
<snip>
[Blunderov] Looking forward to your post tomorrow.
I seem to recall, I think in a recent Scientific American, that an
experiment was devised in which people were given a 'problem' to solve to
which there was in fact no solution. It was a random sequence. They
discovered that as people became more and more frustrated at their lack of
success in detecting a pattern, they began to base their decisions on
emotional criteria rather than logical ones.
Solving puzzles, even trivial ones, using conscious thought rather than
subconscious, is deeply pleasurable to humans. (One sees this everyday in a
million ways - it is our species nature. It provides us with a reassuring
illusion of mastery over the universe.) Perhaps, then, if a particular
problem can only be understood in an intuitive way, it is less pleasurable
therefore, and one becomes aware of the discrepancy?
I'll see if I can find the article I mentioned.
(Sign me up as a Virian unable to solve the problem BTW!)
Best Regards
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