This chapter considers what mental actions are, and how they are best explained. Mental actions are shown to include mental rehearsal of actions, prospective imagining, inner speech, attention, memory search, and (perhaps surprisingly) the spontaneous thoughts that occur while mind-wandering, as well as creative ideas that seemingly occur to one “out of the blue.” The chapter also discusses how controlled sequences of mental action can be explained, and discusses events like judgments and decisions that armchair-philosophers have been apt to claim are mental actions, but really are not.

Chapter 6 is the first chapter in the second part of the book, titled “Entangled Timescales of the Visual Arts.” Chapter 6 explains the meaning of this title by focusing on an important feature of complex systems, namely, that they consist of interacting processes on different time scales, from very short to very long. These processes are entangled, that is, they occur in continuous interaction and are interdependent. These entangled processes form the basis for important complexity features of the arts, such as self-organization, emergence, novelty and creativity, attractors, critical states, variability, and so on.

Creativity may also be viewed as a capacity of the human mind (i.e., an ability to generate ideas that are novel, unexpected, and valuable). Creativity indicates a constellation of traits: Creative persons are self-confident, independent, and unopposed to risk-taking. They have good intuition and display flexible, original thinking; moreover, they dare to differ, challenge routines, and – if necessary – bend a few rules. Finally, creative people can think flexibly. Creative people generate ideas that, at the time, are viewed as novel and perhaps ridiculous, as well as “unreasonable.” Some authors perceive the origins of creativity as a “wonder,” happening in both historical and mundane contexts. The best examples of creativity come from children, as they are free from the pressures of achievement or competition. Children simply play, addressing challenges and innovating. Creativity can be characterized as the mutual reinforcement of two distinct mental models, namely, convergent and divergent thinking, the latter being usually a spontaneous, free-flowing process, where thoughts appear in a “non-logical” manner. Some examples of divergent thinking are herein presented.

This chapter explores the potential of Construction Grammar for analyzing literary texts. First, it investigates typical features of literary language from a constructional point of view. Fairy tales, for example, are characterized by their opening lines like “Once upon a time …,” analyzed as a concrete, complex construction. Similarly, many authors, styles, and genres are characterized by particular constructions, or the use of particular words and phrases. The second section deals with creative, innovative, and seemingly ‘rule-breaking’ language in a constructional framework, suggesting that Construction Grammar as a usage-based and cognitively plausible model offers the perfect toolkit to analyze seemingly unruly linguistic behavior. The third part deals with literary genres as linguistic units beyond the sentence, arguing that literary texts are also learned form–meaning pairings and can be treated as constructions. Genres as constructions may change dynamically over time and be subject to prototypeeffects. Drawing on numerous examples, this chapter thus demonstrates that literary language and texts can be productively analyzed using concepts and methods of Construction Grammar.

Work occupies a significant portion of our lives, providing not only financial stability, but also structure, social interaction, and a sense of purpose. In addition, many jobs contribute to society in a beneficial way. While some jobs offer intrinsic satisfaction and personal growth, others may cause stress and burnout. Meaningful work promotes cognitive health by stimulating problem-solving, critical thinking, and learning. Engaging in social interactions at work enhances emotional intelligence and fosters collaboration, creativity, and innovation. Moreover, work contributes to cognitive resilience and may even reduce the risk of dementia in later life. It’s crucial to acknowledge and manage workplace stress through strategies such as maintaining work–life balance, seeking social support, and setting boundaries. This is particularly important considering the increase in hybrid working. Employers play a key role in creating supportive work environments that prioritize employee wellbeing. Overall, meaningful work enriches our lives, promotes cognitive vitality, and contributes to a fulfilling and balanced lifestyle.

This chapter details the early phenomenon that was ReInvent Law—an aggressive injection of innovation and creativity into the legal profession and legal education. Propelled by the 2008 financial crisis and the slow-rolling legal industry and education crisis that followed, ReInvent Law brought together thought leaders from around the world for rapid lightning talks at well-produced convenings that were coupled with a savvy and successful viral social media campaign. With the early emergence of legal design coinciding with ReInvent Law’s run, the synergies and ongoing impact are revealed here by one of ReInvent Law’s founders.

Compared to people who are rated as less creative, more creative people tend to produce ideas more quickly, with more novelty, and more actively engage regions of the brain associated with cognitive control. Both inside and outside the laboratory, the evidence is clear: the creative mind is a productive mind. Structural analysis of what more creative people produce has led to two different proposals for how this is achieved. One is based on differences in the underlying knowledge representation – the structure of semantic memory – called the associative theory of creativity. The other is based on more effortful cognitive control – how semantic memory is accessed – called the executive theory of creativity. Evidence supports both, but there are few models integrating these two ideas. Network analysis offers some inroads into how to tackle this problem and invites some creativity of its own.

In this penultimate chapter, we take up the philosophical question of whether immortality is truly desirable, seeking to establish an important difference between existing for a finite and for an infinite stretch of time by introducing the following important consideration. If it remains possible for an event to occur, then even an extremely unlikely event is certain to occur, given infinite time. I shall suggest that this consideration leads to insuperable problems with the most popular scenarios currently being envisioned for achieving immortality by techno-scientific means. These problems, moreover, motivate us to think more deeply about death and thereby rethink the requirements of a genuinely meaningful human life. Drawing on Kierkegaard, Heidegger, and other existential thinkers, I suggest that human beings’ most abiding sources of meaningfulness come not from endlessly repeating certain profound experiences (which sometimes does wear out their appeal) but, instead, from our struggle to stay true to and so continue to creatively and responsibly disclose what such momentous events, often rare and singular, only partly reveal to us in the first place, as we often come to realize only in retrospect – much as Heidegger came only retrospectively to recognize and then spend his life creatively disclosing the seemingly inexhaustible ontological riches of that ambiguous “nothing” Being and Time first glimpsed in the momentous experience of existential death, but in a way that Heidegger only partly understood at that time.

This chapter traces the extant historical literature on the growth and development of party politics in colonial Nigeria. These parties were led by formidable personalities who played an essential role in the formation of national consciousness crucial for the formation of an independent Nigeria. While historians have classified it into four phases, the chapter proposes that the growth of political parties should be analyzed into two generational periods: the 1920s and 1930s, and the 1940s and 1950s. The former period is marked by the promulgation of the Clifford Constitution that led to the creation of the first-ever nationalist parties, such as the Nigerian National Democratic Party and The Lagos Youth Movement which, though claiming nationalist status, was, however, confined to the Lagos area. The latter commenced after the enactment of the Richards Constitution which witnessed the growth of regional political parties such as the National Council of Nigeria and the Cameroons, the Northern People’s Congress, and the Action Group all of which espoused ethnic nationalism. By engaging with historical works produced on nationalist movements in colonial Nigeria, the chapter places their value beyond the simplistic teleological development of politics of nationalism in Nigeria.