Ideas and creativity

Ideas are the basis for creativity. Fortunately, there is infinite potential for ideas and insights.

Ideas have the benefit of being both:

- non-rivalrous (if you have an idea, someone else can utilise it at the same time without lessening its potential)

- accumulating (ideas build on other ideas).

However,

“…Inequality risks squandering the idea-generating potential of those without the access to the education or resources to formulate and take advantage of their ideas…”

Guy Debelle, 2024

Furthermore, brainpower, or computer power, is becoming the most important resource; it is renewable.

An example of the use of ideas and science to address humanity's challenges is the pandemic.

“… At the onset of the pandemic, the expectation was that it would take many years to develop a COVID-19 vaccine, if ever. Instead, when a large amount of resources were devoted to research and development around the world, within a year there were at least three vaccine solutions…”

Guy Debelle, 2024

Need to be careful of

“… The rejection of expert views, the discrediting of science, and funding attacks on tertiary institutions are all attacks on the generation of ideas. If superstition triumphs over science, suspicion over reason, prejudice over expertise, the future of growth is in jeopardy. Ideas can underpin growth well into the future but only if they are given the freedom to flourish and be deployed…”

Guy Debelle, 2024