(no subject)

[watertank]

a landmark study of healthy brain development has uncovered a number of surprises. Among them is the finding that, whereas childhood is characterized by improvement on tasks of cognitive and motor function, this progress levels off at around age 11 or 12, just prior to adolescence.
Scientific American, May 18, 2007.

Some time ago I saw studies showing that human creativity peaks at the age of 12. It would be interesting to investigate a possible relationship between brain growth and creativity. It could be that the latter is an expression of a still developing cognitive ability.

I would even go out on a limb and say that now we have an opportunity to develop an objective measure for the newly minted SCOTUS' notion of "person of ordinary creativity". Here's how it will work. Each inventor at the patent application filing time has her brain examined, and if a certified agency confirm that the brain bears signs of continuing cognitive improvement, the invention automatically passes the non-obviousness test. We could go even further and, based on aforementioned tests, build a registry of "creative people" whose works would be automatically considered above average. Down with IQ! Long live direct brain scans!