This is called 'associative knowledge', and it’s a much better reflection of how the brain actually works. There are no discrete categories in your mind: only a bunch of weaker or stronger connections and patterns. This gives us the general principle for compounding our ideas.

Despite this unhinged quality, or rather because of it, Récoltes et Semailles is a profound portrait of the creative act and the conditions that enable our ability to reach out toward the unknown.

Our brain is an uncertainty-reducing machine, willing to do whatever it takes to minimize surprise, even if it is at a high cost.

Those who say we’re often better off, like Jonah Lehrer, tech writer and author of How We Decide, claim that stimulating our brains in different ways can make us more creative and open to new ideas.