Yesterday, I've come across a NY Times article "How Nonsense Sharpens The Intellect". It talks about how unusual things, anomalies, and absurdities prompt the brain to (frantically) search for meaning, and thus facilitate discovery of patterns that would ordinarily remain unseen. In short, when faced with the inexplicable, the brain scrambles harder to find some order.
A quote from the article: "The brain evolved to predict, and it does so by identifying patterns. When those patterns break down - as when a hiker stumbles across an easy chair sitting deep in the woods, as if dropped from the sky — the brain gropes for something, anything that makes sense. It may retreat to a familiar ritual, like checking equipment. But it may also turn its attention outward, the researchers argue, and notice, say, a pattern in animal tracks that was previously hidden. The urge to find a coherent pattern makes it more likely that the brain will find one."
My first thought was that these findings can be taken in so many directions. Like, looking for inspiration in unexpected sources, for example. A few excellent planners I know never actually read other planner's blogs or marketing-related stuff. They read sociology, psychology, economics, design, fashion, and a lot of crazy, super-creative stuff on the Internet. Why? Well, in a way, an unknown/unpredictable situation is similar to an absurd one (in that they both lack a pattern) so, somehow, it makes more sense to look for its meaning elsewhere. Brain indeed does scramble to put a coherent situation together, and one way to do so is to re-cognize patterns that it seen/heard somewhere else. So reading about various stuff not only helps inspiration, it also offers a pool of latent knowledge that help us make sense of the unknown when a brain sees fit.
Then, another thing is that we tend to remember more - and longer - things that violate our logic and expectation. Like David Lynch movies, or Bunuel movies, or some of Murakami's stories, or that stupid Dennis Lehane novel that ended unexpectedly and didn't make any sense and that I still occasionally think about two weeks later. We simply invest more of our resources - time and mental energy - to reach (any) closure. And when we think hard about something, we are likely to reach an explanation (even a very far fetched one).
And now I am curious why the brain can't stand absurdity.