alt Hacker NewsI feel this is the case whenever I "problem solve". I'm not really being creative, I'm pruning a graph of a conceptual space that already exists. The more possibilities I see, the easier it is to run more towards an optimal route between the nodes, but I didn't "create" those nodes or edges, they are just causal inevitabilities.
I dont know this sort of just seems like youre really stretching the meaning of "creative". The conceptual space of the graph already exists, but the act of discovering it or whatever you want to call that is itself creative. Unless youre following a pre-defined algorithm(certainly sometimes, arguably always I suppose) seeing the possibilities has to involve some creativity.