Functional Fixedness

What are you sitting on? Is it a chair? Maybe it is a bed, a sofa, a crate, an inflated rubber ball, a hammock, a stool, a large rock, an overturned bucket, a television, a horse, pile of clothes, or something else. Whatever it is, it is effectively a chair, because that is what you are using it for. I once had a roommate who expressed surprise when I was eating cereal in the evening. “That’s a breakfast food!” he exclaimed. So what? You can only eat cereal in the first few hours after the sun comes up? Just as whatever you are sitting on becomes a sort of chair, you can eat whatever food you want at any time of the day, free of societal norms and associations. It interests me that some people would never think to eat breakfast in the evening, or would never think to use an overturned bucket as a chair. Some people are caught up in what is called functional fixedness, which is to be unable to see beyond the obvious function of an item...

The rest of this post can be found in the Ajax's Whimsical Revolution ebook for Amazon's Kindle. The book is a compilation of my favorite posts, 78 to be exact, of which this is one. If you don't have a Kindle e-reader you can download the free Amazon Kindle app for PC or Mac.