For those who sincerely think HOW to innovate
TRIZ In Films - Ideas for Fooling “FILMI GHOST”
Traveling 4 ½ hrs sitting on the last seat of a 25 seater bus, cramped & clamped is a nightmare. Some of you may empathize with me. My Mumbai- Nasik Return journey perfectly fits this case. In order to dampen this torture, smart transporters, like the one we have here, provide video facility & play latest hits. In TRIZ terms this is called innovation by transition to a super system (Video, films, latest hits etc). The smart innovator asks simple question, can I solve this problem by transition to super system and provides Video facility which acts like a pain killer, provided he plays good movies, otherwise, it results in pain multiplication, of course such incidences presents you with a chance to develop a robust, balanced mind, so consider them as blessings in disguise.
Recently on my return journey from Nasik, my torture subsided as the bus driver played Bollywood’s hit “Bhool Bhulaiyya”. The theme was not that great, but presentation was. (Something like….a good presentation on a lousy topic). I am not going into the details of the story, but to sum up in short, the story goes like this.
From America to his hometowns in the interiors of India, it was a long journey for Siddhartha. But nothing could match the mind boggling journey that now lay in front of him. For it was a journey into an astounding maze in which each step meant mystery, discovery, surprise, shock & revelation.
With open arms, his large extended family welcomes the US based Siddhartha & his newly wed Avani when they come home. But what family resists is Siddhartha’s insistence on staying in his royal ancestral mansion during his stay. The mansion as believed by many held a deadly secret that had repeatedly destroyed family of generations.
The scientifically inclined Siddhartha & his equally modern, archeological expert wife do not believe in such stories and decide to stay put there. Unforeseen happenings, mysterious elements, horrific indications and life threatening incidents swarm their path. Siddhartha calls his dynamic doctor friend Aditya to do root cause analysis & find a permanent solution.
The ancestral property is a haunted mansion. Years ago, a Bengali dancer Manjulica, had committed suicide in the palace, when an evil minded King not able to endure her love for her dance partner beheads him in front of her. Majolica not able to bear the shock commits suicide. Her ghosts (let us say some form of energy) stay in the mansion waiting to find a suitable instrument (someone’s mind & body) to occupy & take revenge abiding law of conservation of energy. So let us say a form of energy that stays locked (static) waiting to get converted into some form of actionable energy.
The story goes further with Avani, who had spent her childhood with her grandmother and away from her parents, who were settled in the US. She grows up listening fairly tales, ghost stories from her grandma. One day suddenly her father decides to take her to the US against her wishes, disturbing her own little world. She stays in a state of shock & helplessness, shrouding agony deep inside her.
The negative energy (extreme agony) of Manjulica fuses with the negative energy of Avani. Avani secretly starts playing Manjulica and nobody understands WHY? May be she finds the closest match to her anguish. Manjulica in her also assumes a long haired handsome man as her lost love in the past birth & considers Siddhartha, her husband in this birth, as the KING who beheaded her love and therefore wants to kill him to take her revenge.
Now you must be wondering why I have taken you so long, have I become a film columnist. No I am not at the moment, in future only knows. What I found at this stage was contradiction. The contradiction was that Manjulica in Avani wants to kill Siddhartha, after which she would leave Avni’s body. Although Avani will be normal afterwards, she would have lost her husband in the present birth. Therefore the contradiction is she wants to kill her husband and don’t want to kill her husband. In TRIZ this is called a physical contradiction in time and the general questions that one asks in formulating them are
When do I want condition (+ A ) ? and When I do not want condition (-A) ?
i.e. I want to kill Siddhartha the KING when I am Manjulica and don’t want to kill him when I am Avani.
The Inventive principles for such a situation are
Principle 15 : Dynamics: If an object or system is rigid or inflexible, make it movable or adaptable
Principle 10 : Preliminary Action : Pre-arrange objects or systems such that they can come into action at the most convenient time & place.
Principle 11 : Beforehand Cushioning: Introduce emergency backups to compensate for the potentially low reliability of an object. E.g. Air Bags or Back-up parachute.
Principle 26 : Copying : Use simple and inexpressible copies in place of expensive, possibly vulnerable objects or systems. e.g. Imitation Jewellery
The scene goes something like this the real Siddhartha is brought on a stretcher mounted on a drum. When Manjulica’s GHOST lifts the sword, the drum is rotated (Principle 15) and the effigy (Principle 26) which is mounted on the other side of the drum (Principle 10, 11) beforehand comes in front. Manjulica cuts the effigy with her sword with all her locked “REVENGE” energy and thus Ghost of Manjulica after taking revenge leaves Avani’s body forever.
TRIZ theory of everything. TRIZ HO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Recently on my return journey from Nasik, my torture subsided as the bus driver played Bollywood’s hit “Bhool Bhulaiyya”. The theme was not that great, but presentation was. (Something like….a good presentation on a lousy topic). I am not going into the details of the story, but to sum up in short, the story goes like this.
From America to his hometowns in the interiors of India, it was a long journey for Siddhartha. But nothing could match the mind boggling journey that now lay in front of him. For it was a journey into an astounding maze in which each step meant mystery, discovery, surprise, shock & revelation.
With open arms, his large extended family welcomes the US based Siddhartha & his newly wed Avani when they come home. But what family resists is Siddhartha’s insistence on staying in his royal ancestral mansion during his stay. The mansion as believed by many held a deadly secret that had repeatedly destroyed family of generations.
The scientifically inclined Siddhartha & his equally modern, archeological expert wife do not believe in such stories and decide to stay put there. Unforeseen happenings, mysterious elements, horrific indications and life threatening incidents swarm their path. Siddhartha calls his dynamic doctor friend Aditya to do root cause analysis & find a permanent solution.
The ancestral property is a haunted mansion. Years ago, a Bengali dancer Manjulica, had committed suicide in the palace, when an evil minded King not able to endure her love for her dance partner beheads him in front of her. Majolica not able to bear the shock commits suicide. Her ghosts (let us say some form of energy) stay in the mansion waiting to find a suitable instrument (someone’s mind & body) to occupy & take revenge abiding law of conservation of energy. So let us say a form of energy that stays locked (static) waiting to get converted into some form of actionable energy.
The story goes further with Avani, who had spent her childhood with her grandmother and away from her parents, who were settled in the US. She grows up listening fairly tales, ghost stories from her grandma. One day suddenly her father decides to take her to the US against her wishes, disturbing her own little world. She stays in a state of shock & helplessness, shrouding agony deep inside her.
The negative energy (extreme agony) of Manjulica fuses with the negative energy of Avani. Avani secretly starts playing Manjulica and nobody understands WHY? May be she finds the closest match to her anguish. Manjulica in her also assumes a long haired handsome man as her lost love in the past birth & considers Siddhartha, her husband in this birth, as the KING who beheaded her love and therefore wants to kill him to take her revenge.
Now you must be wondering why I have taken you so long, have I become a film columnist. No I am not at the moment, in future only knows. What I found at this stage was contradiction. The contradiction was that Manjulica in Avani wants to kill Siddhartha, after which she would leave Avni’s body. Although Avani will be normal afterwards, she would have lost her husband in the present birth. Therefore the contradiction is she wants to kill her husband and don’t want to kill her husband. In TRIZ this is called a physical contradiction in time and the general questions that one asks in formulating them are
When do I want condition (+ A ) ? and When I do not want condition (-A) ?
i.e. I want to kill Siddhartha the KING when I am Manjulica and don’t want to kill him when I am Avani.
The Inventive principles for such a situation are
Principle 15 : Dynamics: If an object or system is rigid or inflexible, make it movable or adaptable
Principle 10 : Preliminary Action : Pre-arrange objects or systems such that they can come into action at the most convenient time & place.
Principle 11 : Beforehand Cushioning: Introduce emergency backups to compensate for the potentially low reliability of an object. E.g. Air Bags or Back-up parachute.
Principle 26 : Copying : Use simple and inexpressible copies in place of expensive, possibly vulnerable objects or systems. e.g. Imitation Jewellery
The scene goes something like this the real Siddhartha is brought on a stretcher mounted on a drum. When Manjulica’s GHOST lifts the sword, the drum is rotated (Principle 15) and the effigy (Principle 26) which is mounted on the other side of the drum (Principle 10, 11) beforehand comes in front. Manjulica cuts the effigy with her sword with all her locked “REVENGE” energy and thus Ghost of Manjulica after taking revenge leaves Avani’s body forever.
TRIZ theory of everything. TRIZ HO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Comment
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Comment by Séverine Baudrux on September 25, 2009 at 11:32pm -
...In the book "Thoughtivity for Kids" by Tatiana Sidorchuk and Nikolai Khomenko, there are many examples: It is stunning! I do not read any more the tales in the same way ;-)
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Comment by Prashant Yeshwant Joglekar on September 25, 2009 at 8:22pm -
Hi Yatin,
Nice to have your comments. I have written something on how Learning can be made fun,in mylatest blog post "Analogical Chemistry- Learning can be made Fun".
I would like to have this "THoughtivity For KIDS Book" from where did you get it. Is it be available as e-book. Becasue my book shop express their inability to procure this. Please advise.
For more on TRIZ posts please visit my blog.
http://prashantinnofuture.blogspot.com
Best,
Prashant
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Comment by Yatin Ubhaykar on September 25, 2009 at 2:32am -
Wow! This is an interesting thread..
Am planning to train my 5yr old daughter on inventive problem solving. While I have a copy of "thoughtivity for kids" with me, these stories will definitely spruce things up.
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Comment by sonali gupta on September 24, 2009 at 10:21am -
Thats very true..
Actually I am an MBA student and came across TRIZ during my summer internship. Thanks to Mr Navneet Bhushan, a hardcore TRIZ practitioner.
One of my professors in my college recommended me about Mr Prashant and suggested me his blog....
Really It was so motivating experience for me that I have started looking around the things and apply TRIZ approach.One of the articles quoted by Mr Prashant that 'Nature is a true innovator" inspired me alot and in fact thats true as I see around so many things where TRIZ can be applied.
Still it's a long long way ahead in the journey of learning...
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Comment by Chirravuri Srinivas on September 24, 2009 at 3:45am -
Hello Prashant and Bala: Simple yet great stories exemplifying TRIZ concepts ( for a beginner like me).... My passion is stories ... and need your help to fit TRIZ principles...
Talking of contradictions, the very need for the different incarnations of lord Vishnu is driven by Contradictions... Here's how:
1) In his incarnation as Rama, some sages approach him at the time of his crowning ceremony approach Rama with a wish to hug him. He was considered the most handsome man that his features were bewitching even for men. Given that Rama in that incarnation is bounded by the principle of "Just one wife" (no polygamy), grants them the boon that it would be fulfilled in the next life...
So you have Lord Krishna in the next incarnation 16000 consorts (Gopikas - sages in their previous birth) :"Play" around with this "Boy/man". Thus a not so possible or acceptable wish is fulfilled in another form or life.
2) Similarly, Jamabavan approaches Rama and expresses his desire to fight with him. Rama could not fight in that life with him as Jambavan is a friend. Yet grants him that the wish will be fulfilled in the subsequent life... Here's how:
Satrajit, a king receives from the lord Sun a golden chain with a pendant that yields huge quantities of Gold at the time of sunrise everyday. Krishna requests Satrajit for the chain and the request gets declined. After a few days, Satrajits brother who goes hunting wearing the chain gets killed by a lion which in turn gets killed by the bear king (Jambavan) who gifts the chain to his daughter, Satyabhama.
Satrajit suspects Lord Krishna of killing his brother and stealing the chain. To clear himself of the inaccurate accusations, Krishna goes searching for the chain and find the lady playng with it and tries to get it from her. That's when jambavan challenges Krishna and the fight goes on for days and nights. Over a period of time, Jambavan grows weak and accepts his defeat...that's when he realises that it was lord Rama in his incarnation of Krishna that defeated him. (Contradiction: Acceeding to the requests of a friend to fight).
3) The other contradiction I can recall is Rama's killing of Vali (the monkey king)... who is blessed with a boon that he can absorb the energies of any opponent who is physically in front of him. Despite the fact that Lord Rama is incarnation of lord Vishnu, he will not be able to beat Vali if he fights him face to face... Rama shoots him from behind a tree while Vali's brother indulges him in a dual. When questioned : How fair that was for a man of integrity to carry out such a menial act of attacking from behind a tree, Rama says "you are a monkey and I'm a hunter. Animals are hunted from behind a tree.. thus it is justified"
4) Ravana is believed to have controlled the planets. So he draws up the horoscope for his "to be born son" (Indrajit) and directs each of the planets to stay in the houses assigned to them. The design is to ensure that Indrajit becomes immortal. At the time of his birth, all other planets approach Saturn for help. Just about the time when the child is about to be born, Saturn slips one of his foot into the adjoining houses... which renders Indrajit to become a mortal. The story after that is incidental.... What's the contradiction. Saturn in general is considered to be not so useful or auspicious planet... and is considered to be one who troubles or puts people through hardtimes. Yet, his services were required to ensure that Indrajit (an evil force) does not become immortal.
5) During Kurukshetra the epic war in Mahabharatha, Pandavas are confronted with Dronacharya. He could be defeated only when he drops his bow and arrows (that's possible only if his son Ashwadhama is no more). Now Krishna plots that Dharmaraja would announce the death of Ashwadhama as Dronacharya would not doubt the news coming from Dharmaraja.
What's the contradiction: Dharmaraja who is renowned to be a staunch believer of being truthful in speech and actions has to tell a lie. How could this be accomplished?
In the battle, Bhima kills an elephant named "Ashwadhama" then Dharmaraja announces saying "Ashwadhama hatah)... Ashwadhama died.... if he stopped with it, that would be a lie... he follows it up with a statement in a low tone or lower decibels saying "Kunjaraha"..(the one that died is an elephant...). so both the criteria or needs are met. Drona heard what he had to hear and Dharmaraja did not have to live with the guild of lying to his teacher.
Look forward to TRIZ principle association to these analogies.
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Comment by Ellen Domb on September 23, 2009 at 11:43pm -
I love the stories and I love the vitality of the TRIZINDIA group! Anyone looking for more stories, don't forget about the TRIZ Journal archives: Latin stories and sayings are the foundation of the Jan. 2008 article by Gennady Retseptor and modern literature was the basis for the article by Darrell and Melissa Mann, Aug. 2006, www.triz-jounal.com/archives then click on the date. Since this is such a cross cultural group, possibly we could explore the nature of tragedy (when the conflict is recognized but not resolved successfully) and comedy (the conflict is not recognized, and the situation changes, and...)
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Comment by Valeri Souchkov on September 23, 2009 at 5:00pm -
A great story, Bala! It also perfectly shows our mental inertia at work - if something can't be done during both night and day, we quickly jump to a conclusion that it can never be done...
Prakash, you are right, contradictions have been with human beings as long as human beings exist. If we look at a history of civilization, it becomes clear that in the process of our evolution we evolve not only technologies and businesses, but we also evolve our minds and thinking skills through resolving contradictions. In my opinion, the history of civilization is a history of development of our creative imagination. Without creativity and imagination, contradictions cannot be solved and we would not be evolving ourselves and the world around us.
The question is, are the principles of problem solving which have been discovered in TRIZ universal? Some TRIZ professionals argue that not: they were extracted from technology and therefore they should be applied to technology only. Well, if we talk about 40 principles, that might be partially true. But if we look carefully at 40 principles, we'll soon find out that they are a mix of very general principles (like Segmentation, Merging) and more specific principles (Thermal expansion, Use of hydraulics, etc). Segmentation and Merging are very universal principles: we can find them not only in the evolution of all types of men-made systems, but also in most of natural systems.
During last 10 years me, my customers, my friends have been successfully applying TRIZ principles (I mean not famous 40 principles but a general approach to finding and resolving contradictions which is broader and more universal than 40 principles) to business and management problems, as well as for marketing, advertisements, and one of my students today uses them for writing movie scripts. Why does TRIZ work there? Because problem solving patterns extracted from patents are not only patterns of technology development; they are also patterns of how our mind solves creative problems in general. Therefore today we evolve TRIZ further: to what we call "power innovative thinking" which is a combination of systematic analytical and creative thinking skills. By the way, you can read my article on the differences between ordinary and innovative thinking: http://www.xtriz.com/ThinkigSkillsForInnovation.pdf
Thus yes, contradictions are everywhere. Just look around where you are at the moment – either at your work desk or in a train browsing the web from your mobile phone: you will recognize at least a dozen contradictions. Think more – and you will see a couple of dozens…
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Comment by Prakasan K on September 23, 2009 at 3:11pm -
Guys, this is going good, excellent examples, and sounds like teaching TRIZ in a very interesting way to people in every culture using the mythological characters.
I'm referring to the posting in Map2TRIZ group by Valeri about the use of contradictions in stories, movies etc. There is a strong reason to believe that TRIZ concepts (especially contradiction) are as old as the human kind! :)
And, indeed, we like contradictions, and contradictions are exciting, hence we spend time reading good stories (where there are excellent contradictions) watch interesting movies. Perhaps it's a good idea to look at the best selling stories, and the contradictions introduced by the author to extract a pattern.
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Comment by Bala Ramadurai on September 23, 2009 at 8:42am -
People,
I like the drift of this conversation. Suchi, mythology is a great place for contradictions. Valeri, thanks for that lovely story. This gives me an inspiration to relate my favourite childhood story.
Prahalad (yeah, C K Prahalad, the management guru is named after this mythological character) was an ardent devotee of Vishnu (Maintainer in the Hindu Trinity). Hiranya was a bad guy trying some disruptive innovations on Prahalad, unsuccessfully. Hiranya was gifted with a boon that he could be killed but it had to adhere to the following conditions. (Typical customer, full of contradictions :))
1. Time of his death cant be night or day
2. He can be killed neither inside the house nor outside the house
3. He cannot be killed by either animal or man
4. The dude who kills him cannot be born
5. The place of his death should neither be on the ground nor in the air
6. The weapon used cannot be man-made
talk about constraints, phew!! Vishnu had to do a lot of brainstorming to figure this out.
Finally, Vishnu created a new avatar called Narasimha (Half lion, Half man - contradiction#3, TRIZ principle#5-merging).
He was born out of an iron pillar (Contradiction#4, principle#6 - universality for the iron pillar or #7 - nested doll)
He took the bad guy to the entrance of his house (Contradiction#2, principle#?)
He placed the bad guy on his thighs (C#5, intermediary or another dimension)
Time of the day chosen was dusk (C#1, ?)
He used his nails to kill Hiranya (C#6, Resource thinking)
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Comment by Valeri Souchkov on September 23, 2009 at 12:18am
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Probably, the most famous example comes from ancient Greek-Roman mythology: Perseus against Medusa Gorgon. Perseus needed to behead Medusa, so he had to fight and win over her, but how? Poseidon, a husband of Medusa, turned her hair to snakes, and gave her a power to turn to a stone anybody who would look directly at her.
So, we have a physical contradiction her: to fight and behead Medusa, Perseus has to look at her. But to remain alive and not turned to a stone, he must not look at her.
A contradiction was resolved by the principle of intermediary (or, Inventive Standard 1-2-1, or a principle of copying). When fighting, Perseus was not looking at Medusa; instead he was viewing her image in his shield which was polished to act as a mirror.
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