The Creative Process and Search Oscillations

The Swing

How do you like to go up in a swing?
Up in the air so blue?
Oh, I do think it the pleasantest thing
Ever a child can do!

Up in the air and over the wall,
Till I can see so wide,
Rivers and trees and cattle and all
Over the countryside--

Till I look down on the garden green,
Down on the roof so brown -
Up in the air I go flying again,
Up in the air and down!
                 -Robert Louis Stevenson - 1850-1894

In his book "Fluid Analogies and Creative Concepts" Douglas Hofstader describes designing integer sequence perception programs. He tells readers of breadth-first and depth first searches and admits that implementation of either may not fully or accurately reflect how human minds function (conversations with Dave Slate confirm this observation). Examination of his own creative process suggests a "initial very shallow breadth-first scan followed by a bit of depth-first in a local area highlighted by the breadth-first scan, then resurfacing for more of a broad overview..." followed by a series of oscillations between these two techniques. His mind loops upon itself, jumping between the wide and deep, until finally settling upon a satisfying answer.

The image of oscillations is a very potent one, conjuring associations of sin curves in their countless natural manifestations: light, water, and sound. Alternation between two poles, hormonal and otherwise, allows for a balance to be reached or a neutrality that still consists of "something" opposed to non-existence.

Hofstader's observations on the creative process may be reflected to some extent in research on the human brain. It has been suggested by Bogen and Bogen (1988)  that creativity may result from the temporary inhibition of the Corpus Callosum. When connection between the two "poles" of the brain is diminished momentarily, hemispheric specialization is enhanced, perhaps leading to "incubation of ideas critical for the divergent component of creativity" 
(Hemispheric connectivity and the visual–spatial divergent-thinking component of creativity) . That lack of connectivity might allow for specific modules to crest. Secluded, each is able to maximize it's individual form of processing. 

My understanding of creativity on a social, macro level certainly suggests the value of such isolation. Groups of people, all posed with the same problem, process separately before they can come together to share, debate, and decide. Perhaps each Pandemonium demon needs a moment of quiet to think about what he is going to shout.

[I imagine creativity oscillations might occur like the push and pull of a child's arms to maximize a swing's height, our hemispheres must work "against" each other to succeed, gaining momentum like waves in a pool. Perhaps they battle like competitive siblings (companies?), fighting back and forth until the best solution is found. ]

I am not seriously suggesting that the broad or detailed depth searches can be mapped exactly to secluded left or right hemispheric activity. While each could be loosely associated with a hemisphere, it is rather the process of oscillation, present in Hofstader's introspection, that is of interest. Perhaps it reflects oscillation between Corpus Callosum connectivity or non-connectivity. Or, instead it is attention that alternates while both hemispheres process in parallel.