How the Obscure Features Hypothesis Leads to Innovation Assistant Software

A new cognitive theory of innovation, the Obscure Features Hypothesis (OFH), states that almost all innovative solutions result from two steps: (1) noticing a rarely noticed or never-before noticed (i.e., obscure) feature of the problem’s elements, and (2) building a solution based on that obscure feature (McCaffrey 2011). Structural properties of the human semantic network make it possible to locate useful obscure features with a high probability. Innovation Assistant (IA) software interactively guides human users to the most likely obscure features for solving the problem at hand.

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