Is a very high IQ bad for open-ended creativity?

Question

While a very high IQ is clearly excellent for directed creativity (e.g., solving a given math problem), one might expect it to be not so great for open-ended creativity (e.g., writing a novel, designing a novel game, etc.).Is this the case?

jqpabc123 · Accepted Answer

Creativity is hard to define and measure.
Is the concept of selling water in a bottle an act of creativity?
When I was growing up, bottled water didn't exist as a readily available consumer retail item. When I first heard the concept, my initial thoughts were, "No way! People won't pay for something that is freely available".
My high IQ brain just couldn't conceive of the creative possibility. And yet today, Coke Inc. earns more money selling bottled water than they do from their secret formula for Coca-Cola.

nabla9 · Answer

No evidence, and no reason to expect that to be the case. I also don't think that things like math are predominantly directed creativity. Math at the highest level is extremely open ended.
The problem in fields you describe comes from the audience. If you want to have a audience you must do works for that audience to understand and enjoy. If the experiences and interests are too different, it does not work.
Some people like Stephen King are very good and highly intelligent, but they are not popular just because they are good writers. They write for the audience with reading level of a teenager. It's a conscious choice. It's slightly more boring to read than necessary for maybe 20% of the readers but it pays off.

egfx · Answer

Creativity breeds out of constraint and limitation. If you have all the resources in the world or all the smarts then there is no need to be creative.

sysadm1n · Answer

> writing a novelThe engineer in me has pondered writing a program that generates novels using sample data from roughly 10,000 popular novels, and generating a plot algorithmically, with syntax, choice of wording, and character development all done with code.

powerbroker · Answer

High IQ is uncorrelated to creativity. Creativity is more correlated with the willingness to take risks, such as, for example:
* Looking stupid;
* accidentally setting things on fire;
* running a couple businesses into the ground;
* being among the first to launch off a mountain with your hang glider;
* making ugly art.

Is a very high IQ bad for open-ended creativity?

While a very high IQ is clearly excellent for directed creativity (e.g., solving a given math problem), one might expect it to be not so great for open-ended creativity (e.g., writing a novel, designing a novel game, etc.).
Is this the case?

Creativity breeds out of constraint and limitation. If you have all the resources in the world or all the smarts then there is no need to be creative.

> writing a novel
The engineer in me has pondered writing a program that generates novels using sample data from roughly 10,000 popular novels, and generating a plot algorithmically, with syntax, choice of wording, and character development all done with code.