Whether you think puzzles are a colossal waste of time or a great way to train your brain, author AJ Jacobs says there can be no doubt about the unifying nature of breaking a headache.
“This quest to solve problems comes deep inside us and we get such joy from fighting and solving problems. And the puzzles are almost a platonic ideal of this experience, “Jacobs told The Sunday Magazine host Pia Chatopadhya.
Jacobs is the author of the new book The Puzzler: One Man’s Question to Sold the most puzzling puzzles ever, from crossword puzzles to puzzles to the meaning of life. He says some people have misconceptions about puzzles, believing they are a trivial activity. But he argues that if you stop and take a closer look, puzzles can go beyond cubes, words and numbers.
Jacobs is the author of The Puzzler: One Man’s Quest for solving the most puzzling puzzles ever, from crossword puzzles to puzzles to the meaning of life. (Lem Latimer)
“I think even if you hate a certain type of puzzle – I’m not a big fan of Sudoku, for example – there will always be a puzzle for you and there will be a puzzle of life,” Jacobs said.
“So approach life like a puzzle. And I think it certainly made my life better, happier and less stressful.
Unity of the puzzle
Jacobs believes that puzzles unite more than just puzzle pieces.
“My Twitter show is usually full of stormy and uninformed opinions, but when Wordle’s madness came up, it was filled with these cute little yellow and green squares, so puzzles can be a unifying force,” he said.
Wordle, a puzzle application that requires people to guess a five-letter word once a day, launched in October 2021 and then gained popularity. In January, the New York Times bought it from former Reddit software engineer Josh Wardle.
As part of his study, Jacobs analyzed research in Wiser: Getting Beyond Groupthink to Make Groups Smarter by Cass R. Sunstein and Reed Hasty, which explored how groups can work together.
“They took liberals and conservatives and tried to figure out how you can bring them together,” he said. “And one of the only ways was to get them to collaborate on a crossword puzzle.”
In the popular Wordle game, the correct letters in the daily word puzzle are green, the incorrect letters are gray, and the letters in the word but in the wrong order are displayed as yellow. (powerlanguage.co.uk/wordle)
The puzzles also helped Jacobs’ parents keep in touch in 1964, at a time when his father was stationed in Korea as a military lawyer and his mother was still in the United States.
The couple mailed a crossword puzzle back and forth, each filling in one word and taking several months to complete.
“[It was] in my opinion, the least effective way to solve a crossword puzzle – but it is certainly romantic, “said Jacobs.
But not everyone agrees that puzzles are the best connecting force.
Stacey Costa says that while puzzles unite people, they can also cause some quarrels. Costa is what is called an enigmatologist, a man who studies puzzles and works at the University of Toronto.
Stacey Costa, a puzzle expert at the University of Toronto, says puzzles can help improve your mind, but you need to challenge yourself. (Erin Collins / CBC)
“If people are in the same genre of puzzles, 100 percent, they find qualities to connect with,” Costa said.
“Separation comes into play when people like different kinds of puzzles … some are more focused on math or more focused on logic, and others are more word-based.”
The Puzzle Way of Thinking
Like Jacobs, Costa believes that there is a puzzle for everyone, and if you think you are not a puzzle person, you may just have to try something different.
As well as being fun, Costa believes there are benefits to making puzzles, such as helping your brain come up with new ways to solve other types of problems. But to get these benefits, you have to deal with puzzles that challenge you, instead of choosing something you can quickly figure out.
“If you get involved in a puzzle that’s a little harder, then the mind will get stronger,” she said. “I think that’s the key: finding the level of difficulty for each individual.”
Depending on the puzzle, it can also readjust the brain as it uses new ways to deal with difficult problems – something that can help with critical thinking, she said.
But neurologist Daniel Levitin has challenged the idea that making puzzles improves neuroplasticity, the technical term for brain reorientation.
“There is no evidence that these brain training games actually make you smarter or improve your memory or prevent Alzheimer’s disease,” he said in an interview with the CBC in 2020.
“If you make sudoku puzzles or crossword puzzles, all you get better at are sudoku puzzles and crossword puzzles.”
Instead, it is learning a new skill that prevents cognitive decline, said the author of Successful Aging: The neurologist is exploring the power and potential of our lives. So for people who have never done puzzles, challenging something unfamiliar can improve brain health, Levitin said.
“It lubricates the neural circuits; it creates new synaptic connections, and this exercise of your brain to get out of your comfort zone is very important for successful aging.”
Jacobs’ parents used crossword puzzles to keep in touch, even when they were in other parts of the world. (Karen Blair / AFP / Getty Images)
He told Jacobs that he had seen clear evidence that the benefits extended beyond pencil and paper. While researching his book, he explores all sides of the Rubik’s Cube, which is a world of puzzles. He visited an unsolved puzzle at CIA headquarters, attended a world puzzle competition in Spain, and saw people from all over the world united in their love of puzzles.
“They encourage curiosity. They encourage what I call puzzling thinking, which is curiosity about everything – about life, family, politics, whatever,” Jacobs said.
He plans to apply this puzzling way of thinking in all aspects of his life.
“There is a motto used in the puzzle community: don’t get angry, be curious,” he said. “For example, if I’m talking to someone on the other side of the political spectrum, it’s a puzzle.” ? “
Written by Philip Drost. Produced by Sarah-Joyce Buttersby.
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