When I solve a sudoku, I typically make quick, incremental progress, then I get “stuck” for a while, then there is an insight, then I make quick, incremental progress until I finish. Not that there is anything profound about sudokus, but something like this might provide a controlled environment for studying insights. http://websudoku.com/ provides an endless supply of classic sudokus in 4 levels of difficulty. My experience is that the “Evil” level is consistently difficult. I have noticed that my being tired or distracted is enough to make one of these unsolvable.
You also discussed cross-discipline insights. There are sudoku variants, such as sudokus with knight’s-move constraints. Here my experience is that having recently worked on a sudoku variant tends to interfere with solving a classic sudoku. I also solve the occasional chess problem, but have not noticed any interaction with sudokus.
When I solve a sudoku, I typically make quick, incremental progress, then I get “stuck” for a while, then there is an insight, then I make quick, incremental progress until I finish. Not that there is anything profound about sudokus, but something like this might provide a controlled environment for studying insights. http://websudoku.com/ provides an endless supply of classic sudokus in 4 levels of difficulty. My experience is that the “Evil” level is consistently difficult. I have noticed that my being tired or distracted is enough to make one of these unsolvable.
You also discussed cross-discipline insights. There are sudoku variants, such as sudokus with knight’s-move constraints. Here my experience is that having recently worked on a sudoku variant tends to interfere with solving a classic sudoku. I also solve the occasional chess problem, but have not noticed any interaction with sudokus.