The myth of the lone genius distorts how creativity works. Newton said he stood "on the shoulders of giants" — but he also collaborated intensively with colleagues, argued with contemporaries, and built on the work of dozens of predecessors. Einstein's theory of relativity owed crucial insights to his conversations with Marcel Grossmann, Michele Besso, and Mileva Marić. Darwin's evolution theory was shaped by a vast correspondence network with other naturalists. The "individual genius" narrative is a post-hoc simplification of fundamentally collaborative intellectual processes.

Yet research on brainstorming shows groups often underperform. Alex Osborn's claim that brainstorming groups produce more creative ideas than individuals working alone has been consistently contradicted by experiments. "Nominal groups" — where individuals generate ideas independently and then pool them — typically outperform interacting groups in quantity and quality of ideas. Why? Production blocking: in a group, only one person can talk at a time, while others wait; hearing others' ideas can anchor your own thinking to similar domains; and social pressure discourages expressing unconventional ideas. Traditional brainstorming creates conditions that often suppress rather than promote creativity.

When does collaboration actually improve outcomes? Research suggests collaboration adds value when: (1) the problem has multiple distinct components that can be divided and recombined; (2) team members bring genuinely different knowledge, skills, or perspectives; (3) the task is sufficiently complex that no individual can hold all relevant information in mind; and (4) there are good communication practices that allow differences to be surfaced and integrated. Collaboration is not always better than individual work — the question is under what conditions.