Extending your concept of “clash” a bit further, isn’t that the basis of human creativity across art, science, business, relationships, etc?
In science, which was my first love, there is a saying that, “the best measure of the greatness of any scientist is the amount of time she or he is able to impede the progress of science”. Ideas are in constant minor motion, but great ideas are like intellectual earthquakes, able to suck up change-energy for decades or centuries.
Disruptive new ideas often seem to work best with cognitive dissonance – a combination of two ideas that people are already comfortable with separately, but had never considered meshed together. Art that is ‘arresting’ of your attention usually works this way.
That’s the “Eureka!” moment that venture capitalists are looking for: a similarly arresting business model or product or service. Entrepreneurs need to showcase something in their venture that wakes people up with its originality, otherwise they’ll be seen as part of the constant minor motion.
Meshing up a new idea is tough enough, but it is usually even harder to find a way to communicate it compellingly. Images, stories, metaphors are your best tools for “crossing the chasm” of peoples’ understanding and behaviour.
Timing and luck play an important role. In human ideas, very much like plate tectonics, all kinds of invisible forces build tensions that can’t even be measured until a major disruption happens when a single right idea occurs at the right place, at the right time.