In three weeks we produced more than 20 concepts and discussed a handful more. We managed to produce both a highly creative discussion and a collective understanding of discussion. We don't have to think about how we write, bicycle, talk and walk. We just do it. This is because these actions are supported by unconscious processes called automata.
Unconscious processes have the stunning ability of being able to run in parallel.
This has some great disadvantages. When we do not have automata to rely on, our consciousness gets a heck of a lot to do. Much of our limitation on thinking capacity stems from the fact that our consciousness works serially. If consciousness were a parallel process, then we could drastically enhance our ability to think. Instead of having to totally rely on our unconscious processes as input for thinking, we can use the other people of a group as inputs.