My theory is that as our brains evolved, many of the complex problems they faced were social. Communicating ideas to somebody else probably uses different parts

My theory is that as our brains evolved, many of the complex problems they faced were social. Communicating ideas to somebody else probably uses different parts of the brain than solitary thinking does. It's best when the listener has good ideas, but sometimes just the act of communicating the problem can get you unstuck. Anthropomorphising parts of a problem ("this object is trying to send this message to this other one, but it isn't getting through") can be useful, for the same reason.