Materialist theories of inspiration again diverge between purely internal and purely external sources. Karl Marx did not treat the subject directly, but the Marxist theory of art sees it as the expression of the friction between economic base and economic superstructural positions, or as an unaware dialog of competing ideologies, or as an exploitation of a "fissure" in the ruling class's ideology. Therefore, where there have been fully Marxist schools of art, such as Soviet Realism, the "inspired" painter or poet was also the most class-conscious painter or poet, and "formalism" was explicitly rejected as decadent (e.g. Sergei Eisenstein's late films condemned as "formalist error"). Outside of state-sponsored Marxist schools, Marxism has retained its emphasis on the class consciousness of the inspired painter or poet, but it has made room for what Frederic Jameson called a "political unconscious" that might be present in the artwork. However, in each of these cases, inspiration comes from the artist being particularly attuned to receive the signals from an external crisis.

In modern psychology, inspiration is not frequently studied, but it is generally seen as an entirely internal process. In each view, however, whether empiricist or mystical, inspiration is, by its nature, beyond control.

Software Inspire Products:

¨The visual learning and thinking software tool Inspiration is most widely known for its use in building graphic organizers, such as concept maps, mind maps, idea maps, diagrams and webs.

The visual learning software tool Kidspiration is used primarily by students in kindergarten through 5th grade to build graphic organizers such as idea maps, diagrams and webs in reading and writing, science, social studies and math. Math manipulatives - fraction tiles, pattern blocks, fraction boxes, color tiles, and base ten blocks - were added to the latest version released in 2008.

A new product called InspireData was released in July 2006. Originally funded under a grant from the National Science Foundation, InspireData was developed by TERC, an educational research and development lab. InspireData is a tool for collecting and analyzing data in science, math, and social studies.