4 ms·

Most of the scientific breakthroughs are achieved by select few super talented scientists. But since we have no way to tell ahead of time who will become such a

by lr1970 6y ago

Most of the scientific breakthroughs are achieved by select few super talented scientists. But since we have no way to tell ahead of time who will become such a genius, we should educate and employ large number of scientists even if only tiny few of them will become next Einsteins.

gaogao 6y ago
Reminds me of the Ratatouille monologue > In the past, I have made no secret of my disdain for Chef Gusteau’s famous motto: Anyone can cook. But I realize, only now do I truly understand what he meant. Not everyone can become a great artist, but a great artist can come from anywhere. It is difficult to imagine more humble origins than those of the genius now cooking at Gusteau’s, who is, in this critic’s opinion, nothing less than the finest chef in France. I will be returning to Gusteau’s soon, hungry for more.
- mhh__ 6y ago
  The whole monologue is brilliant. It's an amazing film.
- ausbah 6y ago
  reading it in his voice really adds some oomph to his speech
dalbasal 6y ago
I agree, but I'm not sure that's enough. "More people working on it" isn't always better. I agree that have no way to tell ahead of time. That said, I don't think this works like buying a lot of lottery tickets. A breakthrough isn't random, even if it is unpredictable. It also isn't just a function of who the scientist inherently is. Circumstances may be the bigger half of the equation. If a patent clerk shows up with relativity, there is no shortage of places that will provide him a desk and some pencils. Newton emerged out of aristocracy, as did Darwin and many others. Tenured professorships are/were an attempt to replicate those circumstances in many ways. Einstein came out of a patent clerk job. In today's terms this is a wfh with lots of bullshit time. We have a lot of math educated people today with these circumstances. It's just a really hard question.. how do we get more "one offs." IIRC pg named it black swan farming. "Employ" is a broad term and I suspect how its defined matters here.
- jacobr1 6y ago
  I also wonder how much access to material resources matter. For mathematical exercises, you don't need much and if you do a modern laptop and open source tools are probably fine for most subfields, but access to high-energy conditions, or wet-labs are harder to come by.
  - dalbasal 6y ago
    I think it's very unlikely they don't play a huge role. Accessibility of all kind is essential, and the bar can never be low enough. I think the age of the internet has taught us this much.
api 6y ago
I had the same thought a while back on the "bullshit jobs" idea. We know that a large percentage of jobs are probably unnecessary. The problem is that we don't know which jobs those are, and finding out is surprisingly hard. A whole lot of things are like this.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
birdsbirdsbirds 6y ago
Or we shouldn't. Education gets diluted the more people are educated. Think about how much you learn in university in a short time compared to how much you learn in school. Now imagine you would have gone to school only with the ones who finished university. How much more would you have learned during that time? Then imagine a fully equipped university that isn't filled with rich kids but with the brightest. Think of Katalin Karikó[1]. We don't trust the degrees because everybody can get one nowadays. That's why established figures in a field decide what is worthwhile to research instead of giving that responsibility to the ones who have proven that they can think for themselves. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katalin_Karik%c3%b3 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katalin_Karik%c3%b3
- optimalsolver 6y ago
  >Then imagine a fully equipped university that isn't filled with rich kids but with the brightest. Who's gonna pay for it?
  - higerordermap 6y ago
    Technically, the industry should afford to. Commoditization of education so brightest kids can get the best of it is a net benefit to the industry. But as long as industry is filled with dumbfuck MBAs it won't happen.
  - TheOtherHobbes 6y ago
    Who pays for the MBAs clogging up our economy?
    - imtringued 6y ago
      The students by going into debt?
  - sien 6y ago
    Isn't that pretty much what Caltech, IIT, the University of Tokyo or Cambridge or Oxford are? No legacy admissions. No quotas. Large populations trying to get in through entrance exams and school performance? (Lots of rich kids wind up at those places, but they have worked for it)
pitspotter 6y ago
I'm not sure it's possible to educate such people. Newton's breakthroughs came during a temporary excursion from university. Einstein was considered a failure who would not do as he was told. Darwin dropped out of medical school. These are not the sort of people you would give a job too, either, because they were basically unpleasant and unreliable in everyday life.
- ausbah 6y ago
  that's a super biased sampling, for every Einstein you're going to have 100 other impactful researchers who followed the traditional route of schooling I think a better way of framing it is that people with some talent will emerge naturally no matter their circumstances
ska 6y ago
> Most of the scientific breakthroughs are achieved by select few super talented scientists. It isn't at all clear that this is true. A lot of real advances are made by a largish collection of people plugging away and sharing ideas. We really love the narrative around the archetype of a lone inventor, but it's rarely that clear cut. This is exacerbated by the incentive structures - we want to pick "winners". This isn't to say that there aren't people who really stand out, far from it. But it's probably a mistake to account too much progress to them.

by lr1970 6y ago

gaogao 6y ago

Reminds me of the Ratatouille monologue > In the past, I have made no secret of my disdain for Chef Gusteau’s famous motto: Anyone can cook. But I realize, only now do I truly understand what he meant. Not everyone can become a great artist, but a great artist can come from anywhere. It is difficult to imagine more humble origins than those of the genius now cooking at Gusteau’s, who is, in this critic’s opinion, nothing less than the finest chef in France. I will be returning to Gusteau’s soon, hungry for more.

mhh__ 6y ago
The whole monologue is brilliant. It's an amazing film.
ausbah 6y ago
reading it in his voice really adds some oomph to his speech

dalbasal 6y ago

I agree, but I'm not sure that's enough. "More people working on it" isn't always better. I agree that have no way to tell ahead of time. That said, I don't think this works like buying a lot of lottery tickets. A breakthrough isn't random, even if it is unpredictable. It also isn't just a function of who the scientist inherently is. Circumstances may be the bigger half of the equation. If a patent clerk shows up with relativity, there is no shortage of places that will provide him a desk and some pencils. Newton emerged out of aristocracy, as did Darwin and many others. Tenured professorships are/were an attempt to replicate those circumstances in many ways. Einstein came out of a patent clerk job. In today's terms this is a wfh with lots of bullshit time. We have a lot of math educated people today with these circumstances. It's just a really hard question.. how do we get more "one offs." IIRC pg named it black swan farming. "Employ" is a broad term and I suspect how its defined matters here.

jacobr1 6y ago
I also wonder how much access to material resources matter. For mathematical exercises, you don't need much and if you do a modern laptop and open source tools are probably fine for most subfields, but access to high-energy conditions, or wet-labs are harder to come by.
- dalbasal 6y ago
  I think it's very unlikely they don't play a huge role. Accessibility of all kind is essential, and the bar can never be low enough. I think the age of the internet has taught us this much.

api 6y ago

I had the same thought a while back on the "bullshit jobs" idea. We know that a large percentage of jobs are probably unnecessary. The problem is that we don't know which jobs those are, and finding out is surprisingly hard. A whole lot of things are like this.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

birdsbirdsbirds 6y ago

Or we shouldn't. Education gets diluted the more people are educated. Think about how much you learn in university in a short time compared to how much you learn in school. Now imagine you would have gone to school only with the ones who finished university. How much more would you have learned during that time? Then imagine a fully equipped university that isn't filled with rich kids but with the brightest. Think of Katalin Karikó[1]. We don't trust the degrees because everybody can get one nowadays. That's why established figures in a field decide what is worthwhile to research instead of giving that responsibility to the ones who have proven that they can think for themselves. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katalin_Karik%c3%b3 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katalin_Karik%c3%b3

optimalsolver 6y ago
>Then imagine a fully equipped university that isn't filled with rich kids but with the brightest. Who's gonna pay for it?
- higerordermap 6y ago
  Technically, the industry should afford to. Commoditization of education so brightest kids can get the best of it is a net benefit to the industry. But as long as industry is filled with dumbfuck MBAs it won't happen.
- TheOtherHobbes 6y ago
  Who pays for the MBAs clogging up our economy?
  - imtringued 6y ago
    The students by going into debt?
- sien 6y ago
  Isn't that pretty much what Caltech, IIT, the University of Tokyo or Cambridge or Oxford are? No legacy admissions. No quotas. Large populations trying to get in through entrance exams and school performance? (Lots of rich kids wind up at those places, but they have worked for it)

pitspotter 6y ago

I'm not sure it's possible to educate such people. Newton's breakthroughs came during a temporary excursion from university. Einstein was considered a failure who would not do as he was told. Darwin dropped out of medical school. These are not the sort of people you would give a job too, either, because they were basically unpleasant and unreliable in everyday life.

ausbah 6y ago
that's a super biased sampling, for every Einstein you're going to have 100 other impactful researchers who followed the traditional route of schooling I think a better way of framing it is that people with some talent will emerge naturally no matter their circumstances

ska 6y ago

> Most of the scientific breakthroughs are achieved by select few super talented scientists. It isn't at all clear that this is true. A lot of real advances are made by a largish collection of people plugging away and sharing ideas. We really love the narrative around the archetype of a lone inventor, but it's rarely that clear cut. This is exacerbated by the incentive structures - we want to pick "winners". This isn't to say that there aren't people who really stand out, far from it. But it's probably a mistake to account too much progress to them.