4 ms·

Hamming (of Hamming codes) has a famous Bell Labs talk "You and Your Research", describing how to have a large impact. It covers a lot of the same ground, but i

by kens 5y ago

Hamming (of Hamming codes) has a famous Bell Labs talk "You and Your Research", describing how to have a large impact. It covers a lot of the same ground, but in more detail: https://www.cs.virginia.edu/~robins/YouAndYourResearch.html https://www.cs.virginia.edu/~robins/YouAndYourResearch.html A few points from it: You've got to work on important problems. How about having lots of `brains?' It sounds good. But great work is something else than mere brains. The people who do great work with less ability but who are committed to it, get more done that those who have great skill and dabble in it. The prepared mind sooner or later finds something important and does it. So yes, it is luck. The particular thing you do is luck, but that you do something is not. One of the characteristics you see, and many people have it including great scientists, is that usually when they were young they had independent thoughts and had the courage to pursue them.

gonehome 5y ago
His book The Art of Doing Science and Engineering goes into some of this (and is just generally great): https://press.stripe.com/the-art-of-doing-science-and-engineering https://press.stripe.com/the-art-of-doing-science-and-engine...
- not-elite 5y ago
  Hamming is great in general. Some years ago, I picked up a copy of "Numerical Methods for Scientists and Engineers" for like $2 at a used book store. I had no idea who Hamming was, but it was cheap so I bought it. After the first chapter I thought, "this guy is pretty sharp let's see what else he's written." That is when I found "You and Your Research".
  - rramadass 5y ago
    All of Hamming's books are Great. Most are available from Dover Publications for cheap. In particular; checkout his * Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics. * The Art of Probability.
bambax 5y ago
Of course. PG's kind of obsessed by this and even republished the talk on his own website, for some reason: http://www.paulgraham.com/hamming.html http://www.paulgraham.com/hamming.html
- dang 5y ago
  Lots of past threads, most recently You and Your Research (1986) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28322153 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28322153 - Aug 2021 (35 comments) with links to the rest here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28323486 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28323486
justin66 5y ago
One of the relatively younger Bell Labs guys who experienced Hamming (in my memory it was either Ken Thompson or Kernighan) described in a public talk the way Hamming would approach young scientists and engineers in the cafeteria and harangue them if he deemed their current area of research non-world shaking, and therefore unworthy of their attention. It was a hilarious story because Hamming was described after a brief pause as a "curmudgeon" but one got the distinct impression Hamming's younger associates had other, more colorful words to describe him.
zem 5y ago
i think feynman's stance on "important problems" was a lot better: http://genius.cat-v.org/richard-feynman/writtings/letters/problems http://genius.cat-v.org/richard-feynman/writtings/letters/pr...

by kens 5y ago

gonehome 5y ago

His book The Art of Doing Science and Engineering goes into some of this (and is just generally great): https://press.stripe.com/the-art-of-doing-science-and-engineering https://press.stripe.com/the-art-of-doing-science-and-engine...

not-elite 5y ago
Hamming is great in general. Some years ago, I picked up a copy of "Numerical Methods for Scientists and Engineers" for like $2 at a used book store. I had no idea who Hamming was, but it was cheap so I bought it. After the first chapter I thought, "this guy is pretty sharp let's see what else he's written." That is when I found "You and Your Research".
- rramadass 5y ago
  All of Hamming's books are Great. Most are available from Dover Publications for cheap. In particular; checkout his * Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics. * The Art of Probability.

bambax 5y ago

Of course. PG's kind of obsessed by this and even republished the talk on his own website, for some reason: http://www.paulgraham.com/hamming.html http://www.paulgraham.com/hamming.html

dang 5y ago
Lots of past threads, most recently You and Your Research (1986) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28322153 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28322153 - Aug 2021 (35 comments) with links to the rest here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28323486 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28323486

justin66 5y ago

One of the relatively younger Bell Labs guys who experienced Hamming (in my memory it was either Ken Thompson or Kernighan) described in a public talk the way Hamming would approach young scientists and engineers in the cafeteria and harangue them if he deemed their current area of research non-world shaking, and therefore unworthy of their attention. It was a hilarious story because Hamming was described after a brief pause as a "curmudgeon" but one got the distinct impression Hamming's younger associates had other, more colorful words to describe him.

zem 5y ago

i think feynman's stance on "important problems" was a lot better: http://genius.cat-v.org/richard-feynman/writtings/letters/problems http://genius.cat-v.org/richard-feynman/writtings/letters/pr...