5 ms·

Richard Hamming discusses clothing, presentation, and the cost of not conforming to expectations in You and Your Research.[1]. It's not exactly analogous to wha

by andrewl 12y ago

Richard Hamming discusses clothing, presentation, and the cost of not conforming to expectations in You and Your Research.[1]. It's not exactly analogous to what's described in the article, but related: John Tukey almost always dressed very casually. He would go into an important office and it would take a long time before the other fellow realized that this is a first-class man and he had better listen.For a long time John has had to overcome this kind of hostility. It's wasted effort! There are several paragraphs in that section, all worth reading (as is the entire essay). [1] http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~robins/YouAndYourResearch.html http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~robins/YouAndYourResearch.html

shawndumas 12y ago
"You should dress according to the expectations of the audience spoken to. If I am going to give an address at the MIT computer center, I dress with a bolo and an old corduroy jacket or something else. I know enough not to let my clothes, my appearance, my manners get in the way of what I care about. An enormous number of scientists feel they must assert their ego and do their thing their way. They have got to be able to do this, that, or the other thing, and they pay a steady price. John Tukey almost always dressed very casually. He would go into an important office and it would take a long time before the other fellow realized that this is a first-class man and he had better listen. For a long time John has had to overcome this kind of hostility. It's wasted effort! I didn't say you should conform; I said ``The appearance of conforming gets you a long way.'' If you chose to assert your ego in any number of ways, ``I am going to do it my way,'' you pay a small steady price throughout the whole of your professional career. And this, over a whole lifetime, adds up to an enormous amount of needless trouble."
- graycat 12y ago
  Gee, apparently it helps that I never saw Tukey, at least not in person! I heard about Tukey from (1) Tukey's lemma, equivalent to the axiom of choice, (2) convergence and uniformity in topology, (3) stepwise regression, (4) the statistics of power spectral estimation, (5) exploratory data analysis, and (6) the fast Fourier transform. So, with (1)-(6), I didn't pay attention to how he looked! But when I wanted to go for a Ph.D., I wrote him at Princeton, explained where my career had run into his work and asked if there was education for a career in such things. I got back a nice letter from G. S. Watson saying, "Yes" and claiming that Princeton was one of the best places for such work. I did apply to Princeton, and did get accepted, but I went to Johns Hopkins instead (my wife was already in her Ph.D. program there so that we wouldn't have to move!).

by andrewl 12y ago

shawndumas 12y ago

"You should dress according to the expectations of the audience spoken to. If I am going to give an address at the MIT computer center, I dress with a bolo and an old corduroy jacket or something else. I know enough not to let my clothes, my appearance, my manners get in the way of what I care about. An enormous number of scientists feel they must assert their ego and do their thing their way. They have got to be able to do this, that, or the other thing, and they pay a steady price. John Tukey almost always dressed very casually. He would go into an important office and it would take a long time before the other fellow realized that this is a first-class man and he had better listen. For a long time John has had to overcome this kind of hostility. It's wasted effort! I didn't say you should conform; I said ``The appearance of conforming gets you a long way.'' If you chose to assert your ego in any number of ways, ``I am going to do it my way,'' you pay a small steady price throughout the whole of your professional career. And this, over a whole lifetime, adds up to an enormous amount of needless trouble."

graycat 12y ago
Gee, apparently it helps that I never saw Tukey, at least not in person! I heard about Tukey from (1) Tukey's lemma, equivalent to the axiom of choice, (2) convergence and uniformity in topology, (3) stepwise regression, (4) the statistics of power spectral estimation, (5) exploratory data analysis, and (6) the fast Fourier transform. So, with (1)-(6), I didn't pay attention to how he looked! But when I wanted to go for a Ph.D., I wrote him at Princeton, explained where my career had run into his work and asked if there was education for a career in such things. I got back a nice letter from G. S. Watson saying, "Yes" and claiming that Princeton was one of the best places for such work. I did apply to Princeton, and did get accepted, but I went to Johns Hopkins instead (my wife was already in her Ph.D. program there so that we wouldn't have to move!).