"You Don't Understand Ordinary People" - Feynman Gives Advice to Wolfram | Hacker News Reader

"You Don't Understand Ordinary People" - Feynman Gives Advice to Wolfram

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264 pointsJoelSutherland78 comments

Wolfram is damn smart. I'll give him that.

He also made a pile of money on Mathematica. I'll give him that as well. It was classic "solve your own problem" entrepreneurship. He needed a better computer algebra program, so he wrote one, then started selling it.[1]

But he's a crank. He wrote a couple good papers in the 80s, then hasn't done anything decent since. He published A New Kind Of Science in 2002, which was supposed to change the world; except that half of it was nonsense and the other half was stolen from other people. (http://www.cscs.umich.edu/~crshalizi/reviews/wolfram/)

Feynnman (kinda) calls him out on this: Complexity research doesn't need its own institute, because complexity research is a pseudoscience that means whatever you want it to mean, like how the homepathy quacks have latched on to the word "quantum".

1: Wolfram Alpha is the same thing. Wolfram wanted a natural language parser, so he wrote one. Except it doesn't work worth a damn, because natural language parsing is a hideously difficult problem, which probably requires strong AI.

Did Feynman said that elsewhere? A more generous interpretation is that "complexity" is a genuine interdisciplinary subject, but for administrative/academic/whatever reasons it doesn't need its own institute.

> He published A New Kind Of Science in 2002

I read it, back in 2002, and was quite excited before starting, but I honestly can't recall a single thing from that book. I can't even remember if I was disappointed after reading it.

Is that Wolfram's fault, or yours?

One would have to determine whether he remembers things from other books he was excited about reading. My guess, given his phrasing, is that he does.

>Complexity research doesn't need its own institute, because complexity research is a pseudoscience that means whatever you want it to mean

This. As far as I can tell, "complexity science" is really just a dumping ground for things we haven't figured out yet. Some pattern seemingly ‘emerges’ out of nowhere? Complexity! Feedback loops causing unpredictable behavior? Complexity! Non-linear or ‘chaotic’ behavior that's difficult to interpret? Complexity! Don’t know where something starts or stops? Complexity! Self-reference or deep, recursive hierarchies doing something weird? Complexity! You can’t talk about any of them without using the phrase “don’t know”. It’s a field defined by our ignorance.

> Feynnman (kinda) calls him out on this: Complexity research doesn't need its own institute, because complexity research is a pseudoscience

I think you're reading a lot more into Feynman's comment than is there. All Feynman says is that the organization of science does not inhibit complexity research.

Thanks for the link to Cosma Shalizi's review of A New Kind of Science; I greatly enjoyed it. I'm also quite fond of this Amazon review:

http://www.amazon.com/review/R6B8KO2M32P8G

One thing to keep in mind is that probably all the bashing of "A New Kind of Science" has more to do with the perception of Wolfram being arrogant or self-centered than with actual merits (or lack of them) of the book.

My favorite Wolfram "dig" went something along the lines of: "The question is who will become self aware first: Wolfram or Wolfram Alpha.", eluding to the fact that apparently he is pretty impressed with himself and happy to share it. Can't remember who said it though. Anyway, this post just made me remember it.

The bit I particularly like is the fact that Feynman was also one of the great minds who did understand ordinary people.

I regularly dig out his lectures on pop-physics for a refresher :D

Exactly....I swear Feynman could have encountered the proverbial pig farmer and talked for several hours and left, and if someone told the farmer who they were talking to later, they wouldn't believe them, they'd just say he was an extremely interesting guy. He could find interesting things about almost any subject, and get everyone excited about them.

Classic Feynman: "with one exception, fall madly in love!"

Someone once said that madness was necessary for creating. Does anybody know who it was? Can't find it.

Maybe this is what you're thinking of, it's by Nietzsche.

One must have chaos within oneself, to give birth to a dancing star.

If it isn't, it is in any case a great sentence. Thank you.

Lot of people said that, in a way or another.

One version, by John Dryden (1681):

Great wits are sure to madness near allied, and thin partitions do their bounds divide.

"A little madness now and then, is relished by the wisest men" - Mr Willy Wonka.

"Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory" must have been where I read it, ages ago. Thank you!

It's interesting because Wolfram quotes Feynman as saying:

"Peace of mind is the most important prerequisite for creative work."

http://www.stephenwolfram.com/publications/recent/feynman/

I think you can be a peaceful nut-case though. I am the living proof ;-) No seriously though, "peace of mind" and "madness" or insanity are not necessarily contrary to one another.

Peace of mind can just as easily be interpreted as "comfort within one's madness."

"The opposite of a correct statement is a false statement. But the opposite of a profound truth may well be another profound truth."

Niels Bohr

Austrian physicist Wolfgang Pauli once dismissed a muddled analysis of a physics problem saying, "It's not right. It's not even wrong."

Either Aristotle or Seneca said "There was never a great genius without a tincture of madness".

Perhaps:

The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man.

-- George Bernard Shaw

I believe this is what you're thinking of.

“No great genius has ever existed without some touch of madness.” -- Aristotle

“There is no great genius without some touch of madness.” -- Seneca

Why limit yourself to falling in love only with non-technical people? :)

"...as little contact with non-technical people, with one exception..."

Meaning: when it comes to love, don't shy away from people just because they're non-technical.

The comments on that make we want to tear my hair out. About half the posts are people convinced Feynman is implying that all women are necessarily non-technical.

That is partially true: during the first part of his life, Feynman really didn't have a high opinion of the intellectual capabilities of women.

Really? Can I ask what you're basing that on? I'm not disbelieving you, just skeptically curious :)

http://www.fotuva.org/online/frameload.htm?/online/science.h...

When he talks about his time at Cornell: "She went on and said, "Suppose you have another line coming in from the other side, and you want to figure out where they are going to intersect. Suppose on one line you go over two to the right for every one you go up, and the other line goes over three to the right for every one that it goes up, and they start twenty steps apart," etc.--I was flabbergasted. She figured out where the intersection was. It turned out that one girl was explaining to the other how to knit argyle socks. I, therefore, did learn a lesson: The female mind is capable of understanding analytic geometry. Those people who have for years been insisting (in the face of all obvious evidence to the contrary) that the male and female are equally capable of rational thought may have something. The difficulty may just be that we have never yet discovered a way to communicate with the female mind. If it is done in the right way, you may be able to get something out of it."

Interesting, thanks. But, without meaning to excuse it, I do wonder how much of that was

a) tongue in cheek (given that it was an informal talk rather than an essay or article)

b) just a reflection of the general attitudes of the era

c) indeed down to personal prejudice

I'm guessing though that whatever prejudices he had must have been re-evaluated by the time he encouraged his sister to go into science

This is not an isolated case either. There are quite a few incidents in print where Feynman shows he had the traditional mindset about females (to put it mildly).

Quoting [1]: 'The charming side of Richard helped people forgive him for his uncharming characteristics. For example, in many ways Richard was a sexist. Whenever it came time for his daily bowl of soup he would look around for the nearest "girl" and ask if she would fetch it to him. It did not matter if she was the cook, an engineer, or the president of the company. I once asked a female engineer who had just been a victim of this if it bothered her. "Yes, it really annoys me," she said. "On the other hand, he is the only one who ever explained quantum mechanics to me as if I could understand it." That was the essence of Richard's charm.'

However, afaik that was mostly because of (b), the general attitudes of the time.

[1]http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http%3A... (Google cache since the original page seems down)

That was a priceless post. Turns out Feynman was wrong on one thing though. Wolfram does like being the boss. Possibly very much.

Wolfram learned to like it in the process..

Citation, please.

The impression I got from this talk: http://www.stephenwolfram.com/publications/recent/ycombinato... is that he became a businessman reluctantly.

I don't read reluctance into those comments at all. Just look at the comments on personnel management. It's clear he likes it. The early remarks about the "stupid decisions" being made at the first company are a clear sign. Most business leaders know it's culturally not cool to talk like they enjoy leadership. To me, Wolfram went to the enfant terrible school of management. At least he turned out to be competent enough to last.

you make it sound like a good thing.

Which thing?

If you haven't read any of Richard Feynman's books, I highly recommend them. They're not only fascinating, but with a wonderful sense of humor, as well. I particularly love the chapter in "Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!" about his safecracking exploits. Not only did it show his physical skills and dexterity, but his ability to do social engineering, as well. Great stuff.

In "What Do You Care What Other People Think?" he talks a lot about the investigation into the Challenger explosion. Amazing writing on such a serious topic, in my opinion.

Feynman is one of my few heroes. This is an interesting situation. Feynman was right and Wolfram did what he wanted and was successful. Perhaps by taking Feynman's advice to heart. Who knows?

The advice was good; however, you can take a path that is not sensible yet succeed by sheer willpower, huge amounts of luck or to a lesser extent great ability.

Advice like this is intended to maximize the probability of success. To put it into a HN familiar example, don't be a single founder because single founders are x% less likely to succeed. The fact that single founders can and do succeed all the time does not make the advice bad, it just shows it to be the generalization that it is.

I'd like to see a transcript of the letter this was written in response to.

Here's both letters: http://elzr.com/posts/wolfram-feynman

"Wolfram did not follow Feynman's advice. Not only did he establish an institute but he also founded the company Wolfram Research, makers of the widely used Mathematica software system. Contrary to Feynman’s expectation Wolfram has been a successful CEO for many years. Within this environment he has managed to pursue ambitious directions in basic science, particularly through his 2002 book A New Kind of Science. He has also been happily married since the early 1990s."

The NKS seminars and forums Wolfram has tried to create are exactly the sort of thing he said he wanted to do back then. They are weak institutions because they are dominated by him and his ideas; they're like a debating society in North Korea. Maybe you'll get a new angle on how awesome is the Glorious Leader, but there will be no surprises.

What does the "RPF;ht" at the bottom stand for? (I vaguely recall this being an old convention of something?)

They're the initials of the author (in caps) and the typist (in lowercase).

'ht' is Helen Tuck, the secretary at Caltech's Theory Group for many years; that mark indicates she typed the letter. I was there many years after Feynman passed away, but I have fond memories of Helen and some of the stories she had to tell about the "old days".

http://pr.caltech.edu/periodicals/336/articles/Volume%202/05...

Despite ignoring Feynman's advice, Wolfram seems to have done well enough, at least financially. Whether his sanity has lasted is another question entirely.

I think Feynman gave him HIGHLY ACCURATE advice, but you have to dig deeper to understand.

Although Wolfram has done quite well for himself, this is beside the point.

You might want to read both sides of the conversation:

http://elzr.com/posts/wolfram-feynman

and then read this article:

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/10.06/wolfram_pr.html

in particular, starting here:

"in the spring of 1992, he became, in his own words, a "recluse."

So, he figured out a way to get away from the administration and concentrate on the science.

I suspect that Feynman's advice probably helped Wolfram steer a clear course through all this.

I wonder if we will ever get to read such transcripts in this age of private emails and ephemeral conversations.

For every person who has gchat set to never document anything, there's another neurotic packrat like my brother who saves all of his chat history so he can go back and show people how prior conversations went whenever there's a disagreement over what was said.

I used to do this. I have a wonderful memory for conversations I've had with people. I ended up turning off chat logging in every app I used because it just became a little too destructive to relationships.

Calling somebody out with cold hard facts works better on to-catch-a-predator than when it's people you enjoy being around :-)

Well, Gmail will archive most of those :P (or Hotmail, Yahoo or your webmail provider of choice).

i thought this was in response to Wolfram Alpha.

Feynman was dead for many years before Wolfram Alpha came out. That would have been some feat to communicate with him then:)

The letter is also dated: October 14, 1985.

I think the grandparent meant for the comment to be taken in jest.

He passed away long before WA

brilliant man, and one of my heroes/idols

Who is the Feynman of our time?

Feynman.

Sorry man, I think he was a one-off from the factory.

Surely You're Joking

From YC speech: "I think I had about 15 employees by then."

Very cool site. <3 HN for these little gems.

Richard Feynman is kind of a jerk.

Edit: What I mean is:

How condescending is it to write someone a letter saying that they don't understand people, and they should try falling in love?

I don't think he's a jerk, but yes, many people would 'cushion' that assessment with 'it seems like' or 'I don't mean to offend, but I suggest'. Others don't get the need to do that. Personally I find there's a balance between being direct and handling people's egos.

How condescending is it to write someone a letter saying that they don't understand people, and they should try falling in love?

Under ordinary circumstances, pretty condescending. However remember that:

a) Wolfram was a 26-year-old at the start of his career and Feynman was 68 years old and easily one of the most respected scientists in the world.

b) Wolfram wrote to Feynman for advice. To get any response from someone that many levels above you is doing pretty well.

c) Wolfram started it -- he was the one who talked about ordinary people being "stupid fools" whom he couldn't tolerate.

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