The Art of Doing Science and Engineering 🤔⚙️
As a CS/AI developer, physics enthusiast, and …, I found a lot of insightful ideas in “The Art of Science and Engineering” by Richard Hamming. First of all, the author, whom I found out from my colleague is a foundational computer scientist who lived during the emergence of the first computers, alongside figures like Turing, Tukey, von Neumann, etc. He witnessed all of it and made great contributions himself. I absolutely geeked out over his deep knowledge and understanding of the concepts and learned a lot.
In his book, he talks about how to become a leader, what mistakes some made, and what others did right to eventually get themselves imprinted in history. He supports it alongside his vast experience and actions of others seen. It’s a great book, 10/10 would recommend, although a background in CS might be useful (like actual CS, not coding).
пока читал я сохранил множество его историй, так как это то обычно о чем никто на лекциях или из книг истории не расскажет. this dude witnessed the birth of computer science and was in the epicenter of it. was part of the manhattan project, and simulated physics of atomic bombs. developed error correction and self taught signal processing. connected the right people so that later the could revolutionize science as we know it. been to the first AI meet ups and has the most sane views on it. I would like to share all of them, but can’t.
Although, here are a few short excerpts I from the book:
It is well known the drunken sailor who staggers to the left or right with n independent random steps will, on the average, end up about steps from the origin. But if there is a pretty girl in one direction, then his steps will tend to go in that direction and he will go a distance proportional to n. In a lifetime of many, many independent choices, small and large, a career with a vision will get you a distance proportional to n, while no vision will get you only the distance . In a sense, the main difference between those who go far and those who do not is some people have a vision and the others do not and therefore can only react to the current events as they happen.
You will probably object that if you try to get a vision now it is likely to be wrong—and my reply is from observation I have seen the accuracy of the vision matters less than you might suppose, getting anywhere is better than drifting, there are potentially many paths to greatness for you, and just which path you go on, so long as it takes you to greatness, is none of my business. You must, as in the case of forging your personal style, find your vision of your future career, and then follow it as best you can.
I need to discuss science vs. engineering. Put glibly:
- In science if you know what you are doing you should not be doing it.
- In engineering if you do not know what you are doing you should not be doing it.
It has often been observed the true gain is in the struggle and not in the achievement—a life without a struggle on your part to make yourself excellent is hardly a life worth living. This, it must be observed, is an opinion and not a fact, […]
Doctors clearly do not follow the advice they give to others, and they also have a high proportion of drug addicts. Lawyers often do not leave decent wills when they die. Almost all professionals are slow to use their own expertise for their own work. The situation is nicely summarized by the old saying, “The shoe maker’s children go without shoes”. Consider how in the future, when you are a great expert, you will avoid this typical error!
I began, at any lecture I attended anywhere, to pay attention not only to what was said, but to the style in which it was said, and whether it was an effective or a noneffective talk. Those talks which were merely funny I tended to ignore, though I studied the style of joke telling closely. An after dinner speech requires, generally, three good jokes; one at the beginning, one in the middle, and a closing one so that they will at least remember one joke; all jokes of course told well. I had to find my own style of joke telling, and I practiced it by telling jokes to secretaries.
If you don’t work on important problems, it’s not likely that you’ll do important work.
When you are famous it is hard to work on small problems. This is what did Shannon in. After information theory, what do you do for an encore? The great scientists often make this error. They fail to continue to plant the little acorns from which the mighty oak trees grow. They try to get the big thing right off. And that isn’t the way things go. So that is another reason why you find that when you get early recognition it seems to sterilize you.
True greatness is when your name is like ampere, watt, and fourier — when it’s spelled with a lower case letter.
How far machines will go in changing society is a matter of speculation—which opens doors to topics that would cause trouble if discussed openly! Hence I must leave it to your imaginations as to what, using computers on chips, can be done in such areas as sex, marriage, sports, games, “travel in the comforts of home via virtual realities”, and other human activities.
Realize, as a general rule, it is not the same job you should do with a machine, but rather an equivalent one, and do it so then future, flexible, expansion can be easily added (if you do succeed).
While the problem of AI can be viewed as, “Which of all the things humans do can machines also do?” I would prefer to ask the question in another form, “Of all of life’s burdens, which are those machines can relieve, or significantly ease, for us?”
Learning a new subject is something you will have to do many times in your career if you are to be a leader and not be left behind as a follower by newer developments.
If you will only ask yourself, “Is what I am being told really true?,” it is amazing how much you can find is, or borders on, being false, even in a well-developed field.
When something is claimed to be new, do not be too hasty to think it is just the past slightly improved - it might be a great opportunity for you to do significant things. But again it may be nothing new.
Are you so much better in doing a simulation you can be trusted not to find what you want to find? Self-delusion is a very common trait of humans.
Beware of the power of wishful thinking on your part—you would like it to be true so you assume it is true!
All impossibility proofs must rest on a number of assumptions which may or may not apply in the particular situation.
“If an expert says something can be done he is probably correct, but if he says it is impossible then consider getting another opinion.”
Moral: when you know something cannot be done, also remember the essential reason why, so later, when the circumstances have changed, you will not say, “It can’t be done”. Think of my error! How much more stupid can anyone be? Fortunately for my ego, it is a common mistake (and I have done it more than once) but due to my goof on the FFT I am very sensitive to it now. I also note when others do it—which is all too often! Please remember the story of how stupid I was and what I missed, and not make that mistake yourself. When you decide something is not possible, don’t say at a later date it is still impossible without first reviewing all the details of why you originally were right in saying it couldn’t be done.