Home > Author > Richard Hamming

Richard Hamming QUOTES

Richard Hamming QUOTES

1 " Vicarious learning from the experiences of others saves making errors yourself, but I regard the study of successes as being basically more important than the study of failures. There are so many ways of being wrong and so few of being right, studying successes is more efficient. "

― Richard Hamming , The Art of Doing Science and Engineering: Learning to Learn

2 " What you learn from others you can use to follow.
What you learn for yourself you can use to lead. "

― Richard Hamming , The Art of Doing Science and Engineering: Learning to Learn

3 " The purpose of computation is insight, not numbers. "

― Richard Hamming

4 " 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. "

― Richard Hamming

5 " True greatness is when your name is like ampere, watt, and fourier—when it's spelled with a lower case letter. "

― Richard Hamming

6 " Does anyone believe that the difference between the Lebesgue and Riemann integrals can have physical significance, and that whether say, an airplane would or would not fly could depend on this difference? If such were claimed, I should not care to fly in that plane. "

― Richard Hamming

7 " Beware of finding what you're looking for.

[A favorite aphorism he often used.] "

― Richard Hamming

8 " 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. "

― Richard Hamming , The Art of Doing Science and Engineering: Learning to Learn

9 " If you don’t work on important problems, it’s not likely that you'll do important work. "

― Richard Hamming

10 " Newton said, 'If I have seen further than others, it is because I've stood on the shoulders of giants.' These days we stand on each other's feet! "

― Richard Hamming

11 " Most people like to believe something is or is not true. Great scientists tolerate ambiguity very well. They believe the theory enough to go ahead; they doubt it enough to notice the errors and faults so they can step forward and create the new replacement theory. If you believe too much you'll never notice the flaws; if you doubt too much you won't get started. It requires a lovely balance. "

― Richard Hamming ,

12 " It is not easy to become an educated person. "

― Richard Hamming , Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics

13 " Moral: to the extent you can choose, work on problems you think will be important. "

― Richard Hamming , The Art of Doing Science and Engineering: Learning to Learn

14 " The applications of knowledge, especially mathematics, reveal the unity of all knowledge. In a new situation almost anything and everything you ever learned might be applicable, and the artificial divisions seem to vanish. "

― Richard Hamming , Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics

15 " is a thin line between having enough self-confidence and being overconfident. I suppose the difference is whether you succeed or fail; when you win you are strong-willed, and when you lose you are stubborn! "

― Richard Hamming , The Art of Doing Science and Engineering: Learning to Learn

16 " A second reason the systems engineer’s design is never completed is the solution offered to the original problem usually produces both deeper insight and dissatisfactions in the engineers themselves. Furthermore, while the design phase continually goes from proposed solution to evaluation and back again and again, there comes a time when this process of redefinement must stop and the real problem be coped with—thus giving what they realize is, in the long run, a suboptimal solution. "

― Richard Hamming , The Art of Doing Science and Engineering: Learning to Learn

17 " 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? "

― Richard Hamming , The Art of Doing Science and Engineering: Learning to Learn

18 " If you cannot drop a wrong problem, then the first time you meet one you will be stuck with it for the rest of your career. Einstein was tremendously creative in his early years, but once he began, in midlife, the search for a unified theory, he spent the rest of his life on it and had about nothing to show for all the effort. I have seen this many times while watching how science is done. It is most likely to happen to the very creative people; their previous successes convince them they can solve any problem, but there are other reasons besides overconfidence why, in many fields, sterility sets in with advancing age. Managing a creative career is not an easy task, or else it would often be done. In mathematics, theoretical physics, and astrophysics, age seems to be a handicap (all characterized by high, raw creativity), while in music composition, literature, and statesmanship, age and experience seem to be an asset. As valued by Bell Telephone Laboratories in the late 1970s, the first 15 years of my career included all they listed, and for my second 15 years they listed nothing I was very closely associated with! Yes, in my areas the really great things are generally done while the person is young, much as in athletics, and in old age you can turn to coaching (teaching), as I have done. Of course, I do not know your field of expertise to say what effect age will have, but I suspect really great things will be realized fairly young, though it may take years to get them into practice. My advice is if you want to do significant things, now is the time to start thinking (if you have not already done so) and not wait until it is the proper moment—which may never arrive! "

― Richard Hamming , The Art of Doing Science and Engineering: Learning to Learn

19 " In closing I want to remind you yet again of Pasteur’s remark, “Luck favors the prepared mind.” Yes, it is a matter of luck just what you do; it is much less luck you will do something if you prepare yourself to succeed. “Creativity” is just another name for the great successes which make a difference in history. "

― Richard Hamming , The Art of Doing Science and Engineering: Learning to Learn

20 " The reason this happens so often is the creators have to fight through so many dark difficulties, and wade through so much misunderstanding and confusion, they cannot see the light as others can, now the door is open and the path made easy. Please remember, the inventor often has a very limited view of what he invented, and some others (you?) can see much more. "

― Richard Hamming , The Art of Doing Science and Engineering: Learning to Learn