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Notes on Hamming's "You and Your Research"

Posted on May 13, 2023
tl;dr: Richard Hamming talked about his observations about why certain scientists come up with great innovations and others do not. This write-up summarizes the talk which boils down that first-class work comes from (i) focus on important problems, (ii) hard work and emotional commitment and (iii) courage to pursue your own thoughts.

Richard W. Hamming is a well-known mathematician and researcher who is best known for his work on error-correcting codes, and many other pioneering stuff (e.g. the Hamming Matrix, the Hamming Window and many more) in the area of computer and information science. In 1986 he held a talk with the title You and Your Research in which he shared his insights on the question Why do so few scientists make significant contributions and so many are forgotten in the long run?.

There is a very good transcription (thx to J.F. Kaiser) of this talk publicly available [1]. This write-up summarizes my notes and thoughts about this talk.

Notes and Thoughts

Hamming’s talk comes with a good structure and is very easy to read. He goes through his observations which makes a scientist perform first-class work and explains them with short anecdotes from his research life.

  • One of the basic and most obvious advice is work on great/important problems. However, how to decide what an important problem is, is not trivial. Hamming comes with some very bold examples (e.g. time travel) but also alleviates the topic by saying there is usually not one big thing but many small ones that will lead to great success.
  • Great researchers have independent thoughts and the courage to pursue them.
  • Poor working conditions can foster great outcomes as they often force innovation and creativity (e.g. a lack of computing power can lead to more efficient implementations).
  • Work hard and be emotionally committed which means you have to want it and prioritize your work.
  • If there is an opportunity grab it.
  • Stay open-minded - great thoughts do not only come from deep thinking but from exchange (with people that dare to challenge you).
  • Never solve isolated problems. Bring the issues to a higher abstraction level and solve a class of problems.
  • Stand on the should of giants and benefit from the scientific community and existing work.
  • Sell your research by writing good reports, publishing papers, holding formal and informal talks etc. Documentation and selling is >50% of the process.
  • You can and should control what you work on (i.e. educate your environment on what you think is important and stand up for it).
  • Do not go for fame but see the process of doing first-class work as the reward.
  • Turn personal defects into assets (e.g. use your ego to push yourself).
  • Choose your battles wisely: Do not fight the system if not necessary and adjust if this makes your life easier and helps you to pursue your actual agenda.
  • Change your subject (not completely) every seven years to don’t get stuck with one topic.

I agree with most of the points made by Hamming even though the reading did not hold any ground-breaking news for me. Nevertheless, it inspired me to rethink some of my current work and behaviors. Especially the question of how to find important problems struck me and will be a topic of a future post I guess.

Lastly, I stumbled over a quote (which goes back to Louis Pasteur) that I liked a lot and that matches many of my experiences.

“Luck favors the prepared mind.”

The transcript was a nice little read and I would recommend checking it out [1]. Next, I will have a closer look at Hamming’s book about science and engineering [2].

Further Reading