You and Your Research
You and Your Research is the blueprint for a successful career in any discipline, not just research; in fact, the talk has the nickname “You and Your Career”. In this lecture, Richard Hamming shares his observations on “why do so few scientists make significant contributions and so many are forgotten in the long run?’’ Some of the key ideas include courage, luck, drive (“knowledge and productivity are like compound interest”), a focus on important problems (“If you do not work on an important problem, it’s unlikely you’ll do important work”), open doors, selling the work (“I suggest that when you open a journal, as you turn the pages, you ask why you read some articles and not others”), and much more. This should be required viewing for every high school student.
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