Feynman's Messenger Lectures (1964) | Hacker News Reader

Feynman's Messenger Lectures (1964)

feynmanlectures.caltech.edu

271 pointsbookofjoe78 comments

From the provost's introduction to Feynman:

> The chairman suggested that an annual salary of $3,000 was a bit too low for a distinguished faculty member, and recommended that Professor Feynman’s salary be increased $900. The dean, in an act of unusual generosity and with complete disregard for the solvency of the university, crossed out the $900 and made it an even $1,000.

Using the BLS CPI inflation calculator to convert from 1945 to 2023 dollars gives an annual salary of ~$67.5k. Pretty good bargain for a "distinguished faculty member".

However, considering that the USD was pegged to gold at $35/troy ounce, $4k in 1945 was worth 114.29 troy ounces of gold. This is $224k at the time of writing. Much more fitting for a "distinguished faculty member". :^)

It goes to show how, adjusted for inflation, people just didn't earn much money a century ago, compared to the huge mid or even 7 figures for people in tech and other STEM fields today. Same for other professions, such as law, finance, medicine, consulting, etc. Those jobs didn't pay that well a century ago. People nostalgize about out how great the past was or how there was less inequality, fail to take into account how people overall were also so much poorer too.

At the same time, however, one didn't have to make the equivalent of today's high mid-six or low-seven figure salaries in order to be able to afford to purchase a home in a world-class metro area. Today one needs to make "world class" money in order to afford to purchase a home in a world class city, due to the perfect storm of NIMBYism restricting supply and a high amount of demand from a large pool of well-heeled buyers. I don't want to come off as whiny, but my salary is only in the low six-figures and my company doesn't provide RSUs, which means I'll never be able to buy a home in Silicon Valley, short of winning either a state lottery or the "startup lottery." Yes, I can relocate and purchase in a cheaper locale, which is something I'm strongly considering once I get married, but that comes with major career tradeoffs; I'm a specialist and it may be hard to find jobs in my specialty outside Silicon Valley. There's also no guarantee that these jobs will be available remotely, especially with the pushback against remote work.

I'll share a family story. My grandfather was born in Arkansas during the height of Jim Crow. He never went to school, and he never learned to read or write. He and his family moved to Bakersfield, CA in the 1950s as part of the Second Great Migration of African-Americans from the South, looking for better opportunities and to escape Jim Crow. He worked on a farm for over 30 years. Despite these challenges, he was able to purchase a modest home there, and he managed to pay off most of his mortgage debt before he was forced to retire. This would be very difficult for a farm worker today.

I have other grandparents who still faced racism but were literate, and they were able to purchase homes in places like San Luis Obispo County back in the 1960s. Now, I wouldn't want to trade places with my grandparents; I'm glad that I was born after the Civil Rights Movement. I'm fortunate to have many opportunities that my grandparents and my parents didn't have. But today's housing prices are one of the most formidable challenges facing my generation. It seems that opportunity in America (and around the world) is increasingly being concentrated in a handful of "winner" cities, and the demand to live in these cities, combined with a reluctance or even unwillingness to grow to meet the demand, has caused housing prices to skyrocket. But moving outside these cities means running the risk of having few opportunities; witness the chronically higher-than-average unemployment rate of the Central Valley of California, and witness the Rust Belt.

The interesting thing is that unless you inherited that property you probably would not easily be able to buy another one there unless you went for something really small, that's prime real estate these days.

Yeah I think that it's fair to say that we have more access to products and services today than our grandparents did, but long term real assets like real estate are less accessible to this generation. My grandfather never graduated high school and worked as a logger and then as a mechanic but was able to afford to buy 3 acres and build a house in his mid 20s.

Meanwhile my cousins who are currently in their mid 20s are mostly jobless and still live with their parents.

Are Dallas, Atlanta and Houston world class cities? Not cheap but still affordable. Not New York but very rich cities nonetheless. The GaWC ranking classifies these 3 as Beta cities.

That's because there wasn't such a huge multiplier in place to get money back out of employing those people.

$224k only seems miniscule in this inner self-selected circle though. $450k net worth is top 1%

Maybe annual income but certainly not net worth (in the United States). Top 1% seems to be a bit over $10M (household) based on a quick search.

Your point seems predicated upon more people being “poorer” rather than focusing on the fact that there wasn’t nearly the wealth inequality we have now (which you mention, but dismiss). Personally, I’m of the opinion that “poor” is relative, and the current age of hyperfocusing on payment is only contributing to all that is bad in the world today. Progress, too, didn’t slow down because the people driving it weren’t paid enough.

...but progress was slower. Exponential growth means it grows faster now than it did then.

And yes, relative poverty matters greatly, but absolute poverty is a real thing even in the US. In 1964, the US launched the war on poverty, and poverty declined. Since the 1980s, some of that progress was reversed, but it's still far better than 1964. (And poverty now is relative, and includes very little literal starvation. That certainly wasn't true in the US in 1964, much less earlier - especially before WWII.

Or... the official US inflation numbers have been bogus over the long term and the price of gold is actually a way better way to measure inflation over the longer term?

Even better metric: in 1950, California's median home price in unadjusted dollars was $9,564, up from $3,527 in 1940.

https://licensesolution.com/20th-century-home-price-changes/

These used to be hard to come across - they were on the internet on, I think it was 'Google Videos' back in the day, and then disappeared, only to resurface on Youtube at some point a little over a decade ago. When they resurfaced I immediately ripped them and saved them, just because of how incredible of a show they are. It's all info I could rehash from memory at this point but I still go back and watch these sometimes just to witness the spectacle of Feynman lecture. The way he speaks, you almost feel like you are getting an understanding of how he thinks as he explains things, and that is the real lesson to take in.

The only other lecture videos I think I have rushed to rip and save like that are the Richard Hamming lectures ("Learning to Learn").

Bill Gates had them on a Silverlight demo website.

Edit: oh, it says that on the page.

Just 10 years ago, to watch Netflix on Linux, you had to run a browser on Wine to have access to Silverlight!

there is a little boy inside me who wants to watch all six lectures right away. but now with two kids and constant demand from work, I have gotten used to consuming education as 2 minute physics shorts on YouTube.

the issue is much deeper than the format of media. it's a sense inside me that I'm "wasting time" not "productive" (related but not the same as not remunerated). I feel I* don't have permission* to just enjoy it ... I can give some reasons, like if I go for a bike ride with the kids it gets me and them exercise and my wife some respite, but sit and listen is just passive consumption that will never be productive... I wish I was free of this sense of guilt

Why do you think you feel the need for every waking moment to be productive?

I know what I'm about to say is not true. but it's a kernel in the right direction. I live in a city where no matter how hard I work I will never own property... and I have this irrational belief that just harder work will allow us to be happy.

Chill. I say that as a reasonably accomplished scientist.

Yes, work hard. But there’s a difference between working hard on the right thing and doing it just because it makes you feel good.

You’re much less likely to find the right thing if you’re in a spiral of working on things you know will be a waste of time. You can pull as many 16 hour shifts at a gas station as you want to, but people only do that because they’re broke, not because they might find it fulfilling.

I recommend reading http://www.paulgraham.com/greatwork.html in its entirety. You strike me as the type of person it was aimed at. And believe it or not, one of the most important takeaways is that you have to allow yourself to play, just a little, in order to Rome the kind of work that makes you happy.

So explore your interests more, and worry less.

Thanks for this.

I can reason that what I'm saying is wrong, but it's how I feel. Some other comments have recommended getting therapy... I have, since I was 18. That's the only reason I'm able to say these things and see myself comically on the treadmill. I'm voicing these things aloud because I figured others might felt lack of permission to indulge in a few hours of physics lectures because of a sense of duty to getting things done

Ps. My kids are 8 and 5.

I mean this in the warmest possible way: this is maybe something to bring up to a therapist.

Then the propaganda has won.

I could have written this same comment. I fully understand where the mental irrationality comes from. I’ve done therapy etc. But what I call “the hearth of the city” means it’s hard to ever really relax. Caring for a family accelerated it.

Move cities? There are plenty of places with cheap houses / apartments. Just save up enough and move there, and do something different with your life.

>harder work will allow us to be happy.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boxer_(Animal_Farm)

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boxer_(Animal_Farm)

Spoilers ahead! (If historical allegory can have spoilers)

""" When he collapses from overwork, the pigs send him to the knacker's yard to be slaughtered, in exchange for money to buy a case of whiskey for the pigs to drink.

Squealer says that his sayings, "Comrade Napoleon is always right" and "I will work harder!" should live on in all the animals;

"""

I assume your kids are somewhat young, and probably not going to be an ideal audience, but are you able to watch it with them? I know Feynman is known for his traceability, so maybe your kids will be entranced :)

> I assume your kids are somewhat young, and probably not going to be an ideal audience, but are you able to watch it with them? I know Feynman is known for his traceability, so maybe your kids will be entranced

I'm so glad that someone stepped up and suggested this, I was about to do the same!

[Full disclosure: have three kids - aged 7, 10 and 13 - and my goodness we do have our hands full with them...]

Presumably you spent 12 years or more as a full time student. And that resulted in the life you have now.

If “passive” watching stresses you out maybe try this: take notes, think about how to explain the one or two main concepts to your kids (or wife).

Presumably: your kids are students now: it’s chance to demonstrate that you value learning in your own life (not just on their report card).

You know what's great? By the time your kids are around 9-12, you can watch these videos together. Watching just for fun, they are still a wonder to learn from, and they are so we'll presented, that the kids will likely watch with interest. (Maybe half at a time.)

I relate so much to this. The only time I could see myself watching something like this is if the wife falls asleep a bit early on the couch one evening. Or as someone else suggested, if I could get the kids interested.

I do listen to a bunch of podcasts and audio books while I'm doing chores or driving, but that's about it these days. I have a faint hope that I will get more time for personal hobby projects (like learning more physics) as the kids get a bit older (currently 4, 7 & 13).

So glad to hear that I am also not the only one with two kids and demand from work and so little free time. Sometimes I fall asleep at night trying to “catch-up” to all the podcasts and lectures.

Does your wife have to wait for you to fall asleep before she does something she wants to do but you have little interest in? You could just watch these lectures together - instead of, say, watching the news.

Watching the news? That's an extremely low probability guess in this crowd.

I realized that once I have a kid I need to push every hobby or whatever away for X years. It's like the more social button I clicked the more pigeon holed I am.

Better idea: bring your kid to your hobby.

I'd say it's more like grow hobbies that kids can join as soon as possible...otherwise it's going to be years and years of waiting.

I believe you should take your time and watch them. It is possible that it will work like with reading: if parents do not read, they do not show an role example to their kids, and then kids do not like reading. I believe parents should think of how they kids see them, what habits and hobbies adults have.

I'm not entirely sure it will work with watching lectures of Feynman, but I think it will. Especially if you discuss what you saw with others in presence of your kids. Or even discuss with kids themselves, they will not understand a word probably, but it doesn't matter really.

> I feel I don't have permission* to just enjoy it ...*

I believe you should feel an obligation to just enjoy it and to show your enjoyment to your kids. If you don't, then how your kids will know, that you can enjoy watching lectures?

You don't have to make it about projecting an image.

Make it about living your proclaimed values. Otherwise, those aren't your values.

My kids have learned to mock my hypocrisy (usually when I'm hanging out on HN or worse), and I never disagree with them; I just try to be better and tell them I want them to be better.

> Make it about living your proclaimed values. Otherwise, those aren't your values.

Yes, exactly.

Watch the video while exercising, cooking, or cleaning.

Unrelated but surprised by how little attention Feynman got in Oppenheimer given how enormous his stature would eventually become. Arguably the best mind on the project.

edit: *one of the best minds on the project.

I spent a fair amount of time during the film playing 'Spot Jack Quaid' in anticipation of Feynman being called out at some point. He is spotted early during the montage when Oppenheimer goes recruiting, and then during various scenes in the background, twice playing bongos (!), but only once is he called by name- Teller calls his name right before the Trinity test for not having goggles or a welding glass to look through, and he notes he is in a truck with a thick windshield that blocks the UV. I smiled so much when that little tidbit happens, as it is a story he prominently tells in his book 'Surely You're Joking Mr Feynman...'

He gives an incredible account of his time there in the lecture (and almost stand-up-comedy act) 'Los Alamos from Below' -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uY-u1qyRM5w

So highly entertaining.

The bongos scene was one that stood out to me for sure.

It's a great lecture. I posted it to HN yesterday, and it sadly didn't get much traction:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36923700

Here you go. AI generated transcript :

https://www.assemblyai.com/playground/v2/transcript/6lvprt5j...

From query:

The video flows in a coherent manner with minimal tangents.

Speakers: Bob Wilson, Richard Feynman, Evaluation committee (Tolman, Smyth, Yuri, Oppenheimer),

Summary: The transcript details Richard Feynman's work on the Manhattan Project, specifically his calculations related to uranium processing and bomb development safety. The project starts at Princeton but moves to Los Alamos. Feynman has various experiences settling in at Los Alamos and navigating censorship. He informs Oak Ridge of safety issues with their uranium handling.

Salient points: - Secret uranium isotope separation project revealed to Feynman. He joins reluctantly. - Feynman calculates and observes experimental setup. - Evaluation committee discusses and makes decisions. Feynman surprised by consideration of different viewpoints. - Project moves to Los Alamos. Feynman sent to Chicago to learn bomb design. - Feynman shares Chicago knowledge with scientists. - Scientists move to Los Alamos though not fully ready. Feynman impressed by scenery. - Feynman has trouble getting own room but manages through trick. - Feynman involved in Los Alamos town council politics. - Censorship of mail implemented. Feynman experiences issues with wife's letters. - Feynman calculates Oak Ridge uranium handling safety. Travels there when wife ill to inform of hazards.

Glossary: Isotope - atoms of the same element with different numbers of neutrons Uranium - radioactive metallic chemical element

Key takeaways: Calculations: - Uranium isotope separation - Bomb design - Oak Ridge uranium handling safety

Locations: - Princeton - Los Alamos - Chicago - Oak Ridge

Challenges: - Getting own room at Los Alamos - Censorship of letters

Quote: "Feynman is surprised to see how they consider different viewpoints and come to a consensus."

Topics to research: Specifics of the uranium isotope separation process and bomb designs. What was the role of IBM machines and colored card decks?

The talk was intended to be listened to. If a person prefers to read or is hearing impaired, I recommend the book 'Surely You're Joking...', as mentioned in my comment, instead as it covers all the same stories and more and in a better written style.

Not an AI transcript of a talk. And I don't think extended summaries copied/pasted from this AI tool is very appropriate to post in response to suggested links in HN comments. I feel it to be cheap and lacking in tact.

That'll be hard to defend given von Neumann was on the effort.

Fair enough. One of the best minds on the project.

Perhaps we can say Feynman was the best human mind on the project since von Neumann et.al. are suspected to be from Mars. ;-)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Martians_(scientists)

And Bethe, and Fermi. Feynman was a small fry there, at the time. (As he happily relates in his memoirs.)

Feynman was involved, but not particularly instrumental in the Manhattan Project. I was glad they included his anecdote about watching through the truck windshield.

Feynman wasn't one of the top guys on the project, he was low-mid level. There's an entertaining lecture somewhere on Youtube where he talked about his time there; most of the time he was buried in computational work and sometimes inspecting chemical plants. He usually wasn't in the rooms where Big Important Decisions were made, which is what this Nolan film spends a lot of time on.

YouTube playlist: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLez3PPtnpncQLg_H7f6T9yJmJ...

What made Feynman a great scientist was that he could explain hard things in a simple manner. If you can't explain it simply, then you don't understand it well enough.

Try to explain that to string theorist. No wonder quantum mechanics isn't making progress. These new scientists just want to prove how smart they are, and not how little they actually know. Thus allowing them to make progress.

This.

Upthread commenters have suggested that Carl Sagan and Jim al-Khalili are comparable to Feynman as explainers of physics. Sagan was good at communicating a sense of wide-eyed awe; al-Khalili can tell a story well. But they both stay well clear of really hard stuff in their popular expositions.

Feynman, on the other hand, didn't seem to have a sense that there was any "really hard stuff". Fools rush in where angels fear to tread (I don't mean to suggest that Feyman was stupid, rather that he was a great joker).

>Try to explain that to string theorist.

if you can't explain it to a string theorist, then you don't understand it well enough

Who would you say is todays Richard Feynman?

I would say it's professor Leonard Susskind [1] - interestingly he was also a Feynman's friend. Any other suggestions?

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonard_Susskind

There are likely many physicists today that are on the intellect level of Feynman, but we will never know because all the low hanging fruits in fundamental areas of Physics have already been picked. So the top scientists today have to spend decades working on one Nobel prize winning quality result. In Feynman's generation, many people were able to get multiple top quality results in their lifetime because they were there to pick.

Recently, the only Physicsy field with new fundamental results is quantum computing/information. But the vast majority of the field is not about building a new predictive theory of nature. On the computer science end, Scott Aaronson is a candidate for a mini-Feynman. But there isn't anyone I can think of on the Physics end who stands super tall above his peers.

The domain of philosophy on the other hand has all sorts of valuable low hanging fruit remaining to be picked. Perhaps someday someone will notice.

I agree. There is actually quite a lot of fundamental work that could be done at the intersection of Physics and Philosophy, that is not getting done. Mainly because researchers are not given the space to engage in moonshot work.

But even if that space was available. It will take truly great minds to learn centuries worth of physics, without fundamentally biasing themselves by the orthodox philosophy, so they can actually rewrite the philosophy of physics.

Realistically, I think what can happen is that we find some new field (not even in physics), which acts as a fertile ground for new philosophy. And once it is developed there, someone imports it to fundamental Physics.

I have a passable understanding of physics, but nothing really for philosophy. I can't even begin to understand what sort of fundamental work you could be referring to. Would you mind breaking it down a bit?

> Realistically, I think what can happen is that we find some new field (not even in physics), which acts as a fertile ground for new philosophy.

Metaphysics. The various phenomena that people talk/complain about constantly, yet insist doesn't exist if you start to investigate it.

This fruit is low hanging, but it needs new techniques to pick it because enthusiastic pickers proclaim that it isn't there (despite whining about it constantly) and various other bizarre behaviors.

What’s an example of a major breakthrough in philosophy in modern times?

Finding a way to make philosophy impotent is a pretty impressive accomplishment in my books, but not what you're looking for I suspect.

Philosophy tends to be the category of problems we can't figure out so people just waffle about them, and then when there is a solution it's no longer called philosophy.

A recent example would be can machines think which used to be philosophical and is now becoming practical.

>we will never know because all the low hanging fruits in fundamental areas of Physics have already been picked

People said that in the 1800s, and they said it in Ancient Greece too.

> On the computer science end, Scott Aaronson is a candidate for a mini-Feynman.

Sorry, but Scott is nothing like Feynman. I wouldn't even call him a nano-Feynman.

Mr. Aaronson has knowledge of a lot of fields. He surely knows more than I about many things. But he's not very well rounded, he's far more certain of his rightness with far less reason to be, and he makes some pretty big errors, with undue confidence, on a regular basis. His thinking isn't nearly as integrated, and his writing is nowhere near the same level.

He's closer to Sheldon Cooper than he is to Feynman.

> He's closer to Sheldon Cooper than he is to Feynman.

Ouch. I don't even know much about Scott Aaronson and yet I felt that one.

Feynman had his wrongs and he had some out there beliefs as well (his opinion on brushing your teeth springs to mind). That did not make him any less brilliant in my book.

Feynman didn't say you shouldn't brush your teeth, or that he doesn't brush his teeth. He said that brushing your teeth without ever looking at the evidence that brushing actually works is silly. Murray Gell-Mann claimed that he said that, but he seemed to have a chip on his shoulder wrt Feynman; and it looks like a jealousy thing.

Feynman was right, too. His point was that people really do follow the herd too much - and he's 10,000% correct. It's good to know why you do things, especially when you do them two or three times a day for your entire life.

Also, it's good to get to the root of the issue. People who don't eat industrial grain based diets have better teeth than we do, without every having met a toothbrush in their lives.

I'm not a physicist, but in terms of capturing the magic of science for the general public, I would nominate Neil deGrasse Tyson. He (and Carl Sagan before him) tremendously furthered understanding of the scientific method and its results.

In terms of communicating science to a general audience - as these lectures do - I think there's Feynman, Carl Sagan, and that's about it.

It really takes a certain personality, a genuine enthusiasm, and their imitators don't really have it.

Not in nearly the same league, but Jim Al-Khalili is a physicist and science communicator for the bbc that I’ve really enjoyed. Far more on the “popular” end than Feynman, but his enthusiasm is infectious.

I liked Brian Cox.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PsRvxQzIDNU

Could caltech upscale audio and video to HD with help from the comp sci dept?

I do love the current old school videos tho - genuinely wish i had a CRT monitor to watch them on!

I like the idea of the "website controls" in top right. Wonder if this should be a native feature in the browser?

I'm watching this, and enjoying it so much:

"Now, that shows that gravitation extends to the great distances, but Newton said that everything attracted everything else. Do I attract you? Excuse me, I mean, do I attract you? I was going to say, excuse me, do I attract you physically? I didn’t mean that." ;)

Unfortunately the quality is quite bad. In order to really enjoy them I've been waiting for an AI augmented version with better audio and video since they were initially released by Bill Gates. It seems we are not there yet - ChatGPT and Midjourney can't help here.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com