What Problems to Solve (1966) | Hacker News Reader

What Problems to Solve (1966)

genius.cat-v.org

493 pointsjxmorris1261 comments

This was a beautiful letter to read, with a simple piece of wisdom about life, spelled out for the student.

I am grateful that this was submitted to Hacker News, and that I was able to read it.

  > No problem is too small or too trivial if we can really do something about it.

I think we often forget this. Especially in our fast paced world and career. But often it is the little things which are hard to get right and also the things that create the most problems.

I think we try to think we can predict what are important problems and what are not. Sometimes this is easy and we're right, but often we aren't. This is true in math, physics, and computer science. In any domain. So do what you like because you never really know. Plus, they say interest is worth an extra 10 IQ points.

From all my reading of Feynman I think there's one thing he'd stress: have fun. To never lose the creativity, that child like wonder. In CS we got here because we loved to play around and hack. I hope we never lose that.

In CS we got here because we loved to play around and hack. I hope we never lose that.

get a job with a few managers and a jira installation and it will dry up pretty quick.

Well that's kinda my point. If you are losing it, push back. I'm betting there are others who feel the same but also feel alone.

Remember, they hire us for our skills. They hire us for our expertise. That means not always being a yes man. If you don't stand up for what you think is right, the product will become worse. The reason to question your boss is because you're on the same side: making the best product you can. It's okay to be wrong, it's okay to speak up, it is okay to ask questions. If anyone says anything different, they aren't interested in making the product, they are interested in their paycheck. Frankly, most of this loss we're talking about is because the business people took over and don't understand that an engineer saying "but what about <x>" is not "no" it is "yes, but let's figure out how". This culture needs to be fixed, and it requires every day normal people to make that normal.

Man while Feynman was a genius, I think it's underappreciated just how articulate and philosophical he was. I've always loved reading his work because he just knew how to say things the right way.

This letter really allows that side of him to shine through.

He could would shrink the complex into something that could fit in even my head.

I like this one:

This particle is a perfect ball bearing that can move at a single speed in one of six directions.

from "Feynman the Explainer" in:

https://longnow.org/essays/richard-feynman-connection-machin...

also:

"Don't say `reflected acoustic wave.' Say [echo]." Or, "Forget all that `local minima' stuff. Just say there's a bubble caught in the crystal and you have to shake it out." Nothing made him angrier than making something simple sound complicated.

That is the main reason why he is appreciated imo

This echoes what I have thought about my career. What to work on.

I've been blessed to have a good paying career in software engineering, but I've never really felt passionate about the products I work on. At the end of the day, my job is a paycheck. I do feel joy solving problems for others, improve society, be able to answer colleagues questions when they "come to my office". My family is happy that I can provide and that I am a role model for them.

I sometimes think I should work on things that make me happier. Sometimes I think that my career path is a mistake, I should work on problems "closer to god", make more meaningful contributions, build the next Kubernetes/ChatGPT/Google/<insert revolutionary product>, advance AI, climate change. I end giving up, I'm not that ambitious or driven.

I'm important to my family and colleagues. That may be good enough.

The vast majority of human existence from million years ago to now is toil. I don't spend anytime feeling bad about being well compensated at an air conditioned office working on CRUD.

Perhaps it’s not ambition or drive but just curiosity. „I wonder if we can …“ -type of thinking.

I don't think so personally, because if its truly from a place of curiosity, then you're in the BEST of place. You're enamored with a specific problem, have some idea of doing it and will slowly explore nooks and crannies to manifest it into reality. The problem here (again, i think) lies in the fact that we don't often see the grander value of our everyday works and yearn to do SOMETHING grander, more impactful, but we don't know which, or how, and in time it will torment us each time we do our normal work. (sorry for the text wall)

> The problem here (again, i think) lies in the fact that we don't often see the grander value of our everyday works and yearn to do SOMETHING grander, more impactful, but we don't know which, or how, and in time it will torment us each time we do our normal work.

I think it's a kind of yearning that can't be satisfied in the outside world. It's an inside problem and can only be solved there.

I’m in a similar career situation and I am trying to beat my ego into submission to adopt a similar mindset

In keeping with the list preceding "climate change", consider changing it to:

"...advance AI, change climate."

He obviously wants to advance climate change

> That may be good enough.

I would argue it is.

I have had discussions with peers recently around doing the big flash-y <insert revolutionary product>. An interesting analogy surfaced. The nuts in the studs of the infrastructure of the many structurally sound homes in existence are just as important (meaningful) as the doors, windows, and more flash-y features. They may be _more_ important in some cases. They all make up the home.

It made me realize it might not be all about maximizing ambitious pursuits. Maybe it is more about experiencing the joy of solving the next problem and the fulfillment that comes from simply being needed pretty regularly.

I was surprised that after “closer to god” comes the “build the next kubernetes”. How do you connect these two things?

E.g. I’ve found the “closer to god” in my yoga practice. And how I now realize that through words I can’t connect that much as through practice (e.g. just eating my lunch being fully present). I still think I can help through my software product building skills, but also know that if I can help people find a more joyful life / build a less painful body is closer to my purpose than “only” building software.

Kubernetes - only god knows how it works. There :)

I interpret it so that current thing X is very messy. It feels very likely that there are a lot more elegant ways to achieve similar goals. If you can make a positive change, you have created beauty and pleasure in the world and removed toil from millions of people.

It depends on what "working on those problems" means to you. If you want to work on those problems as a software engineer, that sounds like an achievable goal.

To me, the interesting, fulfilling bits of building the next Google/ChatGPT/AI/climate change lie in the theory. Arguably with the exception of Kubernetes, this theory does not come from software engineering. As much as I enjoy software engineering, it's a trade. It's a tool to get the job done. And recently, I realized I like building things just as much as I like "the theory".

To me, that was a bitter pill to swallow. I'm not an ML engineer, but I suspect this is also the reason why you can find so many posts about ML engineers trying to pivot to ML scientist roles.

The most important jobs in the world - teaching, cleaning, caring - are extremely underrated. They are lowly paid, and people automatically assume that those doing these jobs are less than.

Sometimes the most important thing in the world is to be a good person to those around you. That can be in extremely short supply to some people.

> You will get the pleasure of success, and of helping your fellow man, even if it is only to answer a question in the mind of a colleague less able than you.

> innumerable problems that you would call humble, but which I enjoyed and felt very good about because I sometimes could partially succeed.

> You met me at the peak of my career when I seemed to you to be concerned with problems close to the gods.

As problem solvers, we need encouragement to face the difficulties that lie in exploring problems. We need to believe that it can be solved but more so that WE/I can solve it. We need to raise our egos to healthy amounts (not sure what is the precise definition of healthy) so we don't back down or give up. And Mr. Feynman alludes to this with "the pleasure of success", "helping your fellow man", "answer a question in the mind of a colleauge", "I enjoyed ... because I sometimes could partially succeed", and "problems close to the gods".

I am exploring (and absolutely denouncing) this egotism for it leads to frustration, disconnection, illusion, entitlement, and shielding. I feel that (good) school/university/work environments raise ego levels (with "good job!") and aloof you from _........ (which is a utopian place with a healthy encouragement to do more work and work harder to a point where it does not overwhelm you).

The identify of this _........ place keeps occuring to me and flees from me as quickly as it occurs to me. If there is anyone who works without ego, please let me know.

Original sin mate. We must suffer an appreciation of the divine while being simultaneously unable to fulfill it. Accept you humanity and be kind to yourself about it.

The best places to work at are full of people that are intrinsically motivated. “Good job” is implied. Feedback, including criticism, is expected, as it helps improve things further or recognise perfection/good enough. Academics do have egos, but typically they compete against academics in other, remote departments, and many of the best ones behave in ego free ways in their groups and collaborations. Same in good industry teams, where having management get out of the way and letting the intrinsically motivated contributors work themselves is key. The competition is the outside world, not the eating of a larger share of the resources of the same team. If you like problem solving, stay humble and help others; you will have a lifetime of fun, even if it feels rocky some bad days.

> "...Do not remain nameless to yourself – it is too sad a way to be. now (sic) your place in the world and evaluate yourself fairly, not in terms of your naïve ideals of your own youth, nor in terms of what you erroneously imagine your teacher’s ideals are..."

Wise words

Thanks a lot for posting this. I highly recommend having a look into the mentioned flexagons. This is a child toy where Feynman laid the mathematical background and it is very fascinating toy which you can easily build yourself. Try it out - it is really fun. No child required except yourself :)

I didn't realize it until I searched for it, but as a kid I did have one of those. An M.C. Escher one (a quick search found exactly the one [1]). My aunt got it for me when I was little and I was fascinated by it. Fond memories.

[1] https://www.jacobsurovsky.com/researchanddevelopment/2020/8/...

I read this letter and then immediately read another discussion on HN, A new pyramid-like shape always lands the same side up

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44381297

Related. Others?

Do not remain nameless to yourself (1966) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23808400 - July 2020 (122 comments)

What Problems to Solve - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8030010 - July 2014 (45 comments)

Do not remain nameless to yourself (1966) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23808400 - July 2020 (123 comments)

Good catch! Added above. Thanks!

Beautiful. Tear to my eye!

I think this is a rare mix of deep humanity and intellectual thinking in one essay.

Lol then... I saw who wrote it!

Good advice for all HN. Often you see a comment and bio shows an amazing career. However they couldnt be amazing without rest of us being average (average of something...). Can't have a max without a median.

This is a great post. Totally resonate with the thought of solving something that gives you the "win" feeling and it doesn't matter whether its small.

> I have worked on innumerable problems that you would call humble, but which I enjoyed and felt very good about because I sometimes could partially succeed. For example, ... [list of many problems] ... Plus all the “grander” problems of quantum theory.

I'm having difficulty understanding what is meant here. Does he intend to say that his student thinks quantum theory is a humble problem?

I don't know what the student thinks but "[list of many problems]" are in some ways less "grand" as they are less about fundamentals of nature compared to the problems in quantum theory. But then Feynman puts "grander" in quotes to reduce its power and imply that "grandness" isn't all that - well - grand. He does this as his advice is that all problems for which you can find solutions are indeed grand problems. That's how I read it.

Part of the point here, IMHO, was to show that Feynman himself worked on numerous problems, even small ones, not just those he is famous for, and sometimes even failing to solve them.

My interpretation is that he is both meaning to say that getting where he is took a lot of patience and hard work, and also that it is on yourself to determine which problems are worth your time. Which are both very important insights to have if you don't want to feel miserable.

His words and advice are truly inspiring and I agree with him.

However, things have changed a lot. Nowadays we're bombarded with ideas and incredible "opportunities" of stuff we can make. It's almost like ideas are shoved into people's heads.

So, I have to add to Mr. Feynman's words an update:

_Be sure that the thing you want to solve is really the thing YOU want to solve_

This is specially true for software development and closed platforms. Sometimes, software vendors have this way of making developers work for free for things they won't get back, ever. They'll do conferences, and attract people, and show you all those nice tools you can use to solve problems (as long as you use their paid platform).

Don't fall for that shit. Remember Twitter and Reddit closing their APIs, platforms being discontinued, companies cannibalizing successful apps by independent developers. Those people wanted to solve problems, and they got scammed.

I agree. IMO understanding what one really wants to work on, leads to an important line of philosophical questioning to understand 'who am I'. There is a surprising amount of clutter and external influence in our minds.

> to understand 'who am I'

I don't worry much about that. I can be lots of things, change my mind, etc.

He didn’t mention it in this letter, but in Surely You’re Joking Feynman described how he solved for the motion of plates spinning and wobbling across a cafeteria in Cornell. When his colleague asked what’s the importance of this problem, he responded: “There’s no importance whatsoever. I’m just doing it for the fun of it.”

https://web.archive.org/web/20121212063351if_/http://genius....

“studying the Coherence theory with some applications to the propagation of electromagnetic waves through turbulent atmosphere… a humble and down-to-earth type of problem.” -> Ended up being a very important (and largerly solvable!) problem in ground-based astronomy

Wow. I didn't know about this letter. It's very inspiring.

I read this letter for the first time many years ago when I was in my physics undergrad and thinking about starting grad school. It still crosses my mind pretty often as a postdoc.

Like anyone, I'm always impressed by geniuses displaying hollywood cliché traits. But that's even more impressive when they are great humans too.

Pick a problem that is big enough to matter, and small enough that you can solve it -- and that's pretty cool.

Thanks for posting this. Wonderful letter.

看的要哭了，第一次想在hacker上留言。

In 1 sentence: Do the opposite of trying to solve the Collatz conjecture.

You are not nameless to me. Do not remain nameless to yourself – it is too sad a way to be.

wow

Highly off-topic. But I just want to inform you all that the only entry for Rob Pike on this web page under "texts" is a cheese cake recipe.

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