I spend a lot of time trying to think about the basics of a problem as opposed to jumping into the middle of an existing framework and turning the crank. Basic assumptions of existing framework are often not appropriate, frequently leading to fuzzy thinking and wrong result.
Starting with the basics usually involves simple modeling and a lot of playfulness. Playfulness is fundamentally important as it allows you to sort through ideas and learning from mistakes and bad paths with no real penalty. Building this spirit into a project into a team that is starting down a new path is non-trivial and incredibly important.
I spend a lot of time working on projects associated with energy and find it astonishing how many companies have teams where the participants lack an understanding of simple basics like the difference between energy and power, let alone a feeling for the problem at hand. This is even more important in problems that introduce serious complexity. A great example is how social and technical issues mix as computation and networking interact directly with our lives. Multi-disciplinary approaches are necessary and the core thinking needs to reflect this very early on. The needs of the world have moved well beyond simple engineering.
As it happens physics is an incredibly playful sport. It is concerned with understanding fundamentals and approaching new problems involves observation and more than a little model building. It is important to find good and bad paths at this point and that will inform work as you go on as well as build your experience. Much of this is done in collaboration and that is often a delightful experience.
Dick Feynman was a master of the approach and crisply summed up why people do physics - the same can be said for other disciplines where passion and curiosity are motivators:
Physics is like sex: sure, it may give some practical results, but that's not why we do it.
Sanjoy Mahajan gives a simple example of this way of thinking applied to a simple problem at a recent Caltech TEDx. Sorting these things out for yourself and building a model that gives a ballpark result is much more important than looking a formula up in a book..
This approach is certainly not unique to physics - it is core to all of the sciences and can easily be extended to other disciplines as well as your own recreation. Probably most significantly, and what has become very important to me, is that the basic approach can be applied to extremely cross disciplinary projects. The basics of a problem are not necessarily confined to the artificial boundaries of single disciplines.
A delightful side effect of working on richly multi-disciplinary projects is you learn a lot that, at first glance, might seem orthogonal to your background. This is a good thing. While you may not become a subject matter expert in the areas of the other folks in your collaboration, you will develop a deeper sense of their way of thinking and that adds greatly to your own tools.
When I started out in physics I double majored in physics and math and didn't see much use for anything else. I needed the basics - it turns out a Ph.D. in physics is just a starting point for the field where you can begin your real education. But it turned out to form way of thinking that allows a bit of insight into diverse areas when you find great people and a bridge to communicate over disciplinary boundaries.
Over the years I've been lucky enough to have become deeply involved in perception (particularly sight and sound), astrophysics, music, art, human computer interaction, anthropology, more electrical and mechanical engineering than I would care to admit, computer science, geology, natural language, sports science, film making, anthropometrics, and even fashion. Over time you find yourself learning to listen to others and hopefully share a bit with them.
I'm sure this is true for many others. Education can easily last a lifetime.
Comments