"You can't possibly get a good technology going without an enormous number of failures. It's a universal rule. If you look at bicycles, there were thousands of weird models built and tried before they found the one that really worked. You could never design a bicycle theoretically. Even now, after we've been building them for 100 years, it's very difficult to understand just why a bicycle works - it's even difficult to formulate it as a mathematical problem. But just by trial and error, we found out how to do it, and the error was essential." - Freeman Dyson
Gamma Red Death World
12 years ago
Posts
Very good point! Human invention 'evolves' by trial and error? Much like DeeNDee?
ReplyDeleteFLAME ON!!
:P
Love it. I made a dish today that was so so. By failing, I now know what to do to make it perfect next time. Had I not made it and failed, there's no way I could have figured out how to be successful.
ReplyDeleteI liked this quote because it applies to a great number of endeavors, including systems for gaming. Failure doesn't necessarily mean that no fun is had in the process, though.
ReplyDeleteI had the pleasure of meeting Freeman at a convention in Bellingham, Washington, where his son George lives. A very kind man who was very patient with the variety of people around him all asking him questions.
If you ever have an opportunity to hear him talk, I suggest you take it. He's one of the last of the great Physicists of the 20th century - the last of the white magicians!