The Surprising Nature of Scientific Genius

We now live in an age of "big science." Large laboratories supported by generous grants churn out hundreds of technical articles. The author list on a paper's title page can easily consume a dozen lines, and so many scientists may contribute to a given discovery that the Nobel Prize committee can find it impossible to determine which three names shall be cast in gold. Contemporary science has become so big, indeed, that it can strain the sizable resources of a big economy, a fact epitomized by the proposed superconducting supercollider. And that is not the only drawback of big-time research, for competition for grant money and scientific honors all too often motivates talented but unprincipled investigators to engage in acts that compromise the very integrity of the enterprise. The free exchange of information may give way to possessive secrecy, for example, and intellectual honesty may even succumb to the quick fix of data fraud and tampering. But what I worry about most is whether all the commotion of big science obscures the voices of a few homeless people who are today's versions of the great geniuses of old. For over a dozen years I have been conducting extensive research on what it takes to make a phenomenal contribution to science. This work often requires me to gather reams of raw data regarding cognitive processes, personality differences, developmental experiences, productivity distributions across and within careers, and even participation in multiple discoveries. These data include thousands of scientists both past and present, and encompass both the also-rans and the luminaries of scientific history. I use the information to test and develop theoretical models that explain the emergence and performance of the most outstanding geniuses. Although this work is still evolving, I have arrived at a rough sketch of the "typical scientific genius." Like all such abstractions, exceptions exist regarding this or that particular trait, yet the overall image remains fairly secure. In fact, the more exceptional the achievement - especially the more revolutionary the breakthrough - the more precise the description tends to be of the contributor. Scientific geniuses are phenomenal risk takers, frequently pursuing ideas that seem prima facie implausible. They do not necessarily boast higher IQs than their less remarkable colleagues, yet they are distinguished by their intense devotion to their work. In fact, their careers assume the quality of creative crusades. As an integral part of this commitment, these individuals are nonconformists, even iconoclasts, often residing at the margins of their disciplines. More likely to be introverted than flamboyant and gregarious, they achieve not so much by facile insights as by brute force; geniuses have no tricks by which they can circumvent the long hours devoted to contemplating empirical phenomena, and they have no prescient ability to avoid the inevitable false starts and misguided conjectures. Throughout their long careers, they will be far more productive than the norm, but that productivity includes about as many failures as successes. Scientific geniuses are right so often only because they are willing to make numerous mistakes, which, fortunately for their reputations, posterity is inclined to forget. This willingness to take a chance on long shots implies an ego so resistant to external incentives and inhibitions that these figures seem almost out of touch with mundane affairs. Yet their rugged intellectual independence enables them to offer contributions that can revolutionize their disciplines. An excellent exemplar of this broad profile is Albert Einstein, one of the undoubted all-time greats of science. This bold and adventurous scientist was an introverted man who favored solitary recreations - his violin and sailboat - that provided him with time for reflection and relaxation. Strikingly independent in appearance, with his disheveled hair and loose-fitting clothes, Einstein, as theoretical physicists go, was not particularly brilliant at mathematics. As a mediocre university student, Einstein could not pursue an academic career, but rather had to regard himself lucky to land a lowly job with the Swiss patent office. Yet he managed to steal enough time away from his responsibilities to ruminate on the fundamental issues in physics, questions that had plagued him ever since he was a teenager. In his 26th year, he published pioneer papers on the special theory of relativity, Brownian motion, and the photoelectric effect - the last marking the contribution that earned him a Nobel Prize 16 years later. Curiously, about the same time, a less important paper was sent off to a university whose faculty was persuaded to mail Einstein a doctoral degree. At 30, he could finally claim a regular academic position as a physicist, yet this advancement did not induce him to change his bohemian ways. He continued to strike out on new paths, developing his general relativity theory, and repeatedly showed himself to be out of step with the scientific zeitgeist. An avid opponent of the quantum physics that he himself helped develop, he was often on the losing side in debates with the proponents of the Copenhagen school. In one notable exchange with Niels Bohr, he found his seemingly invincible argument demolished by Bohr's shrewd application of Einstein's own relativity theory! Many of his contemporaries regretted that Einstein wasted his last years developing a unified theory that was doomed owing to its insistence on deterministic formulations. Yet Einstein himself believed that "science can progress on the basis of error as long as it is not trivial." So this highly prolific scientist was the author of many errors along with those few truths that have ensured his place in the annals of science. When I say that Einstein is typical I am no means arguing that he is identical to other imaginative innovators of science. Each genius is in many ways unique. Even so, the picture is stable enough to justify the query: Where do scientific geniuses fit in the big science of today? Would they find granting agencies willing to fund their crazy projects? Are the vast collaborative efforts of modern science compatible with introverted personalities? And is the competitiveness of the current idea market consistent with the quiet reflection of one more dedicated to the excitement of discovery than to the temptations of money, power, and prestige? Admittedly, it is conceivable that the science has entered a new age that renders the lone genius as obsolete as the solitary knight. Yet we cannot know for sure, and we could be entering instead a period of almost Byzantine scholasticism. Einstein admitted that he was "a horse for a single harness, not cut out for tandem or teamwork," and Newton was, in Wordsworth's memorable lines,~ "a mind forever/ Voyaging through strange seas of thought, alone." So just perhaps, big science does not offer a home to the truly big scientist. Dean Keith Simonton is professor of psychology at the University of California, Davis, and author of Scientific Genius: A Psychology of Science, (Cambridge University Press, 1988)

The Surprising Nature of Scientific Genius

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