The Modern Day Renaissance Man 59
Kilrah_il writes "The Not Exactly Rocket Science blog has an interesting piece about Erez Lieberman Aiden, a scientist that is frequently hopping from one field to another, including 'molecular biology, linguistics, physics, engineering and mathematics.' This is in contrast to the prevailing trend of specializing in a specific field. 'I think a huge amount of invention is recognizing that A and B go together really well, putting them together and getting something better. The limiting step is knowing that A and B exist. And that's the big disadvantage that one has as a specialist – you gradually lose sight of the things that are around. I feel I just get to see more,' Aiden said. The post shows how failure to map antibodies led to an important discovery of the 3D folding of DNA and how the study of irregular verbs created a new scientific field."
Specialization is for Insects. (Score:4, Interesting)
Robert Heinlein put it best:
"A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly."
Re:why most of us can't be a renaissance man (Score:2, Interesting)
If the definition of renaissance man is broadened to mean being well-versed in many subjects, then yes, any bright individual can become one in their spare time.
It normally means that the person is a useful contributor to many fields, though. (Ripped right from wikipedia: "When someone is called a Renaissance man today, it is meant that he does not have only broad interests or a superficial knowledge of several fields, but rather that his knowledge is profound and often that he also has proficiency or accomplishments in at least some of these fields and in some cases even at a level comparable to the proficiency or the accomplishments of an expert.") That has become increasingly more difficult over the centuries, as the sort of contributions you can do with a self-educated background / in your spare time / in the garage / without lots of funding have been covered by others. It's not impossible, and it doesn't necessarily require absolute genius, but it does take a lot of time to achieve.