Before I read the article, I thought the “bus ticket” was referencing William Sidis, who in the early 20th century gave a mathematics lecture at MIT at 10, a Harvard student at 11, was expected to revolutionize math but then dropped out of the public eye to write strange books, one being an etymology of train and bus tickets across the US, collecting several thousand unique stubs. I bet that you could learn a lot about the flow of ideas and culture in the US from such a strange artifact, and while I agree with much of what PG says here, his definition of utility leans towards the economic sense.
Also of note, Knuth has a section on his website devoted to photos of traffic signs!
With that strong endorsement I began going through the whole back-catalog of The Memory Palace, and Episode 36, dated January 7, 2011, “six scenes from the life of william james sidis, wonderful boy”, talks about Sidis' obsession with bus tickets. Or maybe more precisely, streetcar transfers.
I think it said he figured out ways to traverse great distances on a single fare by connecting transfers. That kind of graph traversal thinking strikes me as ahead of its time for the age of streetcars, and could plausibly have led to some interesting places.
I've been fascinated by Sidis in the past, yet never really got his transfer ticket fascination. Maybe because I've been steeped in graph theory for the last couple of years but listening to that episode made me realize the beauty of what he saw.
If this written/possible (is it?) today, no doubt we'd have web pages and youtube channels devoted to "Transfer Surfing".
Glad to hear it. The Memory Palace is one of the most interesting podcasts on my (extensive) list. It's beautifully produced and wonderfully idiosyncratic in its choice of subjects.
The father of William was Boris Sidis. Wikipedia notes Boris:
“sought to provide insight into why people behave as they do, particularly in cases of a mob frenzy or religious mania. With the publication of his book Nervous Ills: Their Cause and Cure in 1922, he summarized much of his previous work in diagnosing, understanding and treating nervous disorders. He saw fear as an underlying cause of much human mental suffering and problematic behavior.”
> his definition of utility leans towards the economic sense.
I think his preference is probably closer to the generality and “interestingness” of the discovery.
Darwin’s theory is obviously very general and applicable in a multitude of domains in addition to the original one he worked on. Although Ramanujan’s series were not obviously general but they imply some deep mathematical patterns that are more general than specific forms. Neither had much economic utility during the discoverer’s lifetime.
A reasonable conclusion. What is perceived as society turning its back on you and betraying you, has a tendency to generate the same in return - especially in people who have a tendency to see more in things than the average person.
Somewhat similar stories with eg Grothendieck and Kaczynski. As the article points out, one of the properties of genius is that it can’t really be deliberately focused.
I think future generations will see our inability to provide opportunity to genius to rise up as a criminal waste of potential. I sometimes idly speculate how different human society would be if we raised our offspring communally, with every child given the same (high) opportunity to express their capabilities.
> one of the properties of genius is that it can’t really be deliberately focused
i think this is true. I think there is a statement that is a bit more crisp, genius focuses intensely on what it must.
I, an average person, can focus or not on whatever. perhaps i'm a genius. I'm not a fool, but i'm also not pushing the boundaries. Your phrasing gives me room to think i'm a genius. (i'm not).
Some folks, on the other hand, get hung up on details. And to those details matter a lot. They don't have a choice, in much the same way i don't have a choice about breathing. I'll do it if i want to or not. Genius is obsession. sometimes that obsession leads somewhere and we all benefit. but usually, it's just crazy guy ranting about squirrels.
