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December 6, 2020

Collaboration

I recently finished reading a good book about Quantum physics, Richard Feynman, and John Wheeler. You can read my review on goodreads, but I bring it up here because it got me thinking about Walter Isaacson and The Innovators.

That book was focused on the "digital revolution", from Lovelace and Babbage through the present. The results nearly always come from creative collaboration, and that's true in physics and math also. Biology? Crick and Watson - and Rosalind Franklin. My reading is focused on mostly math and physics, so I'm sure I've missed plenty of others.

In most of these teamwork stories, the collaborators are usually fairly different. Wheeler had some very creative ideas, Feynman focused on making sure the equations were right. Wozniak was the creative technical genius, Jobs had a head for the market.

Plus I think a biography of a team and an idea is more fun to read than just a biography of a person.

Both those books are solid recommendations, though Isaacson's has a smaller science requirement :)

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