Feynman Appreciation Thread

[Anonymous No.15932689]

I just learnt of the Putnam Competition. had never heard of it
and then among the list was Feynman as a Putnam Scholar
goddamn is there anything this man did not do?

I kneel.

[Anonymous No.15932691]

>>15932689
The more I learn about the greats of STEM the more I am relieved that I did not waste time pursuing an undergrad or beyond in those subjects because they are just so far removed from me it's difficult to imagine.
We are intellectual ants compared to them

[Anonymous No.15932702]

>>15932691
Hey. Everything starts as an ant in size. Doesn't mean you can't build an ant hill.

[Anonymous No.15932741]

>>15932702
hmm wise words anon

[Anonymous No.15932790]

>>15932689
Feynman was a genius of stunning ability and also a big old dork.

[Anonymous No.15932793]

>>15932689
What did you expect? He has the phenotype.

[Anonymous No.15933025]

>>15932790
>a big old dork
rly? Seemed pretty smooth to me

[Anonymous No.15933030]

>>15932689
He was a fine man

[Anonymous No.15933048]

>>15932689
The test was a lot easier and less competitive back when he took it.

[Anonymous No.15933137]

>>15932689


here's the putnam exma feynman did

https://prase.cz/kalva/putnam/putn39.html

doesn't look too difficult

[Anonymous No.15933153]

>>15932691
>The more I learn about the greats of STEM the more I am relieved that I did not waste time pursuing an undergrad or beyond in those subjects because they are just so far removed from me it's difficult to imagine.
Same

one of the few things that bothers me about Feynman is he was always saying he was just an ordinary guy who "tried hard"

if you hear him talk or read his work you can tell he's on another fucking level just genetically. I am just smart enough to see how far ahead he is

painful

[Anonymous No.15933204]

>>15933137
yeah actually that's not super hard at all

[Anonymous No.15933245]

>>15933137
>>15933204
Education was much, much less advanced 100 years ago, even 50 years ago. What might have be considered an upper level undergraduate course today you would learned in a Phd 100 years ago.

[Anonymous No.15933265]

>>15933153
"I'm just an ordinary guy" guys are so full of shit
I'm not sure exactly what angle they are going for – to deny genetics/ eugenics? To promote hard work?
Say Feynman was just indeed an ordinary guy who worked hard. It still means that
a, he was motivated to work hard
b, he was motivated to study science
and where did those motivations come from? Can sometimes who wants to work hard just choose to have that kind of mental constitution? no.

[Anonymous No.15933276]

>>15933265
If you hear him answer questions off the top of his head it's clear he is no ordinary guy. There are probably a significant number of people out there who know enough about the subjects he knew about to give a similar answer. But his answers are so creative and perfect explanations to help people understand that they alone show how genetically clever and quick witted he was.

[Anonymous No.15933281]

>jewish shills shilling jewish shills

[Anonymous No.15933282]

>>15933153
might be from that try hard mentality tho. not every smart human tries hard. but smart humans who try hard seem to do some shit. so to me it's the try hard mentality which makes the IQ shine, and do something in the end.
but there's other factors as well, like where you were born.

[Barkun No.15933285]

>>15933276
No'qqq

[Anonymous No.15933307]

>>15933153
He claims his iq test results were "only" around 125. If you take that as a fact he is on the lower end of genius and top ceiling of normie so it's no surprise he thought he was average. Him being able to describe things well is a matter of language skill and personality.

[Anonymous No.15933319]

>>15933307
Feynman wasn't an example of great brilliance. HOWEVER, he was very good at asking the right questions at the right time.

[Anonymous No.15933332]

>>15933307
>He claims his iq test results were "only" around 125.
>>15933319
>Feynman wasn't an example of great brilliance.
tfw almost midwit but no picrel equivalent.

[Anonymous No.15933336]

>>15932689
feynman did nothing useful, ever

[Anonymous No.15933340]

>>15933285
>No'qqq
?

[Anonymous No.15933342]

>>15933204
The thing is Feynman didnt game the exam with deliberate competition practice like most of the modern Putnam competitors which means his performance is a more accurate indicator of his natural talent back in the day.
These days the signal is worthless to gauge natural talent since everyone grinds for it.

[Anonymous No.15933346]

>>15933307
I get what you are saying but the ability to create and expound upon analogy off the top of your head is a very telling sign of high intelligence. Genius is seeing the way things are related to one another that other people do not see

[Anonymous No.15933361]

>>15933346
he did nothing useful ever

[Anonymous No.15933400]

His great achievement was being clever enough with math to bamboozle physicists into entertaining all sorts of ridiculous notions about phenomena. Read his book QED where he talks about how renormalization is a "shell game", "hocus pocus", "a dippy process", and "not mathematically legitimate". Using mathematical sleight-of-hand to after-the-fact arrive at the correct answers is no substitute for understanding the real motions of real bodies.

[Anonymous No.15933412]

>>15932691
Life is much more mundane than you think

[Anonymous No.15934003]

>>15933361
>he did nothing useful ever
solved the Challenger Shuttle explosion

[Anonymous No.15934065]

>>15934003
how does one solve an explosion?
He discovered how to explode the challenger?

[Anonymous No.15934067]

>>15934003
He poorly explained the failed part in such a way that millions of people now picture 1-cent tiny hardware store o rings when they think of the Challenger o rings. In reality the offending o ring is 11 feet in diameter

[Anonymous No.15934084]

>>15933319
feynman was regarded as an absolute prodigy by his peers. he was an example of brilliance.

[Barkun No.15934085]

>>15934084
I'm doing stuff dimensionally. Gonna maek a complex heart

[Anonymous No.15934091]

>>15934084
Yeah but I want to believe in "muh 120 IQ"

[Anonymous No.15934105]

>>15934084
nothing he did is worth anything, he has a big reputation that was created for him by his hebrew communist cohorts in the media

[Anonymous No.15935475]

>>15934065
>>15934067
Be better.

[Anonymous No.15935592]

>>15933265
>"I'm just an ordinary guy" guys are so full of shit
>I'm not sure exactly what angle they are going for
They don't want to dilute their accomplishments by acknowledging the possible influence of ulterior causes beyond them. All their success is theirs and theirs alone and if you aren't as good is because you just don't try

[Anonymous No.15935595]

>>15934084
>feynman was regarded as an absolute prodigy by his peers
>experts say
>a new study sheds light on Feynmans intellect

[Anonymous No.15935955]

>>15934105
>nothing he did is worth anything,
I guess winning the nobel prize is nothing

i guess the only two people who ever did anything were einstein and newton

[Anonymous No.15936136]

>>15935592
>>15933282
Maybe Feynman considered narccicism and excuses abnormal? He was just a normal guy and everyone else was crazy? Look at the excuses researchers tell themselves:
>I never publish anything because I'm too busy with classes; couldn't get that grant cause it's rigged; my students are bad; I have to do something else first; etc.
Meanwhile, Feynman would just dive into a problem, see how far he could take it, and then maybe discover he was scooped later. Landau was the same way; he derived almost everything himself. Maybe the secret to success isn't innate intelligence but instead just having the executive function, passion, and technical chops to rapidly try and follow through on many things?

[Anonymous No.15936139]

>>15936136
(Continued)
It's also telling that people assume Feynman's claim to normalcy is due to ego, "Don't dilute my accomplishments!", or manipulative, " Everyone will work harder if they think they can reach my level." It's likely he just wanted more cool people to talk to and work with or was tired of watching people create their own misery. The man dedicated a huge chunk of his life to pedagogy.

[Anonymous No.15936187]

>>15932689
Feynman should be canonized as the patron saint of adhd/non-autistic intellectuals/academics that aren’t on the autistic retard spectrum

[Anonymous No.15936281]

>>15936139
he probably just thought it was true

[Anonymous No.15936586]

>>15933307
125 is not on the lower end of genius and upper end of normie. That is normie through and through. It is about the 95th percentile. Are 1 out of 20 people in this world (including the crazy homeless guy on the street and so on, not just the people you might interact with) borderline geniuses?

[Anonymous No.15936954]

>>15936586
for a science board you niggas really can't let go of a never proven notion that the most famous specialists in academic disciplines have to have standardized general intelligence test scores in arbitrairly extremelly high range, high enough range so you don't feel it's too frequent
> 1 in 20 homeless meth addicts is as smart as Feynmann, what the hell man!

>>15936136
> Maybe the secret to success isn't innate intelligence but instead just having the executive function, passion, and technical chops to rapidly try and follow through on many things?
Yes

[Anonymous No.15937026]

>>15936136
>>15936139
stop making sense!! it's all genetics waaaahhh
why work hard it's too late!!! no math phd parents making you study straight out the womb? NGMI!!!
this board, like any other, because this whole site is a bucket of crabs, full of losers blaming everything while doing nothing
you don't belong here, go do something useful, you're too smart to waste your time here