The Art of Doing Science and Engineering

Hamming’s lecture series at the Naval Postgraduate School, turned into a book. Every chapter is a masterclass in thinking clearly about your own work. The famous question — “What are the most important problems in your field, and why aren’t you working on them?” — is only the beginning.

What I took from this is not just ambition but discipline. Hamming argues that luck favors the prepared mind, and that preparation means years of deliberate study in adjacent fields. He practiced what he preached: a mathematician who taught himself enough engineering to contribute to error-correcting codes.

Quotes

If you do not work on an important problem, it’s unlikely you’ll do important work.

Knowledge and productivity are like compound interest. The more you know, the more you learn; the more you learn, the more you can do; the more you can do, the more the opportunity.

Notes

• The chapter on “You and Your Research” should be required reading for anyone starting a career in tech.
• His point about “open doors vs. closed doors” resonates: the people who keep their office doors open get interrupted more but also hear about problems worth solving.
• Pairs well with “Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman” for a complementary take on productive curiosity.