The Art of Doing Science and Engineering

Richard Hamming’s The Art of Doing Science and Engineering is a book about how to do work that matters.

Hamming was a mathematician at Bell Labs who made foundational contributions to error-correcting codes and numerical methods. The book is based on a course he taught - part technical, part philosophical, all opinionated.

The core message: most people don’t work on important problems. They work on what’s in front of them, what’s easy, what’s expected. Hamming argues you should actively seek out the important problems in your field and dedicate your best thinking to them.

Some ideas that stuck with me:

“What are the important problems in your field? Why aren’t you working on them?” Hamming used to ask this at lunch. It’s uncomfortable because usually the answer is some combination of fear, inertia, and not having thought about it.

The value of communication. Great work that nobody understands might as well not exist. Hamming learned to give talks, write clearly, and sell his ideas. Not because he liked it, but because it was necessary.

Working with the door open. Literally - Hamming noticed that people who kept their office doors open knew more about what was going on and had more serendipitous conversations. The metaphor extends to staying connected to the broader world rather than heads-down on your narrow thing.

Preparing for luck. Similar to Pasteur’s “prepared mind” - Hamming argues you can increase your luck by working in fertile areas, staying alert to unexpected results, and being ready to pivot when something interesting shows up.

The book meanders through a lot of technical topics (digital filters, simulation, AI) but the meta-lessons about doing good work are the real content.