> Yet talent is unequally distributed. Some innovators (like Edison, or Newton, or Kelvin) are simply better than others. But if genius is not jumping ahead of the inevitable, where do the "greats" fit in? Simonton discovered that the higher the prominence of a scientist (as determined by the number of pages their biography occupies in encyclopedias) the greater number of simultaneous discoveries they are involved with. Kelvin was involved in 30 sets of simultaneous discoveries. Great discovers not only contribute more than the average number of "next" steps, but are heavily involved in those steps that have greatest impact, which naturally are the areas of investigation that attract many other players, and so produce multiples. If discovery is a lottery, the great buy lots of tickets.
> Yet talent is unequally distributed. Some innovators (like Edison, or Newton, or Kelvin) are simply better than others. But if genius is not jumping ahead of the inevitable, where do the "greats" fit in? Simonton discovered that the higher the prominence of a scientist (as determined by the number of pages their biography occupies in encyclopedias) the greater number of simultaneous discoveries they are involved with. Kelvin was involved in 30 sets of simultaneous discoveries. Great discovers not only contribute more than the average number of "next" steps, but are heavily involved in those steps that have greatest impact, which naturally are the areas of investigation that attract many other players, and so produce multiples. If discovery is a lottery, the great buy lots of tickets.