Re:How to think about science and becoming a scientist
by bedris on Wednesday April 18, 2012 @08:42AM
(#3857625)
I don't have the requisite knowledge to comment on fields other than the life sciences, and I certainly agree with your point that every new scientific and technological advance necessarily has to be more sophisticated than the one(s) that it's built upon. But the notion that the past was chock-full of low-hanging fruit just waiting to be picked seems exaggerated and doesn't give enough credit to the people who did all that work that, in hindsight, looks easy, trivial, and obvious, but at the time certainly required significant insights, advances, and effort.
John LaMattina, former president of R&D at Pfizer, weighs in: http://www.forbes.com/sites/johnlamattina/2012/03/02/there-h...
My old company made what was essentially datalog viewing software. Version 1 of the software was basically just squiggly lines going across the screen. People loved it, because previously they only had squiggly lines going across paper, and a 20-minute recording was the size of a phone book. But version 2 of the software required far more developer work, and had much more polish and detailed algorithms underlying the analyses... but people bridled at 'having to pay again' when 'we don't really get that much for it'. More work, smaller bricks, less appreciation of what it takes to get there...