What Problems to Solve – By Richard Feynman

A former student, who was also once a student of Tomonaga’s, wrote to extend his congratulations. Feynman responded, asking Mr. Mano what he was now doing. The response: “studying the Coherence theory with some applications to the propagation of electromagnetic waves through turbulent atmosphere… a humble and down-to-earth type of problem.”

Dear Koichi,I was very happy to hear from you, and that you have such a position in theResearch Laboratories. Unfortunately your letter made me unhappy for you seemto be truly sad. It seems that the influence of your teacher has been to giveyou a false idea of what are worthwhile problems. The worthwhile problems arethe ones you can really solve or help solve, the ones you can really contributesomething to. A problem is grand in science if it lies before us unsolved andwe see some way for us to make some headway into it. I would advise you to takeeven simpler, or as you say, humbler, problems until you find some you canreally solve easily, no matter how trivial. You will get the pleasure ofsuccess, and of helping your fellow man, even if it is only to answer aquestion in the mind of a colleague less able than you. You must not take awayfrom yourself these pleasures because you have some erroneous idea of what isworthwhile.You met me at the peak of my career when I seemed to you to be concerned withproblems close to the gods. But at the same time I had another Ph.D. Student(Albert Hibbs) was on how it is that the winds build up waves blowing overwater in the sea. I accepted him as a student because he came to me with theproblem he wanted to solve. With you I made a mistake, I gave you the probleminstead of letting you find your own; and left you with a wrong idea of what isinteresting or pleasant or important to work on (namely those problems you seeyou may do something about). I am sorry, excuse me. I hope by this letter tocorrect it a little.I have worked on innumerable problems that you would call humble, but which Ienjoyed and felt very good about because I sometimes could partially succeed.For example, experiments on the coefficient of friction on highly polishedsurfaces, to try to learn something about how friction worked (failure). Or,how elastic properties of crystals depends on the forces between the atoms inthem, or how to make electroplated metal stick to plastic objects (like radioknobs). Or, how neutrons diffuse out of Uranium. Or, the reflection ofelectromagnetic waves from films coating glass. The development of shock wavesin explosions. The design of a neutron counter. Why some elements captureelectrons from the L-orbits, but not the K-orbits. General theory of how tofold paper to make a certain type of child’s toy (called flexagons). The energylevels in the light nuclei. The theory of turbulence (I have spent severalyears on it without success). Plus all the “grander” problems of quantumtheory.No problem is too small or too trivial if we can really do something about it.You say you are a nameless man. You are not to your wife and to your child. Youwill not long remain so to your immediate colleagues if you can answer theirsimple questions when they come into your office. You are not nameless to me.Do not remain nameless to yourself – it is too sad a way to be. now your placein the world and evaluate yourself fairly, not in terms of your naïve ideals ofyour own youth, nor in terms of what you erroneously imagine your teacher’sideals are.Best of luck and happiness.  Sincerely, Richard P. Feynman.
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