Follow curiosity, switch fields: how physicists say discoveries happen
October 5, 2026 · 12 min read
Bernardo Huberman recommends changing fields to find uncrowded beaches, Neil Gershenfeld describes discovery as ready, fire, aim, and Andrew Strominger credits thought experiments and a willingness to be wrong. The shared lesson is that breakthroughs come from play and movement more than from a fixed plan.
The rules, numbers and steps worth keeping in front of you.
- Gershenfeld's method is ready, fire, aim: prepare a lot, try without over-planning, then study where you hit.
- Gershenfeld: aiming first caps the result at what you imagined in advance.
- Gershenfeld: fail fast tends to miss ready and aim.
- Gershenfeld: when an obstacle keeps ruining the experiment, ask whether it is the result, as with the bubbles.
- Gershenfeld: in his lab applications usually lead to basic science, not the reverse.
- Huberman: walk on beaches with very few footprints; crowded fields offer worse odds.
- Huberman: try reversing a relationship, as when he used physics to study computers.
- Huberman: after a success, return to what inspired you and pick a new problem.
- Huberman: calculate the odds and build a strong foundation, because we only hear the success stories.
- Strominger: what matters is the number of things you got right, not the ratio.
- Strominger: look where theories break down, but many contradictions are just mistakes.
- Strominger: choose problems that are neither solvable but dull nor fascinating but hopeless.
- Strominger: be ready to move to someone else's route if it looks more promising.
- Warning: wandering carries career risk and fits poorly where a specific result must be delivered.
This is the short form. The full insight has every expert's reasoning, their own words and the sources.