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ALSO IN THE SERIES

Life Lessons from the Worlds Greatest Religious Teachers
Life Lessons from the Worlds Greatest Scientists
Life Lessons from the Worlds Greatest Politicians
Life Lessons from the Worlds Greatest Comedians
Life Lessons from the Worlds Greatest Artists
Life Lessons from the Worlds Greatest Entrepreneurs
Life Lessons from the Worlds Greatest Teachers

The author and publisher have taken care in the preparation of this book, but make no expressed or
implied warranty of any kind and assume no responsibility for errors or omissions. No liability is
assumed for incidental or consequential damages in connection with or arising out of the use of the
information or programs contained herein. All content is either original or where applicable used
with permission or from publicly available sources.
Copyright 2015 Greatest Publishing
All rights reserved
This publication is protected by copyright, and permission must be obtained from the publisher
prior to any prohibited reproduction, storage in a retrieval system, or transmission in any form or by
any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or likewise. For information regarding
permissions, or discounts for bulk purchases and special sales, please contact the Publisher.
ISBN 978-0-473-31461-3
First edition, December 2014

CONTENTS
Introduction

Plato: Never discourage anyone who makes progress, no matter how slow

Aristotle: To avoid criticism say nothing, do nothing, be nothing

Archimedes: The shortest distance between two points is a straight line

10

Leonardo da Vinci: Being willing is not enough; we must do

14

Nicolaus Copernicus: If only we face the facts, as they say, with both eyes open

18

Galileo Galilei: You cannot teach a man anything, you can only help him find it
within himself

22

Sir Isaac Newton: Tact is the knack of making a point without making an enemy

26

Immanuel Kant: We are not rich by what we possess but by what we can do without

30

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe: A man sees in the world what he carries in his heart

34

Charles Darwin: Who learned to collaborate and improvise most effectively have
prevailed

38

Albert Einstein: If at first the idea is not absurd, then there is no hope for it

42

Stephen Hawking: Concentrate on things your disability doesnt prevent you

doing well

46

INTRODUCTION

Mahatma Gandhi said Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live
forever. But how should we live and who should we learn from?
Welcome to Life Lessons from the Worlds Greatest Geniuses, a coffee book for the
Information Age. But how can figures from antiquity teach us anything of relevance to our
hectic modern lives today? Many of their own theories and discoveries have since been
proven false or superseded.
From Classical antiquity, through the Middle Ages, Age of Discovery, Machine Age, to
the current Information Age the world remains in perpetual flux. But what it means to be
human, and struggles we face on our personal journeys, remain unchanged. Many previous
breakthroughs in human thought are no longer relevant, but it is the leap that they each
made from societys previous level of knowledge which is truly remarkable. To form novel
ideas and invent creative new solutions has set our geniuses apart.
What would the world be like without these thinkers and teachers from whom our very
way of life has been formed? And what would the world be like without you? To the people
you touch and those still to come, the world would be a very different place.
In Life Lessons from the Worlds Greatest Geniuses, we explore some of their
paramount achievements and hear life lessons from them in their own words, teachings that
are still relevant to us today. Perhaps you will find some words of wisdom to help guide you
as you take action and move forward in time. As Benjamin Franklin said Tell me and I
forget, teach me and I may remember, involve me and I learn.

Winston Okeefe

Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a harder battle.

Plato

PLATO
Most education in our modern society is mass produced, prescribed and ridged. Is there a
better way to learn? Plato was a Philosopher from Athens, Greece, and lived from 428 to
347 BC. He is most well-known for his theory of Forms and is estimated to have had an IQ
of 180.
At age 30 Plato inherited a block of land inside land on the edges of Athens. Inside his
property was a garden named which was named after a hero in Greek mythology called
Akadmos. Here Plato founded the first institution of higher learning in the Western world,
to be known as the Academy. Along with Socrates and his most famous student, Aristotle,
Plato helped to lay the foundations of Western philosophy and science. The school did not
have any particular doctrine to teach; rather, Plato (and probably other associates of his)
posed problems to be studied and solved by the others. It is ironic then, that 2,400 years
later we might think of the style of his institution as new age. There is evidence of lectures
given at Akadmos, most notably Platos lecture On the Good; but probably the technique of
argument for resolving disagreement was more common.
Plato used this technique in his writing known as the dialogues. The dialogues have
been used to teach a range of subjects, including philosophy, logic, ethics, rhetoric, religion
and mathematics. In Platos early life he meet Socrates, who become his greatest influence.
Various influences contributed to his inspiration to whose honour and memory he later
devoted most of his treatises. Platos Apology is perhaps the most often read of the
dialogues. In the Apology, Socrates tries to dismiss rumours that he is a sophist and defends
himself against charges of disbelief in the gods and corruption of the young.
The theory of Forms (or theory of Ideas) is the belief that the material world as it seems
to us is not the real world, but only an image or copy of the real world. In some of Platos
dialogues Socrates explains that many of the things, and properties we feel and see around
us can only be perceived by reason. In other words, we have two worlds: the apparent
world, which constantly changes, and an unchanging and unseen world of forms, which may
be the cause of what is apparent.
Plato said, You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of
conversation.
Perhaps open and lively discussions amongst peers as a way to further knowledge should be
encouraged, and higher education need not be mass produced, staged or rigged.

Previous page: Plato as depicted in The School of Athens, or Scuola di Atene in Italian, is one of the most
famous frescoes by the Italian Renaissance artist Raphael. Next page: Title page of Platos oldest
manuscript; Paris.

He who has overcome his fears will truly be free.

Aristotle

ARISTOTLE
From struggles in our own lives, to international conflicts, the strain between ideological
polar opposites is exacerbated the further each side is from a more balanced, compassionate
equilibrium. What would our world be like if the ethics were based on a middle ground
rather than sticking to our guns and firmly defending our own positions?
Aristotle was a philosopher from Euboea, Greece, and lived from 384322 BC. He is
most well-known for his Golden Mean and is believed to have had an IQ of 190. He is
regarded as one of the leading scientists in classical antiquity and challenged the previously
held views about dream and astronomy.
To Aristotle, the golden mean is the desirable middle between two extremes, one of
excess and the other of deficiency. For example, in the Aristotelian view, courage is a virtue,
but if taken to excess would manifest as recklessness, and is as deficient as cowardice.
Aristotle first used the term ethics to name a field of study developed by his
predecessors Socrates and Plato. Philosophical ethics is the attempt to offer a rational
response to the question of how humans should best live. Aristotle emphasized the
importance of developing excellence (virtue) of character as the way to achieve what is
finally more import: excellent activity.
One component of Aristotles theory of Dreams introduces ideas that are contradictory
to previously held beliefs. He claimed that dreams are not foretelling and that they are not
sent by a divine being. Aristotle reasoned that instances in which dreams do resemble
future events are happenstances not divinations. These ideas were contradictory to what
had been believed about dreams, but at the time in which he introduced these ideas more
thinkers were beginning to give naturalistic as opposed to supernatural explanations to
phenomena.
Aristotle refuted Democrituss claim that the Milky Way was made up of those stars
which are shaded by the earth from the suns rays, pointing out that, given current
astronomical demonstrations the size of the sun is greater than that of the earth and the
distance of the stars from the earth many times greater than that of the sun, then ... the sun
shines on all the stars and the earth screens none of them. Aristotle wasnt always right,
however. For example, Aristotles theory that a heavier object falls faster than a lighter
object is incorrect.
Aristotle said it is better to rise from life as from a banquet - neither thirsty nor
drunken. Similarities with Aristotles Golden Mean can still be found in some teachings
today, such as the middle path in Buddhism. However, the dominant push in our modern
world is for faster, bigger and more. Could the pursuit a life of virtue, in the middle between
extremes be more fulfilling?
Previous page: Aristotle by Francesco Hayez. Next page: Original Leaves from Famous Books: Eight
Centuries, Leaf 2 (Aristotle) (State Library of Brisbane).

Eureka! - I have found it!

Archimedes

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ARCHIMEDES
Some build their lives according to their own strengths, while others use leverage to achieve
more. Leverage to build higher, crowd sourcing and outsourcing to get more done, and
financing to grow faster. But for leveraging to work the calculations need to be accurate and
you risk overcomplicating your path to success.
Archimedes was born in the city of Syracuse on the island of Sicily, and lived from
287 BC c.212 BC. He is most well-known for his discovery of how to determine the
volume of an object and is believed to have had an IQ of 190. Generally considered the
greatest mathematician of antiquity and one of the greatest of all time.
How do we know about Archimedes? A Byzantine prayer book, written in Greek and
dated to April 1229 was discovered to have used recycled paper, the paper originally
contained the writings of Archimedes which could be read using Multispectral Imaging.
The pages contained at seven treatises by Archimedes; The Equilibrium of Planes, Spiral
Lines, The Measurement of the Circle, Sphere and Cylinder, On Floating Bodies, The
Method of Mechanical Theorems, and The Stomachion.
From these we learn of Archimedes pulley systems, allowing sailors to use the
principle of leverage to lift objects that would otherwise have been too heavy to move. He
explained the mathematics in his Law of the Lever, stating, Magnitudes are in equilibrium
at distances reciprocally proportional to their weights.
Another of Archimedes principles is that the upward buoyant force that is exerted on
a body immersed in a fluid, whether fully or partially submerged, is equal to the weight of
the fluid that the body displaces. Archimedes principle is a law of physics fundamental to
fluid mechanics.
Archimedes also invented the water pump. It consists of a screw inside a hollow
pipe. As the shaft turns, the bottom end scoops up a volume of water. This water will slide
up in the spiral tube, until it finally pours out from the top of the tube.
A lesser known invention is his odometer. An odometer technically just measures
distance travelled and we see it most frequently in cars to show how far the car has
travelled. Archimedes odometer was a cart with a gear mechanism that dropped a ball into
a container as you travelled each mile.
Archimedes said, Give me a lever long enough and a fulcrum on which to place it,
and I shall move the world. Be meticulous with the calculations and you may find the right
formula to find leverage to achieve more! Just be cautious not to overcomplicate things, as
Archimedes said it best the shortest distance between two points is a straight line.

Previous page: Archimedes Thoughtful by Fetti (1620. Next page: The Archimedes Palimpset

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It is easier to resist at the beginning than at the end.

Leonardo da Vinci

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LEONARDO DA VINCI
When we stand in awe before a masterpiece it pushes further out our mental barriers of
what humans are capable of. It inspires and propels us forward. But is there enough time
in our short lives to accomplish a fraction of what we may be capable of?
Leonardo da Vinci was a painter from Florence, Italy, and lived from 15 April 1452 2
May 1519. He is most well-known for his painting of the Mona Lisa and is believed to have
had an IQ of 180. Leonardo is considered to be one of the greatest painters of all time and
perhaps the most diversely talented person ever to have lived.
Leonardo was, and is, renowned primarily as a painter. Among his works, the Mona
Lisa is the most famous and the most reproduced religious painting of all time: The Last
Supper. Leonardos drawing of the Vitruvian Man is also regarded as a cultural icon, being
reproduced on items as varied as the euro coin, textbooks, and T-shirts. Fifteen of his
paintings have survived the small number because of his constant, and frequently
disastrous, experimentation with new techniques, and his chronic procrastination.
Nevertheless, these few works, together with his notebooks, which contain drawings,
scientific diagrams, and his thoughts on the nature of painting, compose a contribution to
later generations of artists rivalled only by that of his contemporary, Michelangelo.
Leonardo is also revered for his technological ingenuity. He conceptualised flying
machines, an armoured vehicle, concentrated solar power, an adding machine, the double
hull, and also a rudimentary theory of Plate Tectonics. Relatively few of his designs were
constructed or were even feasible during his lifetime but some of his smaller inventions,
such as an automated bobbin winder and a machine for testing the tensile strength of wire,
entered the world of manufacturing unheralded. He made important discoveries in
anatomy, civil engineering, optics and hydrodynamics.
Much has been written about his presumed homosexuality and its role in his art,
particularly in the androgyny and eroticism manifested in John the Baptist and Bacchus
and more explicitly in a number of erotic drawings. Court records of 1476, when he was
aged twenty-four, show that Leonardo and three other young men were charged with
sodomy in an incident involving a well-known male prostitute.
Contemplating the achievements of past masters can leave us in awe, and motivate us to
leave our own legacies. However their accomplishments can also be intimidating. Doubt
creeps in as we consider how much we have left to do in the limited time we have. But there
is no need to mind the clock. As Leonardo da Vinci said, time stays long enough for those
who use it.

Previous page: Leonardo da Vinci Self Portrait dated 1505-1510, located in the Museo delle Antiche Genti
di Lucania, Vaglio Basilicata. Next page: 1 of 72 pages fro the Codex Leicester sold to Bill Gates at
Christies auction house on 11 November 1994 in New York for US$30,802,502

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The massive bulk of the earth does indeed shrink to insignificance in

comparison with the size of the heavens.
Nicolaus Copernicus

18

19

COPERNICUS
Do you share all of the beliefs widely held in society, or do you have another way of looking
at things? Are the views you hold always correct or will they one day be disproven? History
shows that sometimes only long after we have gone is the world ready to accept and benefit
from revolutionary new ideas.
Nicolaus Copernicus was an astronomer from Royal Prussia, Kingdom of Poland, and
lived from 19 February 1473 24 May 1543. He is most well-known for his discovery that
the Sun rather than the Earth at its centre and is believed to have had an IQ of 160.
The publication of this model in his book De revolutionibus orbium coelestium (On the
Revolutions of the Celestial Spheres) just before his death in 1543 is considered a major
event in the history of science. Despite urging by his closest friends, he resisted openly
publishing his views, not wishing to risk the scorn.
Copernicus was acutely aware that the widely held beliefs in society were not always
correct and said, to know that we know what we know, and to know that we do not know
what we do not know, that is true knowledge.
In Copernicus lifetime, most believed that Earth held its place at the centre of the
universe. Copernicus argued that the universe consisted of motionless, fixed stars, with the
Sun motionless at the centre. The known planets revolved about the Sun, each in its own
sphere, in the order: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn. The Moon, however,
revolved in its sphere around the Earth. What appeared to be the daily revolution of the
Sun and fixed stars around the Earth was actually the Earths daily rotation on its own axis.
His radical shift from a geocentric to a heliocentric cosmology was a serious blow to
Aristotles science and helped usher in the Scientific Revolution.
In 1517 he also set down a quantity theory of Money, a principal concept in economics
to the present day. The Quantity theory of Money states that money supply has a direct,
proportional relationship with the price level. For example, if the currency in circulation
increased, there would be a proportional increase in the price of goods.
Key to the development of modern society as we know it are ideas that often turned
conventional wisdom on its head. The work of Copernicus has taught us that the prevailing
view of society is not always true, and indeed, the views we personally hold to be true may
not survive the test of time. It may be wiser to be humble about the view we hold, as in
Copernicus own words, For I am not so enamoured of my own opinions that I disregard
what others may think of them.

Previous page: 1580 portrait (artist unknown) of Nicolaus Copernicus painted by in the Old Town City Hall,
Toru. Next page: A page from his work entitled De revolutionibus orbium coelestium published in 1543

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Wine is sunlight, held together by water.

Galileo Galilei

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GALILEO
Do you dare to challenge the beliefs of the main stream? Today we are often encouraged to
think outside the box, but will society accept your new ideas. Are you open minded towards
others with challenging new ideas?
Galileo Galilei was an astronomer from Tuscany, Italy, and lived from 15 February 1564
8 January 1642. He is most well-known for his development of the telescope and is
believed to have had an IQ of 185. Galileo has been called the the father of modern
science.
With regard to matters requiring thought: the less people know and understand
about them, the more positively they attempt to argue concerning them.
His contributions to observational astronomy include the telescopic confirmation of the
phases of Venus, the discovery of the four largest satellites of Jupiter (named the Galilean
moons in his honour), and the observation and analysis of sunspots. Galileo also worked in
applied science and technology, inventing an improved military compass and other
instruments. Galileos telescope allowed him to view the skies in a way that wasnt
previously possible. In 1610, he found four objects surrounding Jupiter that werent normal
stars he had discovered the large satellite moons now known as Io, Callisto, Europa, and
Ganymede. He also discovered that Earths moon was round and had an uneven surface,
that other planets had moons that rotated around them, and that Venus orbited the sun, not
Earth, as had been previously thought.
Galileos championing of heliocentrism (the sun at the centre) was controversial within
his lifetime, a time when most subscribed to either geocentrism or the Tychonic system. He
met with opposition from astronomers, who doubted heliocentrism due to the absence of an
observed stellar parallax. The matter was investigated by the Roman Inquisition in 1615,
which concluded that heliocentrism was false and contrary to scripture, placing works
advocating the Copernican system on the index of banned books and forbidding Galileo
from advocating heliocentrism. He was tried by the Holy Office, then found vehemently
suspect of heresy, was forced to recant, and spent the rest of his life under house arrest. It
was while Galileo was under house arrest that he wrote one of his finest works, Two New
Sciences, in which he summarised the work on kinematics and strength of materials.
Today we are often encouraged to think outside the box but does society simply put
another bigger box outside it? In his own words it is surely harmful to souls to make it a
heresy to believe what is proved. Come up with new ideas, but in practice perhaps only
within an acceptable degree of change. Society may not always welcome new ideas, but
Galileo is proof that history remembers those people who pushed the boundaries of
conventional knowledge, tested their theories and against popular opinion had the courage
put their ideas forward.
Previous page: Galileo Galilei by Justus Sustermans dated 1636. Next page: L uso del compasso by Galileo
Galilei published in Opere, Bologna, 1656.

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Men build too many walls and not enough bridges.

Sir Isaac Newton

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SIR ISAAC NEWTON

Society tells us what it means to be successful, and being self-assured and assertive is a trait
we can see in people who we perceive as having made it. However many of us value
compassion and kindness. Can you be accommodating, humble and also successful?
Sir Isaac Newton was a physicist and mathematician from Lincolnshire, England, and
lived from 25 December 164220 March 1726. He is most well-known for his mathematical
description of gravity F=Gm1m2 / r2 and is believed to have had an IQ of 190.
Sir Isaac Newton walking in his gardens, had the first thought of his system of
gravitation, upon seeing an apple falling from a tree. Voltaire wrote this in his Essay on
Epic Poetry, 1727. It is known from his notebooks that Newton was grappling in the late
1660s with the idea that terrestrial gravity extends, in an inverse-square proportion, to the
Moon; however it took him two decades to develop the full-fledged theory. The question
was not whether gravity existed, but whether it extended so far from Earth that it could also
be the force holding the Moon to its orbit. Newton showed that if the force decreased as the
inverse square of the distance, one could indeed calculate the Moons orbital period, and get
good agreement. He guessed the same force was responsible for other orbital motions, and
hence named it universal gravitation.
The Kings School, Grantham, claims that the original apple tree was purchased by the
school, uprooted and transported to the headmasters garden some years later. A
descendant of the original tree can be seen growing outside the main gate of Trinity College,
Cambridge, below the room Newton lived in when he studied there. The National Fruit
Collection at Brogdale can supply grafts from their tree, which appears identical to Flower
of Kent, a coarse-fleshed cooking variety.
Not so well known is that Newton spent a lot of time studying the idea that the end of
the world is coming. He concluded that according to the Bible, the world would end no
sooner than 2060. This I mention not to assert when the time of the end shall be, he
explained, but to put a stop to the rash conjectures of fanciful men who are frequently
predicting the time of the end, and by doing so bring the sacred prophesies into discredit as
often as their predictions fail.
What does a man widely recognised as one of the most influential scientists of all time
and as a key figure in the scientific revolution think of his own abilities and successes? In
his own words Newton says, If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of
Giants. Perhaps all of us can succeed only from the knowledge passed down to us and with
the respect and support of the people around us.

Previous page: Godfrey Knellers 1689 portrait of Isaac Newton (age 46). Next page: A page from Sir Isaac
Newtons personal note book dated 1664.

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The busier we are, the more acutely we feel that we live, the more
conscious we are of life.
Immanuel Kant

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IMMANUEL KANT
Are you free? Freedom is a concept that many people and nations around the world value
and hold dear. But what does it mean to be free? If freedom has restrictions governed by
the laws of nature, does that lesson its worth?
Immanuel Kant was a philosopher from Kaliningrad, Russia, and lived from 22 April
1724 12 February 1804. He is most well-known for his Critique of Pure Reason and is
believed to have had an IQ of 175. He is widely considered to be a central figure of modern
philosophy.
Kant defines his theory of Perception in his influential 1781 work, the Critique of Pure
Reason, which has often been cited as the most significant volume of metaphysics and
epistemology in modern philosophy. Kant maintains that our understanding of the external
world had its foundations in both experience and a priori concepts (knowledge independent
of experience), referred to as his Copernican revolution.
In the Critique of Pure Reason, Kant distinguishes between the transcendental and
practical ideas of freedom. He explains that the transcendental idea refers to the question
whether we must admit a power of spontaneously beginning a series of successive things or
states as a real ground of necessity in regard to causality. His practical concept of freedom
as the independence of our will from the coercion or necessitation through sensuous
impulses.
In his other work called Critique of Practical Reason, Kant introduces the categories of
freedom: (i) to be free; (ii) to be comprehensible as free; and (iii) to be morally evaluated.
Reason can give us only the pragmatic laws of free action through the senses, but pure
practical laws given by reason a priori dictate what ought to be done.
Kant was also very interested in exploring the proof of God. He was critical of practices
of religious external ritual, superstition and a hierarchical church order. He sees all of these
as efforts to make oneself pleasing to God in ways other than with the moral rightness in the
choice of ones actions. Christianity: The Only Possible Argument in Support of a
Demonstration of the Existence of God is a book by Immanuel Kant, published in 1763. In
it, Kant questions both the ontological argument for God and the argument from design.
While Kant believed that freedom of the will is determined by universal laws, he
nevertheless gave freedom great value. In his own words, Freedom is the alone
unoriginated birthright of man, and belongs to him by force of his humanity. Human
freedom is realised in the adoption of humanity as an end in itself. Freedom is essentially
about exercising choice and creating ones place in the world as a whole.

Previous page: Portrait of Immanuel Kant, painter Dresdner Kunsthandel around 1790.
Immanuel Kant, Opus postumum, 1702.

Next page:

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As soon as you trust yourself, you will know how to live.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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GOETHE
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe said, No one would speak much in society if he were aware
how often we misunderstand others. Expressing our thoughts and emotions to one
another is a key to a higher level of communication and understanding.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe was a writer from Frankfurt-am-Main, Germany, and
lived from 28 August 1749 22 March 1832. He is most well-known for his writing of Faust
and is believed to have had an IQ of 179. His novel Wilhelm Meisters Apprenticeship has
been called one of the four greatest novels ever written.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethes Faust is a tragic play in two parts. Although rarely
staged in its entirety, it is the play with the largest audience numbers on German-language
stages. Goethe finished writing Faust Part Two in 1831. In Faust Part One, the focus is on
the soul of Faust, which has been sold to the devil. Faust Part Two explored social
phenomena such as psychology, history and politics, in addition to mystical and
philosophical topics. The second part appeared only posthumously in 1832.
Versuch die Metamorphose der Pflanzen zu erklren, known in English as
Metamorphosis of Plants, was published in 1790. In this work, Goethe essentially
discovered the homologous nature of leaf organs in plants, from cotyledons, to
photosynthetic leaves, to the petals of a flower. The ever-changing display of plant forms,
which I have followed for so many years, awakens increasingly within me the notion: the
plant forms which surround us were not all created at some given point in time and then
locked into the given form, they have been given ... a felicitous mobility and plasticity that
allows them to grow and adapt themselves to many different conditions in many different
places.
Goethe was also in a personal search for religion. In his Venetian Epigram 66, Goethe
listed four things that he disliked: tobacco smoke, bugs and garlic and the cross. A year
before his death, in a letter to Sulpiz Boissere, Goethe confided, I have found no
confession of faith to which I could ally myself without reservation. Now in my old age,
however, I have learned of a sect, the Hypsistarians, who declared that they would treasure,
admire, and honour the best, the most perfect that might come to their knowledge, I had the
feeling that all my life I had been aspiring to qualify as a Hypsistarian. That, however, is no
small task, for how does one, in the limitations of ones individuality, come to know what is
most excellent?
Oftentimes an improved grasp of language can help us better understand ourselves. We
all have a fundamental knowledge of language, but perhaps we can grow our abilities by
learning from the masters of the spoken word. In Goethes own words, To communicate
oneself is Nature; to receive a communication as it is given is Culture.

Previous page: Goethe in an 1828 painting by Josef Stieler. Next page: Ginkgo poem by Goethe, 1815

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It is always advisable to perceive clearly our ignorance.

Charles Darwin

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CHARLES DARWIN
What can success and failure of animals in the natural environment teach us about
surviving and thriving in our own lives? The answer according to Charles Darwin lies in one
thing that most of us resist. Darwin was a Natural historian from Shropshire, United
Kingdom, and lived from 12 February 1809 19 April 1882. He is most well-known for his
discovery of evolution by natural selection, and is believed to have had an IQ of 165. Darwin
has been described as one of the most influential figures in human history.
From 27 December 1831 to 2 October 1836 the young graduate Charles Darwin
accompanied a survey expedition of HMS Beagle, a Cherokee class sloop of the Royal Navy.
Part of the survey included a stopover at the Galpagos Islands where Darwins observations
helped to form his views which he later published.
His work entitled On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, published on
24 November 1859 is considered to be the foundation of evolutionary biology. Darwins
book introduced the scientific theory that populations evolve over the course of generations
through a process of natural selection. Ideas about the transmutation of species were
controversial, as they conflicted with the beliefs that species were unchanging parts of a
designed hierarchy and that humans were unique, unrelated to other animals.
Natural selection is the gradual process by which heritable biological traits or variations
become either more or less common in a population. Variation exists within all populations
of organisms. This occurs partly because random mutations arise in the genome of an
individual organism, and these mutations can be passed to offspring. Individuals with
certain variants of the trait may survive and reproduce more than individuals with other,
less successful, variants. Therefore the population evolves. His observations lead Darwin to
state that one general law, leading to the advancement of all organic beings, namely,
multiply, vary, let the strongest live and the weakest die.
Not so well known, is that Darwin took an interest in eating the strange new creatures
that he observed. Darwin would even discover a whole new species of a bird on his dinner
plate, which would later be named after him: Rhea darwinii. So what traits should we
adopt to succeed where only the fittest thrive? Despite our innate desire for consistency,
our affection for familiar things and our resistance to re-learning and re-training, the reality
we face is that the world around us is not fixed. Our world is fluid. Change is an obstacle,
and sometimes the obstacle is not there to change our direction; it is the way. In Darwins
own words, It is not the strongest or the most intelligent who will survive but those who
can best manage change.

Previous page: late 1830s George Richmond portrait from after Darwins return from the voyage of the
Beagle. Next page: Page from Darwins notebooks around July 1837 showing his first sketch of an

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Logic will get you from A to Z; imagination will

get you everywhere.
Albert Einstein

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ALBERT EINSTEIN
If we dont conform and tone down our unique or quirky ways we risk being criticized or
ostracised. Do our positions and roles in society require us to look and act the part that we
each play? What would we gain from risking being different from the crowd?
Albert Einstein was a Physicist from Wrttemberg, Germany and lived from 14 March
1879 18 April 1955. He is most well-known for his theory of General Relativity and is
believed to have had an IQ of 160.
Einsteins Zur Elektrodynamik bewegter Krper (On the Electrodynamics of Moving
Bodies) was published 26 September 1905. It reconciles Maxwells equations for electricity
and magnetism with the laws of mechanics, by introducing major changes to mechanics
close to the speed of light. This later became known as Einsteins special theory of
Relativity. Consequences of this include the time-space frame of a moving body appearing
to slow down and contract (in the direction of motion) when measured in the frame of the
observer. Einstein produced what is known as the worlds most famous equation: E=mc2
(where E is energy, m is mass, and c is the speed of light in a vacuum) from his special
relativity equations.
In 1917, Einstein applied the general theory of Relativity to model the structure of the
universe as a whole. He had a problem because, while his equations predicted the universe
to be either contracting or expanding, he wanted the universe to be eternal and unchanging.
In 1929, Einstein visited Edwin Hubble in Mount Wilson who confirmed that the universe is
expanding, after which Einstein discarded the cosmological constant.
Part of Einsteins charm was his dishevelled look. In addition to his uncombed hair,
one of Einsteins peculiar habits was to never wear socks. Einstein went without socks
everywhere, even to a formal dinner at the White House. Less well known is Einsteins
penchant for poetry, which he used to express his ideas about God. He said he believed in
the pantheistic God of Baruch Spinoza, but not in a personal god, a belief he criticized. He
even saw verse in maths and said, Pure mathematics is, in its way, the poetry of logical
ideas.
When we each conform to look and act like the part we play at work and socially, do we
lose a little of what makes us unique individuals, and does that impede our creativity? Or
our unique characteristics add value to who we are and what we bring to our roles? Perhaps
being ourselves at fosters within us the confidence to think freely and, perhaps, come up
with life changing new ways of doing things. In Einsteins own words It is important to
foster individuality, for only the individual can produce the new ideas. Everything that is
really great and inspiring is created by the individual who can labour in freedom.

Previous page: Albert Einstein, source unknown. Next page: Einsteins Poem Spinoza from 1920.
Einstein was interested in Baruch Spinoza ethics as a way of reconciling science with his own religious

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I like physics, but I love cartoons.

Stephen Hawking

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STEPHEN HAWKING
What does the worlds smartest man think about most often? This was the question posed
to Stephen Hawkins during an interview aired on New Years Eve, 1999. Sex. Well, if
nothing else this tells us that regardless of our skills, talents, abilities and achievements, we
are all human after all! So if we cannot attain perfection, where should be focus our
attention?
Stephen Hawking is a theoretical physicist from Oxford, England, and was born
8/01/1942. He is most well-known for his book A Brief History of Time and is believed to
have had an IQ of 160. Stephen Hawking is considered the worlds most recognizable
theoretical physicist.
Hawking has made major contributions to the field of general relativity using deep
understanding of what is relevant to physics and astronomy, and especially from a mastery
of wholly new mathematical techniques. He established a series of successively stronger
theorems establishing the fundamental result that all realistic cosmological models must
possess singularities. Using similar techniques, Hawking has proved the basic theorems on
the laws governing black holes: that stationary solutions of Einsteins equations with
smooth event horizons must necessarily be axisymmetric; and that in the evolution and
interaction of black holes, the total surface area of the event horizons must increase.
Hawking also works on the idea of the Multiverse. The Many-worlds theory implies
that all possible alternate histories and futures are real, each representing an actual world
(or universe). In lay terms, the hypothesis states there is a very large perhaps infinite
number of universes, and everything that could possibly have happened in our past, but did
not, has occurred in the past of some other universe or universes. Before the Many-worlds
theory, reality had always been viewed as a single unfolding history. Many-worlds,
however, views reality as a many-branched tree, wherein every possible quantum outcome
is realised. Many-worlds reconciles the observation of non-deterministic events, such as the
random radioactive decay, with the fully deterministic equations of quantum physics.
On perfection Hawking said, One of the basic rules of the universe is that nothing is
perfect. Perfection simply doesnt exist.....Without imperfection, neither you nor I would
exist. So perhaps we need not raise the bar so high that we berate ourselves or condemn
others for not being perfect.
While it may not be possible to achieve perfection at everything, we each have a
strength to which we can ably our efforts. In Hawkings own words, Remember to look up
at the stars and not down at your feet. Try to make sense of what you see and wonder about
what makes the universe exist. Be curious. And however difficult life may seem, there is
always something you can do and succeed at. It matters that you dont just give up.
Previous page: Stephen Hawking in the UK to his autobiographical movie Hawking in 2014. Next page:
Hawking suffers from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), and he communicates by using a single cheek
muscle attached to a speech-generating device

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