Talk:Richard Feynman

Alternative quote

While looking up quotes for another article I found this one from him that made me laugh:

• If I could explain it to the average person, I wouldn't have been worth the Nobel Prize.

Ho Ho.--Bob^{"I think you'll find it's more complicated than that."} 19:54, 6 September 2014 (UTC)

That's a great quote. I found it in his biography by James Gleick, who previously wrote one for Sir Isaac Newton. But I think the current one is more appropriate for RationalWiki. Nerd (talk) 23:38, 14 June 2016 (UTC)

Mention of his children

This part reads kinda bad to me:

"Later in life, Feynman tried the same parental approach towards his own children, encouraging them to be inquisitive and steering them towards the STEM fields. Unfortunately, it works for his son, Carl, but not for his (adopted) daughter, Michelle. The child's personality likely plays a role.[1]"

1: It kind of seems like it's bashing Michelle Feynman for not going into STEM which seems kind of shitty.

2: Is her being adopted relevant? This part might just be me being oversensitive to this stuff; I'm a biological child with adopted siblings and I get salty when it seems like adopted children are getting the asterisk treatment. If I'm off-base here, I'm a-ok with being told so, as I am admittedly biased on this topic.

Gringodemaio (talk) 19:42, 11 January 2019 (UTC)

1. No. It is just a matter of personal taste and personality. Not everyone likes STEM, and there is nothing wrong with it. Note this is about children in general. Sex is irrelevant.

2. No entirely, which is why the information is in parenthesis. Nerd (talk) 21:06, 11 January 2019 (UTC)

Regarding 1: I think we're in agreement that not everyone wants to do STEM and that's ok. So what I'm questioning is why the article says "unfortunately" in reference to only one of his two children doing so. Regarding 2: again we're in agreement that it's not relevant which is why I questioned it even being mentioned, but since that topic is a personal bugbear of mine and it's a simple addition of factual information, I can't see any point in arguing for its removal. It's not hurting anyone by being mentioned after all. Cheers!

Gringodemaio (talk) 18:03, 13 January 2019 (UTC)

@Gringodemaio

1. That is to warn people of the possible failure of trying to nudge their children towards a career in STEM. That's it. Children's career choices should be informed, not forced. That's the message. Feynman respected his children's choices, so cheers to him. Nerd (talk) 20:05, 13 January 2019 (UTC)

That actually makes perfect sense. I didn't parse the sentence that way but looking at it now, yup. You're right. Merci! Gringodemaio (talk) 12:23, 14 January 2019 (UTC)

@Gringodemaio Glad we cleared that up. Thank you for commenting! Perhaps I should make that explicit in the article. Nerd (talk) 15:13, 14 January 2019 (UTC)

Accent

I realize that "accent like a Brooklyn cab driver" is a joke, so I'm leaving it alone in the article. But really, the NYC accent is not a class accent. If you are born in the city and spoke English at home you have it, unless you are African American (with some exceptions), belong to Old Money like FDR, or have trained yourself out of it like Marisa Tomei. Of course, exactly what "it" consists of changes with the passage of time, like any accent: only the over-70s say "swallowing ersters on Thoity-Thoid Street" any more. Feynman spoke like every other New Yorker (modulo the above) born in 1918, just as Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump speak like any other New Yorkers born in the 1940s. --Johnwcowan (talk) 16:27, 20 April 2019 (UTC)

"Dating Tips"

This section appears to be a device to criticize Feynman for a quote from his book "Surely You are Joking,..." There are a number of problems with the paragraph. First of all there are no details of the anecdote from which the quote is drawn. We don't actually know if Feynman was really joking because there were no known witnesses. Certainly he did not make a practice of similar pronouncements in public. There is evidence Feynman supported women scientists. From WP: "Jenijoy La Belle, who had been hired as Caltech's first female professor in 1969, was refused tenure in 1974. She filed suit with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which ruled against Caltech in 1977, adding that she had been paid less than male colleagues. La Belle finally received tenure in 1979. Many of Feynman's colleagues were surprised that he took her side. He had got to know La Belle and both liked and admired her" Ariel31459 (talk) 20:55, 19 May 2019 (UTC)

Agreed. Having actually read that book, and biographies by John Gribbin and by James Gleick, I can also say that he learned said "dating tips" from an acquaintance at a bar, tried them out once, felt guilty and halted the practice altogether. His sister is also a physicist, completing her PhD on condensed-matter physics before switching to heliophysics. There was this funny incident involving him, his sister, and certain angry people who thought he was sexist and wanted to bring him down. Anyway, if you can access Surely You Are Joking, please rewrite that paragraph. Nerd (talk) 23:15, 19 May 2019 (UTC)

I went though the trouble of finding not one, but two online copies of the book in question, citing and re-writing based on the contents of both. If you have a problem with the section I would advise reading the book once more to be sure that my edits are accurate, before making a substantial re-write to the section. ☭Comrade GC☭^{Ministry of Praise} 23:27, 19 May 2019 (UTC)