By James McKenzie 

After years of putting it off I finally got around to reading Feynman’s book “Surely You’re Joking Mr. Feynman!: Adventures of a Curious Character”. I was originally turned on to it by a documentary on his life and accomplishments.  I was impressed that the humor and energy of Feynman’s oral presence was so perfectly preserved in the book.  The book reminded me of my original sentiment that Feynman embodied a very unique type of intellectual artistry.  He is often spoken of as a Nobel Prize winning physicist who played bongo drums and drew pretty good pictures.  This is a view that Feynman himself was disappointed by.  Take for example Feynman’s sentiment on giving a seminar in the biology department at Harvard “I always do that, get into something and see how far I can go.” (Feynman 76). To Feynman the success of the endeavor was not the novelty of him attempting it but rather the wonderment at how far an individual can reach in a chosen direction.  In this way he was able to accumulate a great deal of success in many different fields of endeavor.  Despite this success in disparate fields Feynman preserved a talent for finding the point at which amateur ability is separated from professional ability.  Although he is proud of his abilities and accomplishments in various fields he never loses track of that distinction.

Throughout the book Feynman refers to himself as a ‘faker’.  It was a reputation that he gained as an undergraduate at MIT based primarily on his love for puzzles, riddles and the pursuit of perfect understanding.  Despite all of his success Feynman expresses an underlying feeling of imposition to the extent that his first reaction on receiving word that he would receive the Nobel Prize was to not accept it.  Feynman always knew that he was a great physicist but his pure love of discovery made him question the value of his contributions.  For Feynman the important thing was the process.  To push for a result that did not come naturally was the worst kind of intellectual fakery.  In fact one of Feynman’s key understandings was that a scientist must have a “kind of scientific integrity, a principle of scientific thought that corresponds to a kind of utter honesty – a kind of leaning over backwards. For example, if you’re doing an experiment, you should report everything that you think might make it invalid—not only what you think is right about it:  other causes that could possibly explain your results;  and things you thought of that you’ve eliminated by some other experiment, and how they worked—to make sure the other fellow can tell they have been eliminated.” (Feynman 341) 

This book is utterly accessible to the non-scientist.  In fact, reading this book can give a decidedly non-scientific reader a deep and profound understanding of just what science is and what scientists should strive to do.  And it is that ability to draw back the curtains of mystery that shroud the scientific process that is the true accomplishment of this book.  It reaffirms one of my own sentiments that everyone is a scientist; it’s just a matter of degree.

Feynman, Richard.  "Surely You're Joking Mr. Feynman!: Adventures of a Curious Character." Vintage, 1992.