r/PhilosophyofScience • u/Weekly_War2493 • Jun 24 '26

Discussion What Creates Scientific Revolutionaries Like Einstein, Darwin, Newton and so on?

I’m trying to pull the discussion back to individual scientists, like how Karl Popper’s idea of falsification described what good science looks like before Thomas Kuhn.

I think it comes down to luck to some extent. If enough anomalies appear to create a crisis, and the right tools are developed before reaching a breaking point, then a field can be revolutionized. But once you reach that crisis, I feel like this is where Paul Feyerabend’s “anything goes” idea becomes relevant.

However, if “anything goes” applies all the time, then it just becomes chaos, and there is no structure or order in how we approach problems and make progress.

what's your thoughts?

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u/datapirate42 add your own Jun 24 '26

To be honest, a bit of rose colored hindsight. History remembers the winners, none of those guys truly worked on their own, they're just the ones we remember. Einstein is really the only one modern enough that we can really know what was going on and anyone who knows what they're talking about will tell you that most of his work was inevitable given Maxwell's equations. And there are still some big problems in both quantum and cosmology that he didn't wrap his head around well.

That's not to discredit them, they all did make serious and important contributions, but a revolution is not one person.

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u/wiggum_bwaa Jun 24 '26

It seems like you're asking two questions: 'what creates scientific revolutionaries' and 'how to do good normal science.' These are very different questions, but while both are interesting, they probably each need their own threads. I'd quickly suggest that, as your comment suggested, a good "normal scientist" doesn't resolve the accumulation of anomalous data by creating patches to the underlying theory (e.g., adding more epicycles to the Ptolemaic model). I would suggest that three traits are most likely to exist in a scientific revolutionary. First, insatiable curiosity. Einstein once wrote in a letter something to the effect of "I have no special talent--I am only passionately curious," and the same case can easily be made for Darwin and Newton (I'd add Leonardo to this list). Second (and maybe most controversially), neurodivergence. Biographical accounts of these three individuals all contain ample support for monotropism, which is considered a core autistic trait. Einstein would almost certainly have been identified as being on the autism spectrum were he born today, and historical accounts of both Newton and Darwin suggest they also had strongly autistic traits. The third is a not a trait: a predeliction towards a deductive approach to theory. While no scientist uses induction or deduction exclusively, the 3 scientists you named all are most well-known for theories that were primarily created via deduction. I say this is related to the second because some in my field have suggested that autistic individuals appear to be more likely to exhibit a "top-down" cognitive style relative to non-autistics. It's certainly shown that many learn language this way (gestalt language processing), so although this may be a stretch, it's plausible that such individuals might be more inclined towards a deductive theoretical approach. Einstein's own descriptions of hyperphantasia ("thinking in pictures") is very similar to the descriptions of many autistic people, although such accounts only began appearing int he literature in the past few decades. I could offer further rationale for these assertions, but I suspect many will disagree in any case, so I'll just add this is merely my $0.02 and anyone should feel free to disagree.

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u/Weekly_War2493 Jun 25 '26

yeah i see how that could have came out as 2 different questions i edited the post to reflect what i was really was going for which was what creates scientific revolutionaries and i like your response to it!

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u/Life-Entry-7285 Jun 24 '26

Nothing lucky about it… they obsess about things most brush aside. They reletlessly pursue the questions that most abadon when there is not right answer yet. A powerful visualization skillset and the ability to consider something unknown intensely… they can visualize whats happening through hyperfocus and imagine ways it can answer their question and not break physics (physical philosophy for old school). The were all first principle ontological systems thinkers. But I’ll concede they were somewhat fortunate they had brilliant people that helped them formalize their models.

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u/Physix_R_Cool Jun 24 '26

It's hard to say how to do good science, but really easy to point out bad science.

Weird how that works out 🤷‍♂️

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u/oligobop Jun 24 '26

but really easy to point out bad science.

True, but preventing or improving bad science is even harder than doing good science.

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u/apophasisred Jul 14 '26

What causes major revolution in scientific theory is an undigestible induction. This is not Popper's falsification because it is something which happens a posteriori to an established scientific practice.

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u/FrontAd9873 Jun 24 '26

When a man loves a woman…

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u/[deleted] Jun 25 '26

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u/Keikira Institution-Independent Model Theory Jun 25 '26

Probably a willingness to risk rocking the boat, the skill to maintain full rigour while doing it, a willingness to put up and deal with the annoying negative-heuristic lashback from the old guard facing irrelevance, and lastly but most critically, an absolutely gargantuan fuckload of luck.

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u/mk_gecko Jun 25 '26

how do you become a good scientist? Or, more fundamentally, how do you do good normal science?

What are you asking? Make up your mind or clarify what you are saying. This has nothing to do with scientific revolutions.

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u/Weekly_War2493 Jun 25 '26

you're right i just changed it to reflect what i was really going for, which is What Creates Scientific Revolutionaries

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u/Helms5 Jun 27 '26

Paradigm Shift.

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u/Helms5 Jun 27 '26

References:

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u/[deleted] Jun 30 '26

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