"Dr. Hoenikker used to say that any scientist who couldn't explain to an eight-year-old what he was doing was a charlatan."
"Then I'm dumber than an eight-year-old," Miss Pefko mourned. "I don't even know what a charlatan is."
"Then I'm dumber than an eight-year-old," Miss Pefko mourned. "I don't even know what a charlatan is."
Kurt Vonnegut. Cat's cradle.
Genrikh Altshuller used to say that you should be able to strip your idea of all technical jargon and explain your invention to a 12-year-old because the 12-year-old would need only some understanding of physics. The more I work with inventors, the more I realize that most concepts can be easily explained to much younger kids. Unless, of course, adults package their explanations in layers of professional buzzwords, the buzzwords often designed to signal affinity with a certain group and repel the uninitiated. When stripped of packaging, ideas become much easier to understand, and, more importantly, develop much further into additional inventions.
tags: quote, creativity, knowledge, communication
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