Several
years ago, I was turned on to Thomas Kuhn’s revolutionary book, The
Structure of Scientific Revolutions. It is a book whose author took a
similar path to knowledge as I did, from engineer/scientist to philosopher
(junior grade) and back again, creating a more balanced, hearty and happy ME.
Along the way, after taking a year off from college to finally graduate at the
Dawning of the Age of Aquarius (1969), I became an Air Force officer stationed in Florida, then
the Republic of Turkey, California, and finally at Denver’s Lowry Air Force
base into 1973.
I began my careers... first in space systems as an orbital analyst. Then, after moving to Denver and leaving the Air Force, I got a Master's Degree in civil engineering (water resources and water rights consulting) forming the bulk of my career from which I retired last year (2014). Like Kuhn, I was profoundly impacted by a History of Science course in college; what began as a serendipitous elective produced some of the most profound AH HA! insights of my life.
I began my careers... first in space systems as an orbital analyst. Then, after moving to Denver and leaving the Air Force, I got a Master's Degree in civil engineering (water resources and water rights consulting) forming the bulk of my career from which I retired last year (2014). Like Kuhn, I was profoundly impacted by a History of Science course in college; what began as a serendipitous elective produced some of the most profound AH HA! insights of my life.
I
was extremely lucky to fall in love with science, philosophy – and the
opportunity to dabble in law (expert testimony more than 70 times as a Professional Engineer working
with more than 130 different lawyers). I overcame obstacles like inadequate
high school preparation for these rewarding careers. In 1963, I graduated
from Highland High School in Albuquerque, New Mexico, ranked 463rd
in my class of about 500. Growing up working in my Dad’s auto wrecking yard and
reading hot rod magazines, I had a D average, failing to qualify with the C
average required to enter the University of New Mexico (UNM) in my hometown.
But, after a year off from college working at various jobs, I began again at the College of St. Joseph (now the University of Albuquerque) to get my grades up and finally qualify for the engineering
curriculum at UNM.
As
the old saying goes, what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.
Apparently, it can also make you more successful and happy, if you allow it. Even today, at age
70, I look back with fondness to attribute both the bad and good decisions I
made in my early adult development. The good things I did were obvious, but after-the-fact, I also came to realize how certain challenges
and temporary failures of mine led to a more balanced, battle-tested personal
constitution that including a variety of sports, hobbies and diverse skills.
Along the way, I visited at least 45 states and enjoyed trips to England, Germany
and the middle east, spending a year in the Bronze Age (3500 year-old) city of Diyarbakir, Turkey before leaving the Air Force. I have owned and trained more than 30 dogs, and have judged more than 100 others in the vigorous outdoor sport of tracking (like search and rescue). I
ran marathons and other distance running and did scuba diving in Fiji, off
Cozumel Island and the Dos Ojos (two eyes) springs connected by a scary
underground traverse north of Cancun, Mexico, as well as other sites in
California and Florida (from the panhandle to many springs mid-state down to
and including Key Largo). For the last four decades, I have lived in the Denver, Colorado area.
Speaking
of challenges making you stronger - about a decade ago, I was diagnosed with a
tumor in one of my kidneys. After a few hours of online research, it became
obvious to me that the best course of action was to remove the entire kidney,
rather than cut it up and possibly spread cancer cells throughout my abdomen.
As it turned out, I have been cancer free for a decade now, and choose to
attribute at least some of my good luck heatlhwise to my body’s reaction to
these stresses, which must have improved my immune system and ability to fight
off disease. Without the early detection of my kidney cancer from a routine
checkup, I may not have made the best decisions for my health, which I now call
the blessing of a curable cancer.
As
my rambling here comes to a close, let me heartily recommend Kuhn’s attached book
which so elegantly integrates the rationality of logic (simple, easy,
predictable) with the irrational, difficult and unpredictable – the essential
essence of creativity and the underrated bad twin of science and
health.
Here
are the first two paragraphs from Kuhn’s preface - a profound addition to my
life from the attached pdf copy of The Structure of Scientific
Revolutions:
Preface
The
essay that follows is the first full published report on a project
originally
conceived almost fifteen years ago. At that time I was a
graduate
student in theoretical physics already within sight of the end
of
my dissertation. A fortunate involvement with an experimental
college
course treating physical science for the non-scientist provided
my
first exposure to the history of science. To my complete surprise, that
exposure
to out-of-date scientific theory and practice radically
undermined
some of my basic conceptions about the nature of science
and
the reasons for its special success.
Those
conceptions were ones I had previously drawn partly from
scientific
training itself and partly from a long-standing avocational
interest
in the philosophy of science. Somehow, whatever their
pedagogic
utility and their abstract plausibility, those notions did not at
all
fit the enterprise that historical study displayed. Yet they were and
are
fundamental to many discussions of science, and their failures of
verisimilitude
therefore seemed thoroughly worth pursuing. The result
was
a drastic shift in my career plans, a shift from physics to history of
science
and then, gradually, from relatively straightforward historical
problems
back to the more philosophical concerns that had initially led
me
to history. Except for a few articles, this essay is the first of my
published
works in which these early concerns are dominant. In some
part
it is an attempt to explain to myself and to friends how I happened
to
be drawn from science to its history in the first place….