The most
exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is
not ‘Eureka!’, but ‘That’s funny …’- Isaac Asimov
If serendipity were defined as
stumbling upon one thing while researching another, would it not make sense
that the act of serendipity relies on luck and chance alone? Contrary to this
seemingly correct statement, one important aspect gets in the way: education.
One of the most famous examples of serendipity is Louis Pasteur and his accidental discovery of penicillin. He left a petri dish of staphylococcus, not to be confused with streptococcus that causes strep throat, uncovered and when a mold invaded and killed the bacteria, he discovered the antibiotic we all know today. Though, what if you had seen the petri dish? Would you have looked closely enough and been able to identify just what happened, or would you have groaned and thrown the petri dish away and started again? Pasteur’s education enabled him to look at his apparent failure and gleam something from it. This idea of serendipity and education is not new. Shakespeare himself stated in Henry V, “all things are ready of our minds be so.” What is a mind if it is not educated?
Serendipity may be paraphrased as a fortunate accident, but serendipity is picky and only exercises its power on people whose minds can handle and understand something new. Serendipity is the very act of finding something you never knew you were looking for, which is scarily similar to the idea of scientific research.
One of the most famous examples of serendipity is Louis Pasteur and his accidental discovery of penicillin. He left a petri dish of staphylococcus, not to be confused with streptococcus that causes strep throat, uncovered and when a mold invaded and killed the bacteria, he discovered the antibiotic we all know today. Though, what if you had seen the petri dish? Would you have looked closely enough and been able to identify just what happened, or would you have groaned and thrown the petri dish away and started again? Pasteur’s education enabled him to look at his apparent failure and gleam something from it. This idea of serendipity and education is not new. Shakespeare himself stated in Henry V, “all things are ready of our minds be so.” What is a mind if it is not educated?
Serendipity may be paraphrased as a fortunate accident, but serendipity is picky and only exercises its power on people whose minds can handle and understand something new. Serendipity is the very act of finding something you never knew you were looking for, which is scarily similar to the idea of scientific research.
For more information on serendipitous
discoveries, check out this article on Business Pundit, a blog dedicated to
entrepreneurs and businesses.
I completely agree that education is one of the sole reasons serendipity remotely exists. Without prior knowledge of what you are trying to make/create, this process would not be called serendipity, it would be called luck. Education is what thrives one to explore into and/or discover something new. When they create something and it fails and is beneficial in another way, this is what we would call serendipity. So yes, I entirely and wholly believe what you are saying is true. There are no opposing views here.
ReplyDeleteRahul Iyer, Section A4 (Forgot to add this. Sorry.)
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