<p>Essay Prompt: A colleague of the great scientist James Watson remarked that Watson was always “lounging around, arguing about problems instead of doing experiments.” He concluded that “There is more than one way of doing good science.” It was Watson’s form of idleness, the scientist went on to say, that allowed him to solve “the greatest of all biological problems: the discovery of the structure of DNA.” It is a point worth remembering in a society overly concerned with efficiency.</p>
<p>Assignment: Do people accomplish more when they are allowed to do things in their own way? Plan and write an essay in which you develop your point of view on this issue. Support your position with reasoning and examples taken from your reading, studies, experience, or observations.</p>
<pre><code> Unique perspectives and different techniques allowed for the discovery and invention of many astounding results that greatly impact our society as a whole. Benjamin Franklin, for instance, flew a kite which he held onto by a metal rod in hopes of directing bolts of lightning onto the apparatus. One faithful night he and his son William Franklin did just that, and thus the discovery of electricity. This was not standard practice at the time nor is it today, however electricity is one of the most advantageous discoveries of human existence and if it weren't for this outside the box approach electricity would have not have been found on that particular day. That is not to say it would not have been discovered at all but his choice to do it his own way greatly sped up the human agenda.
If it is true that something new is indeed learned every day then it would stand to reason that going through each day with society's "accepted" and "expected" ways would be an awful idea as it never allows room for improvement and change. This room for improvement and change is what led to many great things including milk for instance, it's not exactly normal to go up to an animal, have a liquid come out of it and assume it would be ready for consumption per say, however thanks to one brave individual we have been given a staple to our daily diets. An individual who did the unthinkable, took upon a task in a different, and unique way and benefited billions of human beings for generations to come.
There is a story of a young boy who was so bright that he perplexed his teacher and constantly interrupted with cries along the lines of "I'm done!" and "When can we move on?". This frustrated the teacher so she decided if the boy wanted to show off and rush her she should teach him a lesson. She told the boy to add up the numbers 1-100 and come back to her when he had the result. She assumed that he would like many others had done before, add one to two and then three to three and six to four and so on until he got to 100, however he noticed a pattern. When you take the numbers of 1-100 from the opposites end of the spectrum they would always equal one-hundred one. The boy used the pattern and figured out that that 1-100 had 50 pairs of 101 so all he had to do was multiply 101 by 50 and thus he got the answer to be 5050 and so he told his teacher he was done which really put a fright in her! Through his creative and logical thinking the boy completed a problem which could have taken upwards of twenty minutes in just a few seconds!
Standard approaches are great for acquiring standard results at standard rates but extraordinary results require extraordinary thinking. People need to be allowed room to think and grow as people. The right way may not always be the right way, in conclusion, yes I do believe people accomplish more when they are allowed to do things in their own way.
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