26 October 2004Persi Diaconis on Collaboration
Persi Diaconis, Mary V. Sunseri Professor of Statistics and Professor of Mathematics at Stanford University, is a facinating personality, and I already devoted a posting to some of his work on coin flipping. Here I'd just like to cite what he said about collaborative work in an interesting interview with Donald J. Albers that appeared in the volume Mathematical People by Albers and Alexanderson.
Question: Do you think that your insticts are such that you are more inclined to collaborate than to work alone?
Diaconis: ..... There is a great advantage in working with a great co-author. There is excitement and fun, and it's something I notice happening more and more in mathematics. Mathematical people enjoy talking to each other. Teaching someone else your tricks is as much fun as doing the new math. It's a great way to learn stuff and solve problems and also to have somebody to compete with in a friendly style. Collaboration forces you to work beyond your normal level. Ron Graham has a nice way to put it. He says when you are doing a joint paper, both co-authors do 75% of the work, and that's about right: if it's not done that way, it's not much fun to collaborate.
I leave you to ponder whether you agree with him. I'm off to Reykjavík tomorrow. My next posting will be from the North Atlantic.
Last modified: Tuesday, 26-Oct-2004 10:34:31 CEST.