In Part 1 of this installment, we discussed four prominent inventors of the past and how their techniques might help you win the UX for AI invention game:

• Albert Einstein: Imagination is More Important than Knowledge.

• Leonardo da Vinci: Let your imagination take flight.

• Thomas Edison: Prototype Faster and Cheaper. Then, Patent it.

• Antoni van Leeuwenhoek: Tools are but a Means to an End

In this second and final part of the series, we continue our exploration with Archimedes, who taught us to find divine inspiration in the mundane.

Archimedes of Syracuse: Inspiration in Everyday Objects

The famous bath incident where Archimedes (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archimedes) was inspired by the displacement of water in his bath to figure out the method of measuring the volume of the new crown to see if silver was mixed in with gold. The discovery allegedly caused him to run through the streets naked, shouting, “Eureka!” 

Regardless of whether you think that story was actually true or, as Galileo Galilei has postulated, Archimedes never ran around naked but used instead the appropriately named hydrostatic Archimedes' principle, found in his treatise On Floating Bodies: a body immersed in a fluid experiences a buoyant force equal to the weight of the fluid it displaces. (Using this principle, it would have been possible to compare the density of the crown to that of pure gold by balancing it on a scale with a pure gold reference sample of the same weight and then immersing the apparatus in water. The difference in density between the two samples would cause the scale to tip accordingly.)

But forgive me, dear reader – I delve too deeply into science, and we are here to talk about inventions.

The point I’m trying to come around to is that Archimedes almost certainly took baths, as was the fashion of his day. There is little doubt that in the relaxed frame of mind, he was inspired to think about his more significant ideas, and playing around with the bath water at hand was the key to many of his breakthroughs. Much like Leeuwenhoek played around with his lenses (as we discussed in Part 1), Archimedes played with what was at hand – bath water, bows, mirrors, bronze, silver, gold, and rocks. He keenly observed his surroundings and got inspired by everyday things and objects. Since homo sapiens learned to band together, billions of people took a trillion baths. But it took Archimedes taking a bath (or likely several baths… or several hundred baths…) to come up with the Archimedes' principle. 

As UX Designers, we can learn a great deal from approaching our environments with the same level of relaxed but mindful attention. There is much to be learned from the real world and simply from watching and playing with what’s at hand, using a mind that is technically ready and carefully prepared to receive inspiration, even if it comes from the most unlikely of activities, like taking a bath. You can also think of playing with what is in the environment as a kind of prototyping, which brings us to the Wright Brothers.

Wright Brothers: Apply What Works in One World to Another. Test & Fly!

The Wright Brothers (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wright_brothers) were bike mechanics who are also credited with “inventing, building, and flying the world's first successful… controlled, sustained flight of an engine-powered, heavier-than-air aircraft.” However, the brothers’ real breakthrough invention was creating a three-axis control system, which enabled the pilot to steer the aircraft effectively and maintain its equilibrium. Their system of aircraft controls made fixed-wing powered flight possible and remains standard on airplanes of all kinds. 

They got this idea from riding bicycles, which requires balance and practice.

The brothers built and flew gliders, tested engines, wing geometries, varied seating positions, and of course, flight controls. In short, they tinkered constantly with real-world prototypes. They worked on a shoestring budget, in relative obscurity, which actually helped them. (In contrast, the government flying project costing 50 times as much plunged into the Potomac River "like a handful of mortar.")

Finally, the brothers had each other to hold them up in moments of doubt and despair.

Today, we are facing our own equivalent of flying – this time, however, we are creating AI-driven products. Just like in the early days of flying, most of our efforts (85% of them, according to Gartner) will fall out of the sky and into obscurity "like a handful of mortar." We, too, need to create a new control system for our AI to make this truly powerful thing useful and productive. And in this journey, we can learn so much from the Wright brothers. 

The most significant ideas would be: 

• Take the learnings from one thing (e.g., the balance needed when riding bicycles) and apply it to another (controlling airplanes).

• Do not get discouraged by early failures.

• Use your lack of funds and relative obscurity to keep the expectations low and give yourself space to tinker.

• Tinker. Make lots and lots of real-world prototypes and keep testing and measuring.

• Don’t do it alone (have a brother or sister or a trusted co-conspirator).

All of these principles will serve UX Designers well in building AI-driven products. 

Let us highlight again the two most important points because they are critical for UX for AI success: 

(As we've mentioned before: https://www.uxforai.com/p/the-importance-of-staying-lean, “mo’ money” really can mean “mo’ problems” when it comes to innovation. The Wright Brothers are just another example. Ditto on the critical importance of focusing AI development work on real-life use cases that really matter to customers. We’ve written extensively about this here: https://www.uxforai.com/p/stop-f-cking-up-ai-projects-avoid-these-5-pitfalls and here: https://www.uxforai.com/p/how-to-pick-an-ai-use-case )

I want to go back for a second to the idea of measurement.  You might not know that to hone their ideas, the brothers built a small, home-built wind tunnel, which enabled them to collect more accurate data than any before, allowing them to design more efficient wings and propellers – the key to success. Accurate measurement is the key to many inventions, which brings us to John Snow.

John Snow: Measure, Then Act.

You know nothing, John Snow (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Snow). You don’t even know how disease spreads (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1854_Broad_Street_cholera_outbreak). After all, the germ theory is not yet established – Louis Pasteur has yet to propose it in 1861, 7 years after your seminal work. 

But you suspect. 

You suspect that cholera might be spread “by a 'morbid matter' which, passing from one patient in his evacuations, is accidentally swallowed by other persons as a pollution of food or water...” (4) 

(In other words, you suspect that hundreds of thousands of your fellow Londoners are drinking raw sewage water contaminated by human feces infected with cholera. Drink up, me hearties yo ho!)

So you measure. 

You interview. 

You think. 

And you measure: again, and again, and again. You do it in the midst of the largest outbreak of one of the deadliest and most terrifying diseases of your age. 

In Snow's own words:

“On proceeding to the spot, I found that nearly all the deaths had taken place within a short distance of the [Broad Street] pump. There were only ten deaths in houses situated decidedly nearer to another street-pump. In five of these cases the families of the deceased persons informed me that they always sent to the pump in Broad Street, as they preferred the water to that of the pumps which were nearer. In three other cases, the deceased were children who went to school near the pump in Broad Street ...

With regard to the deaths occurring in the locality belonging to the pump, there were 61 instances in which I was informed that the deceased persons used to drink the pump-water from Broad Street, either constantly or occasionally ...

The result of the inquiry then was, that there had been no particular outbreak or prevalence of cholera in this part of London except among the persons who were in the habit of drinking the water of the above-mentioned pump-well.

I had an interview with the Board of Guardians of St. James's parish, on the evening of Thursday, the 7th September, and represented the above circumstances to them. In consequence of what I said, the handle of the pump was removed on the following day.” (5) 

This event marks the birth of epidemiology. 

By the simple act of persuading* the board to remove the Broad Street Pump handle, John Snow likely saved more people than anyone who ever lived. His idea to measure the spread and identify the "focus of infection" (sites, such as the Broad Street pump, in which conditions are favorable for transmission of infection) was the key to improved public health and the construction of improved sanitation facilities worldwide. 

In the age of AI, numbers are key. Understanding “how much” something is working is going to be critical to making informed, timely decisions. Understanding data science measurements like accuracy, precision, and recall, as well as being able to articulate the relationships and trade-offs between them, is one of the keys to success. As UX Designers, we need to take the time to learn how to evaluate AI-driven projects, measure the outcomes, interview customers, and put the knowledge into a form that is understandable and actionable for our teams. Just like John Snow, you must be relentless, and the evidence we provide needs to be so persuasive that even the most skeptical “miasmaist” would be compelled to remove that broad street pump handle.

Learn from John Snow: 

Figuring out what to measure should be a natural outcome of your Digital Twin workshop: https://www.uxforai.com/p/digital-twin and Value Matrix we wrote about previously is a great place to start your measurement analysis: https://www.uxforai.com/p/ai-accuracy-bullsht-heres-ux-must-part-1. 

Conclusion: Standing on the Shoulders of Giants

In our age of AI-driven products, we are standing on the shoulders of giants: the inventors of the past, whose ingenuity, imagination, and grit have helped shape the world we live in today. As you stand on the threshold of great inventions of your own, fueled by the rise in functional AI, here are some time-tested approaches that might help you in your own practice:

• Einstein: “Imagination is more important than knowledge.” Lack of imagination is the #2 leading cause of failure for AI-driven projects.

• Leonardo: Dare greatly. Set aside time to think. Sketch Constantly. Most ideas are just stepping stones on the road to invention.

• Edison: “I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work.” Fail fast — kill your sacred cow without much drama and move on to testing the next idea. You don’t need to be the first to invent the lightbulb – invent a system to make it cheap. Make friends with patent attorneys. Patent everything.

• Leeuwenhoek: You are not your tools. A tool is but a stepping stone to a discovery. 

• Archimedes: Practice relaxed but mindful attention. Be prepared to receive inspiration, even if it comes from the most unlikely of activities, like taking a bath.

• Wright Brothers: Use the learnings from one thing (e.g., the balance needed when riding bicycles) and apply it to another (controlling airplanes). Tinker – make lots and lots of real-world prototypes and keep testing and measuring. Stay connected with the real-world use case. Lack of funds and obscurity create space for failure, which is necessary for learning. Don’t do it alone. 

• John Snow: It’s OK to know next to nothing as long as you bravely apply yourself to the problem with enthusiasm and rigor. Embrace the numbers – accurate measurement is an essential part of the discovery process. Numbers make your ideas and qualitative observations more persuasive* (and might just give birth to a new science and save billions of lives.)

In this series of articles, we have given you the keys to success and have done our best to inspire you with examples. Now it is up to you. 

What will you invent for this beautiful world to enjoy?

Greg Nudelman & Daria Kempka (Contributing Editor)

*NOTE: Numbers do NOT automatically make your conclusions indisputable! Just look at the upcoming election, where numbers AND conclusions are SURE to be disputed, at least by one of the parties. Numbers can be interpreted in innumerable ways depending on the motivations of the interpreter and the other context that is pulled in. However, numbers triangulated with meaning MIGHT help you understand to what degree something is happening so you can see whether your interventions are moving the situation in the desirable direction. So, numbers are good; just be sure to supply a meaningful overstory to go with the numbers, and keep working on your persuasion technique!

P.S. Pssst… Did you vote yet? Get out there! And remember, no one knows who you voted for — your vote is anonymous. So go vote while you still have a choice.

References (Part 1 and Part 2)

1. Ings, Simon (July 26, 2019), "The real history of electricity is more gripping than The Current War", New Scientist. Archived July 18, 2020, at the Wayback Machine.

2. Who Invented the Light Bulb? Archived June 15, 2020, at the Wayback Machine LiveScience, August 17, 2017

3. Boyer, Paul S., ed. (2001). The Oxford Companion to United States History. Oxford University Press. p. 211. ISBN 978-0-19-989109-2. OCLC 57680178.

4. Frerichs, Ralph R. "Competing Theories of Cholera". www.ph.ucla.edu. Archived from the original on 30 June 2017. Retrieved 5 March 2017.

5. Snow, John (1855). On the Mode of Communication of Cholera (2nd ed.). London: John Churchill.