“A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, and die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.”- Robert Heinlein
This came from a friend, a senior infact, Aditya Mandrekar. I think I have mentioned him before, for his mailers titled: ‘Everyday’.
I am going to try and disect it.
First of all, the order. Why is changing a diaper at the top? Interesting choice of sequence. Immediately followed by an invasion. Ooh! Butchering a hog, and cooking a tasty meal, though apparently related, are not quite in order… I wonder if Mr. Robert did give a thought to this…
Interesting choice of tasks too… He wants a human being to be a mom (or a dad, just to be more gender unbiased), a general, a butcher, a captain, an architect and a mason, a poet, an accountant, a bone-setter and a priest (but never a doctor), taker and giver of orders (which means to be in the middle?), co-operate and act alone (nothing really to comment on that), a mathmatician and a problem solver (solutionist?), a gardener, a programmer (now, don’t we have enough of those, already?), a gourmet cook, a fighter and above all, a gallant dier (?).
I wonder if all this is humanly possible. Well, let’s see… Mom/Dad, cooking, co-operating, acting alone, taking and giving orders is fine… But one cannot be a butcher and a general and a captain and a priest and a programmer and a mason and an accountant at the same time… Too many things to do… Jack of all trades, master of none… Unless, of course, you are a super-human. Yes, we have those too.
Specialization is for insects? Now, where did that come from? Ants? Last I heard was, that those are supposed to be very well organized with a social structure that is extremely successful. Wonderful ant-hills and humungous storage. Except yes, only one queen and stuff, but then, one can’t have all, can one?
What I would say, specialization is for everybody. And sometimes, it is the only thing that can keep you alive. Especially, in cut-throat competition of today’s world. Of course, anybody’s guess if one is a doctor of the second nerve ending of the little finger of the right hand, how successful he’d be. That is assuming that there are atleast a given number of people who would have a problem with that very nerve ending. And that there are not many people specialized in again, that very nerve ending.
Of course, opinions can differ. But as I see it, online and offline, there is never an end to ultra-specialized businesses.
{I may have run aground with this blog, too many intrerruptions.}