I was reading a biography of the polymath John Von Neumann and his association with Richard Feynman and it would seem that besides being coworkers on the Manhattan Project and being at Princeton for a considerable amount of time of their careers, they also attended what I would consider was one of the two most important conferences ever assembled, the Shelter Island Conference of 1947. In Feynman’s books, he would describe his struggle in trying to understand the electromagnetic interactions of the quantum world. At this conference however, he managed to get the small hint he was looking for in formulating the foundation of modern Quantum Electrodynamics (QED), which would become the most accurate theory in describing phenomena. Like the Shelter Island Conference, there was another equally important conference that occurred, the Solvay Conference of 1927 where the world’s greatest physicists and chemists came together to discuss the most vexing problems of their day. (pic taken from source)

What I see when I look at that picture is a mastermind of the most revolutionary group of thinkers and genius ever assembled. Each of these people in the picture on the right have had a distinguished professional career, with the man in the middle being declared the Person Of The Century by Time magazine 10 years ago. Almost all of the people each have a Wikipedia page dedicated to their work and life. They have contributed much towards the human race, and when they come together they can only help each other in advancing their research and ideas further than they could have alone.

When I think about how much innovation, creativity, and breakthroughs can occur when a group of people come together to solve the big problems in any field, I always get excited at the thought that we can get together the best and most influential people of this community to solve the problem. In almost all subjects I have ever studied, the idea of the group and of putting a group of brains together is often the best idea towards progress. Currently we have the Podcast that is used to broadcast our messages and I do try to get other important people on the show. I have this website but it’s reach and influence is very limited. There is no forum because I can’t see at this point just how it would help in pushing the effort further or lead to any new possible breakthroughs.

We need to meet face to face, mingle, discuss, and brainstorm our ideas to each other. I consider myself old school in my research. I like to go through the library and look through old texts and journals to find my ideas. When I need ideas communicated to me, I prefer to have a person explain it to me face to face, not through emails, instant messaging, or even Skype. I have found that the trasmission of data to be far more effective when the person giving me instructions or guidance to be in front of me, so that the interaction is more natural, more fluid, and not likely to be interrupted by such things like internet connection failure.

So I propose that “The Height Increase Community Should Have World Research Conventions Similar To The Solvay And Shelter Island Conferences“