“A good scientist is a person with original ideas. A good engineer is a person who makes a design that works with as few original ideas as possible. There are no prima donnas in engineering.”
Pt. 1, Ch. 10
Disturbing the Universe (1979)
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Freeman Dyson 90
theoretical physicist and mathematician 1923Related quotes

Source: "The Engineer as an Economist," 1886, p. 428; Second paragraph
Context: To insure the best results, the organization of productive labor must be directed and controlled by persons having not only good executive ability, and possessing the practical familiarity of a mechanic or engineer with the goods produced and the processes employed, but having also, and equally, a practical knowledge of how to observe, record, analyze and compare essential facts in relation to wages, supplies, expense accounts, and all else that enters into or affects the economy of production and the cost of the product. There are many good mechanical engineers; — there are also many good " businessmen;"— but the two are rarely combined in one person. But this combination of qualities, together with at least some skill as an accountant, either in one person or more, is essential to the successful management of industrial works, and has its highest effectiveness if united in one person, who is thus qualified to supervise, either personally or through assistants, the operations of all departments of a business, and to subordinate each to the harmonious development of the whole.

When Thomas Edison visited the Eiffel Tower during the 1889 World's Fair, he signed the guestbook with this message, as quoted in The Tallest Tower by Joseph Harris, p. 95.
1800s

Source: Kritik der zynischen Vernunft [Critique of Cynical Reason] (1983), p. 56

“There are no original ideas. There are only original people.”

BBC interview http://www.bbc.co.uk/films/2002/11/20/john_cleese_die_another_day_interview.shtml on Die Another Day (20 November 2002)]