Aid to Evaluating Your Accomplishments

part of Career Guide for Engineers and Scientists
Compare yourself to these four ordinary people who were selected at random:

Encyclopedia Americana staff writer Norbert Wiener

Received Ph.D. from Harvard at age 18, subsequently founded field of communication science/cybernetics.

(more)

Former Community College Student Craig Venter

Developed shotgun gene sequencing technique and founded Celera Genomics, a private company that raced ahead of the government-funded Human Genome Project.

(more)

Judean Carpenter Jesus of Nazareth

Told young women he was God and they believed him.

(more)

Corsican Lieutenant Napoleon Bonaparte

Conquered most of Europe and Egypt. Emancipated the Jews throughout Europe.

(more)

Programmed by Eve Astrid Andersson and Philip Greenspun back in the mid-1990s. If you're a nerd, you might find the source code useful.

Original Inspiration: How to Make Yourself Miserable, by Dan Greenburg


philg@mit.edu