Linus Pauling — "The best way to have a good idea is to have a lot of ideas."
The best way to have a good idea is to have a lot of ideas.
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More from Linus Pauling
"I think that the future of medicine is in prevention, not in treatment."
"I have always been a scientist, and I believe that science is the best way to understand the world."
"I have never had a bad idea."
"I have always been a curious person, and I believe that curiosity is the key to discovery."
"My own estimate is that all of the people in the United States would be killed in a nuclear war, if we do not build fallout shelters, and that if we do build them and train the American people, all of…"
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Understanding this quote
What it means
Generating many ideas — even imperfect ones — is the most reliable path to finding a genuinely good one. Creative output is a numbers game: you cannot cherry-pick a winner from a tiny pool. Quantity creates variety, and variety creates the conditions where breakthrough thinking can emerge. Filtering comes after generating, never before.
Relevance to Linus Pauling
Pauling embodied prolific ideation across chemistry and medicine. He proposed the alpha-helix protein structure, pioneered quantum mechanics applications to chemical bonding, and championed vitamin C megadosing. His two Nobel Prizes — Chemistry and Peace — came from different domains entirely, proving his own maxim: cast wide, then refine ruthlessly.
The era
Pauling worked through mid-20th century science's golden age, when Cold War funding flooded research institutions and interdisciplinary thinking was reshaping biology, physics, and chemistry simultaneously. Competition with Watson and Crick over DNA structure, and his peace activism during McCarthyism, demanded both intellectual boldness and willingness to publicly risk being wrong.
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