Edisonian Empirical Testing

“iv) The Edisonian principle Engineering is a state of mind, or at least a method of working. You can become expert on anything in six months, but steer clear of projects that require too much maths, and stick to empirical things. You can achieve major breakthroughs by a bit of lateral thinking, and this approach will often lead to new inventions being born of each other (just as, for example, the Dual Cyclone came out of the Ballbarrow). Keep testing and retesting and believe only the evidence of your own eyes, not of formulae or of other people's opinions. You may have to fly in the face of public opinion, and market research. They can only tell you what has happened. No research can tell you what is going to happen.”

“That is what development is all about. Empirical testing demands that you only ever make one change at a time. It is the Edisonian principle, and it is bloody slow. It is a thing that takes me ages to explain to my graduate employees at Dyson Appliances, but it is so important. They tend to leap in to tests, making dozens of radical changes and then stepping back to test their new masterpiece. How do they know which change has improved it, and which hasn't?”