Einstein’s Rule of Simplicity

“Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler.” 
— Albert Einstein

This rule comes up regularly in exhibition planning discussions. For good reason. It’s applicable to every project we do. 

We should make content accessible for non-expert visitors. But we shouldn’t simplify the content so much that it’s no longer true or accurate.

But wait, there’s more.

It turns out that Einstein never said those exact words. That’s somebody else’s misattributed paraphrase. Einstein actually wrote something … less simple:

“It can scarcely be denied that the supreme goal of all theory is to make the irreducible basic elements as simple and as few as possible without having to surrender the adequate representation of a single datum of experience.”

So — ironically — the more common paraphrase is itself a demonstration of the rule it describes. It takes the original, and makes it as simple as possible, but no simpler.

And that twist makes this rule impossible for me to forget.

Here’s the thing:
“Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler.”
— Albert Einstein (simplified as much as possible)

Warmly,
Jonathan

P.S. Nerd out on the complete fascinating detective story of that famous paraphrase here.