There’s a
passage in When I Say No, I Feel Guilty,
by Manuel J. Smith, where my favorite scientist is mentioned although not
named. See if you can guess who it is:
Recently, after one class, I ran into a former
student, a physicist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratories, set up and
administered by the California Institute of Technology, and he told me an
amusing story.
The night before this incident happened, I had
given an introductory demonstration of assertive verbal skills to a number of
Cal Tech students on campus. The following day, the physicist noted one of the
student assistants in the laboratory going around all morning and
indiscriminately using a FOGGING response in reply to anything said to him. He
kept enthusiastically saying: “You may be right,” to everything, including
statements like: “You want some coffee?”
Having heard me describe this typical phase of
learning in class as “the impulse you get, after you are given a brand-new
shiny set of tools, to go around looking for loose nuts to tighten up,” and
having gone through it himself, the physicist knew I would appreciate the humor
inherent in the situation. . . .
With a puckish glint in his eye, but also with
some sympathy for the novice FOGGER, the physicist told me that he was tempted
to go up to the unaware student and say something like: “Harry, I’ve noticed
that you’ve been using a lot of FOGGING this morning. Don’t you think you could
save it for manipulative situations?”
He restrained his impulse out of his own
identification with the student’s situation. He remembered how enthusiastic he
himself felt in first being more assertive and learning to cope better with
other people. In spite of his [kindness], he still wished he could have heard the
novice’s probable response, “You mean you know this already?” and watch his jaw
drop when he replied: “Of course. Everybody knows about FOGGING. Where have you
been?”
While appreciating the humor in his aborted
prank, I asked him: “What makes you think he wouldn’t simply have replied: ‘You
may be right. I am probably overdoing it’?” The physicist looked at me and said
in kind: “I should have thought of that. He might have!” and we exchanged
understanding grins.
There are
plenty of clues in the above, so I won’t add any more. Can you name the
scientist?
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