Crackpot Scientists: Inside the ‘Einsteins’ That Never Made It

Albert Einstein

You may never have heard of Alfred Lawson. Yet, he was one of the most influential people of the twentieth century: He pioneered the commercial airline industry, and some say created the airliner. He also played professional baseball for both the Boston Beaneaters (now the Atlanta Braves) and the Pittsburgh Alleghenys (now the Pittsburgh Pirates). He even created a university. Despite all of this, post-hoc many people in the scientific community have looked down upon him. Many people, among scientists and the general public, have long scorned him as a person, for having many extremely eccentric ideas: Debunked pseudoscience theories, self-comparisons with Einstein, and a religion that believed that humans were created by aliens. History is filled with countless creative and unusual people like him. They are grouped as “scientific crackpots” — people with extremely pseudoscientific theories who believed with complete certainty and grandiosity that they were the next “Einstein.” We paint some as the “great people of history” while treating others as forgotten faddists. I would argue that it is worth returning from time to time to those that the science community has put on the ash heap and see if they merit a fresh look. We should commemorate their usage of their creative ability; this would be better than viewing the crackpots as people to shy away from due to their self-centralized views.

People today take billions of flights. Lawson is believed to have created the first “commercial air transport” or airliner and he secured millions of dollars of funding for the early aviation industry. The world would be very different if Lawson wasn’t there to revolutionize airliners. He built the first ever prototype of the airline: The Lawson C-2 was able to carry 26 passengers. He innovated airline safety, via comfort seating and shock absorption. Modern airlines such as United, American Airlines, and Emirates might not be flying today if Lawson wasn’t there to pioneer the airliner. He also created one of the first aviation magazines — called “Fly” — which was first published in 1908 along with making another Aviation magazine a few years later called “Aircraft”.

In spite of his many creative achievements, Lawson is the prime example of a “scientific crackpot.” He had invented or subscribed to many scientific theories which are now considered debunked. These theories had names such as “Zig-Zag-and-Swirl (Lawson’s attempt at prescribing physics),” “Menorgs (positive and constructive forces in the universe that bring order, harmony, and health),” and “Disorgs” (oppositive, destructive forces that represent decay, disorder, and deconstruction) — which he described in his book “Lawsonomy” italicize book titles, no quotes — that he considered to be on par with Einstein’s Theory of Relativity (he is not remembered for his humility). He also created a bizarre philosophy and religion (to say the least) called Lawsonomy. Some of Lawsonomy’s core tenets were the ideas that humans were created by aliens and that energy did not exist. Despite its outlandish sci-fi foundations, Lawsonomy attracted thousands of adherents, advocating for these beliefs, and from Des Moines to Wisconsin there were many Lawsonian churches around the country. Moreover, to have truly learned Lawsonomy’ and receive the degree of “knowlegonian,” a person had to have studied it for 30 years, which very few people did. Although over 2000 people attended the University of Lawsonomy part-time, most did not finish it. Students were expected to devote themselves to only reading Lawson’s books and all other books were banned. After countless IRS and Senate investigations, the University was closed in 1954: the year of Lawson’s death. Only one person is known to have been documented as believing in the religion as of 2020. Despite all of the backlash against Lawsonomy, Lawson firmly believed that he would live to the age of 200. This belief unfortunately did not work out for him.

Currently, Lawson’s grandiose theories are treated as discredited pseudoscience, with the few writings about him largely being pieces memorializing him for his blunders such as this piece from WIRED, in spite of his creative achievements. But, I urge that we take away something else from the stories of “crackpot scientists” such as Lawson. Despite his many eccentricities and wrong-headed theories and beliefs, we also must credit Lawson for his imagination, creativity, and real-life impacts on one of the most important inventions and economic markets created by man — the airline industry. There are many examples of creative people who were much more lauded historically and whose idiosyncratic traits parallel him. While they are in a different league, Sigmond Freud, psychology’s most famous figure, defended the idea of boys wanting to have sex with their mothers and kill their fathers as an innate desire through his infamous work on the Oedipus Complex. Film producer, business magnate, and aerospace engineer, Howard Hughes rarely trimmed his nails, later in his life, and kept jars of his urine. Hughes was a very similar innovator in the aviation space to Lawson. Both experienced mental health problems (OCD for Hughes and likely Narcissistic Personality Disorder for Lawson). Lawson is in general more known for the negative side of his problems than Hughes. Yet, Freud has been far more celebrated by society and the aviation world long-term due to him focusing less, in the public lens, on his flawed ideas (he didn’t share much about his negative habits publicly) than Lawson who was very public about his religion with flawed beliefs.

What is the difference between Hughes and Freud vs the “crackpot scientists” such as Lawson? I would argue that the main difference between them is what they focused on and not the traits that they had. Lawson had extreme creativity and eccentricity; we don’t really say that someone “has creativity” or “has eccentricity”: we might say they exhibited high levels of creativity and eccentric behaviors, or possessed eccentric traits similar to Freud and Hughes. However, he focused large amounts of his efforts towards a pseudoscience religion. If he had focused more of his life on just the airliner, history might have told a different story about him. He is not too far off from other similar innovators in history, in believing in ideas and practices (the Lawsonian religion) from what most of society would consider normal. Yet, we (society) love to celebrate the few (of the many) who are successful and considered “innovators.” Freud did have a couple of big breakthroughs (unconscious, import of home environment, talk therapy) that are still with us and credible; Hughes was a very successful film producer, aviator, and inventor in aviation — despite their other eccentricities and invalid ideas. Being a crackpot is not a laudable goal and it should not be aimed for. But, the act of creation is worth celebrating and we should acknowledge the rare instances that it does happen. Crackpot scientists do not need to be treated as Einstein. But, crackpots focusing on the wrong things does not mean that they are not legitimate. legitimate what? legitimate in what sense exactly? as humans?

True creativity is very rare. The Creative Achievement Questionnaire, a self-report questionnaire developed at Harvard, measuring people’s creative achievement across 10 domains, which can be taken by anyone, has a median score of 0. The test involves asking people about their accomplishments across various creative domains such as art, music, and dance. It represents the rarity of creative practices in the world. Globally, regardless of the place, more creativity is needed. We need more, not fewer, people like the “crackpot scientists.” We shouldn’t be encouraging people to express grandiosity or practice isolation. But, we should all try to be open to different people’s theories of the world, willing to question their flaws, and understand that just because someone seems crazy or delusional does not mean that everything they believe is a detriment to society.

Steve Jobs, the creator of Apple, is another example of an extremely creative person who practiced eccentric behaviors: He soaked construction his feet in company toilets and did not ever take showers. His most famous advertisement with Apple, “Think Different” finishes with the words “The people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones who do.” Many innovators have had behaviors and beliefs that can have been extremely detrimental to society. But, these negative aspects to them do not legitimize all of their choices and actions. A lot of the same people that are able to conjure up non-societally accepted ideas are the same people that create the ideas that innovate. So, the ultimate question of what affects people’s innovation is not who they are but what they choose to focus on.