Seymour Cray - Wikipedia
en.m.wikipedia.org

Another favorite pastime was digging a tunnel under his home; he attributed the secret of his success to “visits by elves” while he worked in the tunnel: “While I’m digging in the tunnel, the elves will often come to me with solutions to my problem.”

Wikipedia cited a rather entertaining Time article as a citation for this.

  • Sergio@slrpnk.netEnglish
    1·
    1 month ago

    I’m pretty sure he was kidding about the elves. In the article he says:

    “I work for three hours, and then I get stumped, and I’m not making progress. So I quit, and I go and work in the tunnel. It takes me an hour or so to dig four inches and put in the 4-by-4s. … Then I go back up and work some more.”

    It’s a common technique when dealing with a difficult research/creative problem.

    • gain a good understanding of the problem (even if you’re stuck on how to solve it)
    • go do something unrelated work (preferrably physical, like gardening or housework or… working on your basement apparently.)

    I think it gives your subconscious a chance to work on the problem without your conscious mind interfering.