"The Creativity of Scientists" by Yukawa Hideki (May 1964)

Writing a paper may seem to be for the benefit of others, but it is first and foremost a reminder to myself.

◆Persistence is a necessary condition (pp.339-41)

　(omission) In short, learning itself is an obsession. All people who aspire to study must have had that kind of obsession, but how strong that obsession is and how obsessive it is differs from scholar to scholar. However, how strong or how vindictive they were does not necessarily mean that they would succeed. There are people who do not succeed no matter how vindictive they are. (omission) Being vindictive is certainly a necessary condition. But it is also certainly not a sufficient condition.

　When it comes to the reason why someone is so vindictive, I think it has a lot to do with the fact that he or she has a very serious internal contradiction.

　(omission) People who are geniuses, or people who are equivalent to geniuses, are different from saints and saints in that they always seem to have serious contradictions within themselves. They are attached to one idea, but they cannot get rid of the opposite idea. Scholars are always in a state of confusion, wondering what they should believe or not believe.

　(omission) A certain scholar is strongly advocating a certain theory. He seems to believe in it 100 percent. However, surprisingly, in his/her mind, he/she is concerned about the opposite theory. This is probably the case in many cases. That is the way people who do excellent work are. That is why it is so powerful. They fight within themselves first. If you have realized it for yourself, there is no need to write a paper. Writing a paper may seem to be for the benefit of others, but it is first and foremost for the sake of reminding oneself.

◆Genius and eccentricity (pp.341-3)

　In any case, contradiction and obsession have a great deal to do with each other. However, there are many different kinds of obsession, whether it is contradiction or obsession with a single thing. It may be a very high ideal, a very large and distant one that is not easily attainable. Those who try to achieve it will have a larger scale of work and the possibility of accomplishing a large task. But at the same time, there is a very high probability that he or she will not be able to accomplish anything coherent even if it takes a lifetime to do so.

(in "Zuihitsu Zenshu, Vol. 9" / Jun Ishihara, Shinichiro Asanaga, Hideki Yukawa, Showa 44 (1969), Shogaku Books)

※The above article is an English translation of "「科学者の創造性」湯川秀樹（1964年5月）: 本に溺れたい ", by DeepL.

※参照　誰にも言えそうなことで、誰も言えなかったこと（２）／ What anyone could have said and no one else could have said (2): 本に溺れたい