What’s the fastest way to build a jig-saw puzzle? That was the question posed by Michael Polanyi in 1962. An obvious answer is to enlist help. In what way, then, could the helpers be coordinated most efficiently? If you divided pieces between the helpers, then progress would slow to a crawl. You couldn’t know how to usefully divide the pieces without first solving the puzzle.
Polanyi found it obvious that the fastest way to build a jig-saw puzzle is to let everyone work on it together in full sight of each other. No central authority could accelerate progress. “Under this system,” Polanyi wrote, “each helper will act on his own initiative, by responding to the latest achievements of the others, and the completion of their joint task will be greatly accelerated.” Read More
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