Instruction for Miracle-Making from Professor Kulish
New Year is approaching — the time for miracles! At the Institute of Winter Wonders, we teach students to create miracles with their own hands (and brains). In our high-tech age, many have already mastered walking on water, turning water into wine, and getting the sick back on their feet.
If you want to surprise and delight those around you with a truly bright, competitive miracle, Professor Dmitry Kulish recommends applying the stages and methods of creating a startup. After all, successful startups are miracles too! Just like a startup, a miracle must be targeted at a specific audience, validated in a scientific experiment, and inspire the wizard — that is, You!
So, let's take it step by step.
If you want to surprise and delight those around you with a truly bright, competitive miracle, Professor Dmitry Kulish recommends applying the stages and methods of creating a startup. After all, successful startups are miracles too! Just like a startup, a miracle must be targeted at a specific audience, validated in a scientific experiment, and inspire the wizard — that is, You!
So, let's take it step by step.
Dmitry Kulish //
Professor, Skoltech’s Lead for Innovation Workshop and Business Angel
> Joy and beauty? "We issued a decree for the holiday: let snowdrops bloom today!"
> Benefit for other people? "Happiness for everyone, free, and let no one be left behind!"
> Benefit for You personally? Perhaps finally confirming that hypothesis in your experiment?
Wisdom from an experienced miracle-worker: You cannot create a miracle that satisfies all needs at once. It’s an impossible trilemma.
Step 1. Define Your Goal
First, clarify what the New Year's miracle should bring to generate traction:
> Laws of nature? Are you interested in breaking small local laws, like Murphy’s Law (the butter-side-down one), or shall we aim straight for the Second Law of Thermodynamics? Maybe violate the conservation of energy to increase portion sizes in the canteen? Or make the air temperature comfortable for everyone instantly?
> Laws of society? How about making all people simultaneously satisfied with what they have? Or making everyone stop being lazy and capricious at the same moment?
> Laws of physiology? Eating nothing but pizza and kvass without gaining weight? Walking from the "Disc" to "Nobel" in five minutes?
Wisdom from an experienced miracle-worker #2: The more ambitious the law you want to break, the more energy-intensive the miracle. Calculate your mass balance!
> Before lighting up every Christmas tree at Skoltech, experiment with a small sapling outside. Otherwise, instead of a miracle, you might start a fire: the alarm will howl, and everyone will have to evacuate into the freezing cold.
> Before making all humans joyful, start with your immediate team of miracle-workers. No one knows what millions of joyful people might do.
> Before making the temperature comfortable for the entire Earth, start with the Institute building.
> And please, be careful with the planet. Before resurrecting all the dead, try resurrecting just one person, solve their housing issue, ensure you can handle the paperwork, and think carefully once more before scaling this miracle.
Remember: Until your dreams are prototyped and a validation experiment is conducted, no one will recognize you as a wizard. Even if you burn down every tree in the district.
> Before making all humans joyful, start with your immediate team of miracle-workers. No one knows what millions of joyful people might do.
> Before making the temperature comfortable for the entire Earth, start with the Institute building.
> And please, be careful with the planet. Before resurrecting all the dead, try resurrecting just one person, solve their housing issue, ensure you can handle the paperwork, and think carefully once more before scaling this miracle.
Remember: Until your dreams are prototyped and a validation experiment is conducted, no one will recognize you as a wizard. Even if you burn down every tree in the district.
> Full-stack Mages. They will perform synergistic miracles.
> AI Operator. They will provide analytical support.
> Founder Wizard. That’s you! You are here for goal-setting, inspiration, and assembling the final solution.
Without a team, the miracle won't happen — if only because while you are lighting the tree, someone needs to stand nearby with a fire extinguisher.
> AI Operator. They will provide analytical support.
> Founder Wizard. That’s you! You are here for goal-setting, inspiration, and assembling the final solution.
Without a team, the miracle won't happen — if only because while you are lighting the tree, someone needs to stand nearby with a fire extinguisher.
Step 2. Choose Your Technology
While startups use scientific research and laws of nature, a true miracle must break them. Which laws are you excited to violate?
Step 3.
Create a Prototype
Create a Prototype
Step 4. Assemble a Team
First, ensure your miracle works in a controlled system on a small object.
Just like a startup, a miracle is impossible without a team. At a minimum, you will need:
Step 5. Scale Your Miracle
This is much more boring than conceiving and prototyping miracles, but you can't do without it. Here you will need boring managers and brazenly self-confident salespeople. Quality control, supply logistics, strategic marketing — all this lies beyond the boundaries of the miracle itself but is necessary for its distribution across the Universe.
Final Step. Have Patience!
Only with the help of managers and salespeople can you deliver the miracle to every human and alien, who will repay you with joy, respect, universal equivalent, and love. After all, isn't that why you started this New Year's miracle in the first place?
