Erno Rubik | Celebrating 50 Years of the Rubik's Cube | Talks at Google

Well, good morning everyone and thanks for coming to our talks at Google and our week long celebration of the 50th anniversary of the invention of this little baby ray here. So my name is Jim Hogan and I am the chief innovation evangelist for Google Cloud. And my job is to evangelize innovation, oddly enough. So I use this cube to describe the myriad of complex issues that we all face every day. And so because this thing has got 43 quintillion combinations and if I can solve it in 30 seconds, there isn't any problem that you can't solve if you don't put your mind to it, so. Or if you put your mind to it. So I reminded today of the Dr. Seuss quote, which is, to the world you may be one person.

But to.

One person you may be the world. And there's two people here today that are that to me. So first of all, I have the distinct honor of introducing my friend and, and partner in crime, Emmanuel Pacheco, who is going to be coming up in a sec. And after we're done with this Talks at Google session, we're going to be doing our master class, which we've done all over the world, about how to solve the cube and why. So the other person is. And he didn't really realize this until the other day, but Arnold Rubik is somebody who is extremely important to me because this cube changed my life. And I'll explain to that later. So let's welcome Emmanuel Pacheco and I'm going to sit down here and be quiet.

So have you ever held this puzzle in your hands, twisted and turned it, felt a surge of both frustration and determination. How many here? Yes. And that feeling, that captivating struggle is something Erno, Erna Rubik understands deeply. He's not just the man behind the Rubik's Cube, which is one of the best selling toys in history. He's an architect, a designer, and a lifelong explorer of the beautiful complexities hidden within simple forms. But beyond the puzzle lies a story of curiosity, determination, and the power to play, to unlock human potential. Get ready to explore the world through the eyes of the man who taught us that song. Sometimes the most challenging problems lead to the most rewarding solutions. Please welcome to the stage, Ernu Rubek.

Hello, nice to meet you.

Have a seat.

Thank you.

So I did not know that Erna was such a good table tennis player because he kicked my butt just down on the floor, which I'm not kidding, he really did. So, Erno, welcome, welcome.

Thank you very much.

Yes, thank you. Welcome to Google. And again, all of us have played with a cube. We've all kind of seen them, we've all tried to figure out. Some of you have solved them. Some of you can solve them in less than 10 seconds. Some of you can't solve it in less than six months. Ok, but that's ok. But today we're going to talk more about the puzzle which is Erno Rubik's. Oh, but your journey began long before the cube, even before your early days studying and teaching both sculpture and architecture in Budapest. Now, how did your father's work as a glider engineer and also your mother's creative and artistic influences really affect your approach to design and problem solving?

Everything started at the beginning and it takes time. You discover what you have done and what you got from your parents. And I think there is a balance, a nice balance that I got from them. My father as an engineer has an engineering mind and has great power to. To create in every part of life. So that's nature. They have their target. They fall in love very early in gliding, flying in the air and working on instruments which help you to fly. And it's a very. It became a very long lasting love of her. And still till the end he was doing well. His last attempt was to create a glider for one person who can fly with it without any help. So that's starting and so forth and so on. And my mother has poetic mind. She wrote poems and she played piano very well and so on and so forth. So she was past. I was able to discover the significance of feelings and humanity. So that was not a bad starting. And for a long time I was busy growing up and going to school and so on and so forth. Play and I was typically, I think some kind of lonely child. I love to play alone and discover personally my surroundings and the possibilities. Climbing on trees which are very like a normal child. Yes, it's a very nice thing and try to do anything and discover my capabilities, what to do. I got the connection with art and as most of the child started to draw with something that is available. And that was why I started started my little higher education to study sculpturing and later on architecture and design. So that's my short story.

Before the cube and with architecture and design, how did that really influence your problem solving and discovery of being able to invent a cube?

I think probably the opposite is more interesting how my problem solving interest influence design and architecture. It's architecture you choose architecture. I really don't remember precisely how it happened because I didn't know one architect before. Personally, I don't know how it's happened, because there are several architects all around the world and in Hungary as well, and in Budapest as well, many of these, but accidentally that was not in no. 1 nearby. But I have seen the result of architecture. I've seen the buildings, cities and so on. And I felt architecture as a combination of art and technology. So that's design engineering work and it's part of it. And the other part is the result must have some kind of artistic content and value. So that was my very early thoughts of architecture. And when I finished my school, I had the phalanx and I got the knowledge how important details. So I wanted to make some kind of postgraduate studies to study design. What is working with details, with objects and so on and so forth. And interestingly and luckily, so when I finished my school, got my diploma, my second one, I got an invitation to stay in the room, in the building and on the side of the cathedral, and started lecturing architecture and design.

Did you ever give up? Did you ever lose faith on what you were building? What was the experience of how you persevered through giving up?

Not giving up, no. I'm saying. So that's an interesting time for me. I was discovering a lot of things. I was discovering the very strange new situation. I am not listening, but speaking. I tried to speak, not too much. So I mainly use my hands and drawing for the kids, what to do and so on. So not just by by word. It's very difficult to explain the content of a design and so on. So you need to try to illustrate what you are saying. And that was one part. Other part was I enjoyed the atmosphere of the school, discovering all of the workshops. In the design school you can find every different kind of workshop. They are working there with wood, with plastic, with metal and so on. There are graphic designers, there are working with textile, with fashion, and so they are working on graphic design. So you have seen the printings and so many, many different area of activities and production. The final result has a content of beauty and material because the material is holding it. So they are not writers using the word as a material.

Well, and with the material. And I know the first one was made out of wood, right? That you created the first prototype, right. And when you created that again in your book Cubed, which I loved by the way, the perspective from the cube, which during the pandemic was a good book for us to read, your focus shifted from the nature of the cube to the nature of Human relationships with it, which I found fascinating and find very, very important. What specific insights did you gain about the relationship and how did this change your understanding of your own invention?

So imagine. It's a nice and interesting word. I prefer to say I was discovering the potential in space and geometry and tried to put it and explain it with material. So what you can handle. So not to speak about, not to show, but give it into your hands, your feelings. And the cube with my, how can I say, my example or my sample to speak about three dimension. Three dimension is I think where we are living and it's very important to us. Nature you can dream of. And there are writers who are speaking about a two dimensional world and how interesting living in a two dimensional world. But it's not my way of living. So I love three dimensional environment. And I was looking for what possibility to show and to learn this on the simplest way. Partly because probably my habit has some kind of playful part as well. So I think to play with something without any specific target, just to do something and wondering what you have done, the result of it and enjoy. So I would like to create something what is capable to a good tool for that. And that's why I use the simplest geometry. It was available. It is. And what is good for demonstrating potential in space and simplicity and complexity in the same time? What is a contradiction? But this contradiction is the content of the cube.

Yeah. And again, play is a very important part in problem solving. Right. And I think you talk about this of the importance of a playful mindset when you're problem solving. Can you talk a little bit more about how you deal with play and how important it is?

So problem solving. The word is problem. It's a funny word. It's a question. It's a good word or a bad word. So it explains something good or bad. Partly it's bad because you know, we have all the time problems we need to. There are situations which have several reasons and to choose how to escape from the bad potential and to find the good potential and the good result. That's a problem. So in general terms it has a negative content. We have problems. So many other hand problems are challenges. Challenges. They are questions what to do if and how to reach that kind of target or result. So that's a problem again, but it's with a very positive content. So naturally what I like very much the second possibility of the world and content of the world of problem, what it helps is to surpass and be efficient in the wrong version as well. So really we can have serious problems and to be able to solve that one. Mainly, mainly they are generated by us. But anyway, so that's the nature of people and us. But it's very important to be able to handle these kind of problems and to find a good result.

Yes, my wife and myself have many arguments sometimes and I try to get out of the problem and I try to problem solve. It's all positive. It's all positive. But this is an important part and with a lot of us here as well, what advice would you give young inventors, programmers, engineers or designers as they're starting to bring their ideas to life? What advice would you give them?

You can have many advices because it's not a difficult task to give. It's much more difficult to keep and to follow these advices. But one thing is, if you got an idea at first you need to know what you got and to try to understand your idea. Secondly, try to understand if you are able to fulfill the idea, what we get, what is the final result. And thirdly, don't finish before it's finished. You got the final result. So that's not give it up before that. So that probably if you are keeping these three main rules, it will be successful.

And you've inspired so many with your invention. Some you've changed their lives dramatically. Myself, you've done that to me and the lessons that we've done at Google. We have 13,841 Googlers who've joined the Go Cube club and I see some of them here as well. So we have so many people here, but one person in particular, who I taught the cube for the first time. I don't know if there's anything you wanted to say to Rubik about how it's affected your life.

Well, you know, the Cube for me is a life changer. And what a lot of people know who have heard me speak before is that I'm autistic. And my early formative years were being poked and prodded and being tested and every time they put a physical puzzle in front of me, I could never do it. And so when I started at Google, after I was doing a few of my public speaking things and people started watching that and I would get pinged from all around the world. And one time this guy from Canada named Emmanuel Pacheco, he just pinged me on LinkedIn and said, I'm going to teach you how to solve a Rubik's Cube. And just said, Go Cube Club, which is our internal link. And basically I said, no, no, No, I, I've never been able to solve a Rubik's cube and problem. You know, physical problem solving is really difficult for me. And then Emanuel shared a perspective with me that I shouldn't look at it as a physical problem, I should just look at it as a computer problem. And he's going to teach me seven algorithms and I'll be able to solve the cube from wherever it's scrambled. I'll be able to get to the bottom of it. And two days later I was a solver. And I never look back because my life has changed. And just imagine like sitting on my meetings and off camera, I'm constantly solving the cubes and 3, 400 times and I'll be on meetings and if I'm off mute, somebody will say, what's that clicking sound? And it's like. And they're like, that's just Jim solving his cube, nevermind. So it's part of my user guide. It's part of my. Has become the. My existence has. I'm always walking around with the cube and it's actually made my autistic life better because I can play with the cube in public, I can stim with it, I can have a neurological or the physiological outcropping of my neurological situation that's going in my brain. I constantly have to be fidgeting with something because the world's very overwhelming. But that is basically why it's life changing. And when I'm sitting at a Google office with my cube, people just come up and assume I'm just another geek who works at Google. So I'm like, woo. But that's why it's so important. And that's why the two of you are like some of my favorite people.

But you've affected many lives, many, many lives. And I know we had the pleasure to meet and listen to Judith Polgar, the Hungarian female grandmaster, who was by the way, the youngest grandmaster at the age of 15 who beat who had the same or who beat the distinction from Bobby Fischer. So we met her at Cambridge University earlier this week. And what are your current plans on working with her in terms of the chess world and what she's working on as well?

You know, in chess and with puzzles, it's very close. It's a problem solving process. Both nature's situation is very different with problem solving. In puzzles, you are alone or not totally because you have an object or you have the challenge in front of you. And that's two things. And only one is alive, but the other one is there and presenting the challenge. And you need to be the challenge. So sometimes it's really not easy. But that happened with the cube. To discover the cube, it's easy. Here's the cube and I can turn it, that's fine. But how to solve it, that's another case. And at the very beginning, it was my very first challenge. I created for myself or discovered myself. I've done and created a structure, but is capable to do what it's capable to do. Moving space freely in three dimension without falling apart and showing the changes. But what does it mean? It's trivial question all the time I see some mixture of colors. So how to find a way back? That's the basic question. And to find the order of the rules. That was my first task, was created for myself. And I wanted to solve it before I give it to somebody else. Because I thought there's a question. It's possible to do it or not. At first it's trivial, it's possible. Why not? I'm going in one direction. I remember the way of doing where I went to go and going back, that's simple. But after a while you discovered it's not possible because you are not able to remember what you have done. After a while, nature. You can remember 1 move, 2 move, 3 move, 4 moves, if you have a very good mind, 5 move, 6 move. And it ended. So that was terrible, difficult to find.

The reality is that you have billions around the world that have either played with it, picked it up, own it, have shared it with friends, have taken it apart, but all of them know the Rubik's brand. They all know the Rubik's Cube and that's what they go to. What's your greatest hope for the legacy of the Rubik's Cube? Moving forward?

How can I say? I think everything, art and most of the activities. If you have something that has a quality and the content, it became part of the quality of life. And especially the cube, which has some kind of educational content of tell because it teach you something, teach you without any help of somebody else. You don't need a teacher to tell you what you are learning. I prefer that type of learning, which doesn't need nothing else. Just facing with something and learn from something. And learn from your own activities. Discovering what you are doing. And after a while you will understand what you are doing. So it's not happened at once. And that's one thing. Other thing is the cube gives you a good example how good to be able to beat a problem. So that's Such a. If the problem is difficult and very hard to beat it, the more problem is more you became more and more happy to be able to beat it. So it proves your potential of understanding and capability. And that's a very good feeling. And it makes you brave to going on think on something else. And that's what we need. That's what we need to be existing problems or discovering new ones which are important. And the final result will be progress. So progress, eliminate problems which are bad and creates things which make life better.

I love that. And with that I would ask if there's any questions we can go. There's the online questions that we have. We'll probably take one or two. We have a few and then we'll have some. If people want to get cubes autographed, we have a limited amount of time, but we'll go in the right hand corner there. But if there are any questions, I have one right here in the audience. Yeah, go ahead. Just a question about how you think about the Cuban solving. You can solve it intuitively or you can have more of an algorithmic approach which is much more about memory versus trying to understand how things fit together. What for you is the most important or what would you prioritize or what do you really like about the cube?

So it's very difficult to say if you have a complex process, which one and which elements of the process is more important. In my view the whole is the most important thing. So to have every part of it. So if you take away something, it's not just the percentage of the user value, but it's possible to lose everything. So these processes are altogether are very important. And the most important thing keeping it in one and going through. So not to give up before you fulfill your target.

Yeah, that's amazing. And we have an online question as well. To what extent were you involved in other Rubik's Cube products like the 6x6, 7x7, 8x8 Rubik's Cube keychains, things like that. And are these interesting to you or are they more novelties for you?

You know, from the very early time I have seen there are so many other potentials. So if you have in many parts of life, and especially in Germany, if you have something you can multiply, if you add, you can add and so on. But interestingly, there is an optimal number of elements which are not. It's good enough and not too much. So that's interesting. So at first I started with the two by two and it was not enough. And when I did the 3x3. I was very happy. It was right. And if I was thinking above of that, I felt it takes more time and more things happen. But the, the quality what has happened, it's less because after a while you lose the numbers became more and more important. It takes more and more time. It's not because you are more stupid or the task is more difficult, only just it takes time. You know, it's something like that. It's holding. You have a, how can I say, volume of material, what you need to bring from here to there. If there are many more material and it's more heavy, it takes more time. But it doesn't mean by itself that there are any difference. It's more tiring. Nothing else.

You have another question come up to the mic. So there is lots of science around Rubik's Cube. So you know, like group theory is taught based on Rubik's Cube. There are like reinforcement learning discoveries based on Rubik's Cube. So what was the most fascinating for you? From what science about Rubik's Cube was the most inspiring for you? What scientific discovery about?

So in science general, naturally all the time there are some kind of discoveries about new and new questions. And one of the main parts of the science try to answer for that kind of questions. In that sense, it's a fundamental question. For example, I design the cube or I just discovered the structure which is capable to do what today, if it's immaterial, means the cube. That is the cube. So that's in my belief I just discovered what to do, achieving my target There great discussion about this in math. These formulas which are finally the result of the work of mathematicians designed by them or just discovered by them. So that's a very interesting. It's really similar what I think about the cube or this kind of inventions.

Because one of the things people discover a lot of things in the cube when they start to work through it, whether it's an algorithm, whether it's how to get unstuck, whether it's how to solve multiple things at the same time, it's discovering and then you discover more about yourself. Right.

You know, with an activity you can have several results. One is especially you have an up to date target and you fulfill your target. But in the meantime you can discover potentials. And answering one question you became capable to ask questions. That is in my view is much more important than to answer them. So that's because the question contains the answer. So that's a great discovery.

I love that and I'LL take one more question in the audience, but I'll do one online as well. At what point did you realize the Cube's potential to become a widely recognized cultural phenomenon?

The Cube became the cultural phenomenon.

Well, you.

You became the cultural phenomenon. Two legs beat me at tabletop and that's all. So that's. I think it's the Cube. I'm not an actor, so that's not. I'm the product. But the Cube it is. So that's. It's. Luckily it's not happened at once. His kids happened at once. It's very dramatic, so that it was time to accommodate and so on and so forth. Naturally, the very first time in the 80s, it was a very dramatic, how can I say. Strong reaction from people. It became. They call it a craze. So that's. And they sold out hundreds of millions in a very short time. So that was a very, very interesting time. And that was only just the beginning of something. So in that time it was distributed only in the developed part of the world. And so many. So there were many restrictions. But after a while I can say the Cube is everywhere, but it's a fact, so it's not a question. So you got the proof, naturally, the Internet, what is in the same age as the Cube? Prove it so you can find it. And because of the anniversary, I was searching a little bit and look after the appearance of the Cube on different occasions. And I found, for example, in Pope art, in Pope part music is very important. Some element of the process of music is the discs. And you have the graphic design on the disc and on the COVID And I found more than. I think 1,400, 500 different type of different graphic design on music. And they are very funny and very good. And what is interesting is many of them in this year. So it's not just the beginning, but partly the Cube became a symbol of the 80s, the decade of the 80s, because in that part of the world it started in the 80s. And if you are thinking back to the 80s music of the 80s, it's again, it's important. So nature of the Cube is there symbolizing the 80s on these colors. But today you can find it and not speaking about the 80s, speaking of so many things that is some kind of human contents of life and is there. So that shows the flexibility of the content of the Cube. But they can suggest. But in the other hand, for example, nature. I'm speaking about the books which are about the Cube, but I'm speaking about books which are about everything about life and the content of human intellectual abilities and contents. So I have about 3,500 books on the COVID The cube is there. The book is not speaking about the cube, but the cube is speaking about psychology, math, physics and many other things which are important for us. And really, if you go a little bit deeper, there is a content. So that's a very interesting experience was for me to discover these type of effects on the cube. For the cube.

That's amazing. We have one question in the audience. Thank you, Dr. Opi, for coming.

I had a question, if it's not.

A secret, what's your fastest time to.

Solve 2x2 and 3x3?

And what do you think in general.

Of speed solving competitions?

I never do it. I never did it for speed. It's the very first time. It takes time and I'm not practicing to shorten my time. That's a very different task. You know, it's the same thing. I love walking and discover the landscape and the countryside and so on, but I am not targeting to be there earlier. So that's because if you are running, you have no time to to wondering how beautiful they are. So in that sense, I think time is not important in life. But sometimes it's important, especially if you would like to escape and not avoid crossing the street and meet with the car. So that's good. If you in that you have it able to do it fast. But in general, I think time is not important. The importance is the root of movement. Thank you.

Thank you. So Erno, I wanted to give enough time for people because again, you mean so much to so many people. I want to thank you very much for taking the time to have a conversation beyond just being here and solving the cube in 3.1 seconds.

Right.

So I'm not expecting that now we're going to have a bit of time at the side there. If you do want to have a quick chat with Erno to sign your cube. If you're so gracious to do that, we would love to have you join us there.

Thank you.

That's okay. Please give a big round of applause for Erno.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you.

Sa.