It's Not the How or the What but the Who

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The Magic Number

Back in 1611, Johannes Kepler’s first wife died of cholera in Prague, ending an unhappy arranged marriage. The great astronomer then made a decision: instead of outsourcing his next marriage, he would systematically search for the right candidate. He made a list of eleven eligible women and carefully considered them for two full years. Eventually, he chose a favorite but was persuaded by friends to propose to someone else, the fourth woman on his list. Luckily, she turned him down, annoyed that he’d kept her waiting so long. Kepler returned to the one he really liked, and they lived happily ever after.

More than two centuries later, the famed evolutionary biologist Charles Darwin took a different approach to the same problem. ...