Erno Rubik | Celebrating 50 Years of the Rubik's Cube
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Welcome to the Talks at Google podcast, where great minds meet. I'm Emma, bringing you this episode with Erno Rubik, inventor of the Rubik's Cube. Talks at Google brings the world's most influential thinkers, creators, makers, and doers all to one place. You can watch every episode at youtube.com slash talks at Google. Chances are you've tried and maybe succeeded at the Rubik's Cube.

Patented in 1975, the Rubik's Cube then made its international debut in 1980 at the New York Toy Fair and quickly became the best-selling toy in history. But you may not know that Erno Rubik also patented many other successful toys and designs, including the Magic Snake and Rubik's Magic. His book, Cubed, The Puzzle of Us All, has been published in several countries around the world.

Here is Erno Rubik, celebrating 50 years of the Rubik's Cube. 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. Okay? But that's okay. But...

But today we're gonna talk more about the puzzle, which is, or no, Rubik. But your journey began long before theCUBE, 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? - Yeah, so everything is started at the beginning.

It takes time to 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 falling 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 affair and still the end, 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 on and so on. And my mother has

poetic mind. She wrote poems and she played piano very well and then so on and so forth. So she was surpassed. I was able to discover the significance of feelings and humanity. So that's

That was not a bad starting and for a long time I was busy to going up and then taking, 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.

I tried 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 my

a little bit 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 the cube?

I think probably the opposite is more interesting. How my public 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. Actually, I don't know how it happened because there are several architects all around the world and in Hungary as well and Budapest as well.

many of it, but accidentally that was not in no one nearby. But I have seen the result of architecture. I have 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's a

That was my very early thoughts of architecture. And then when I finished my school, I had the feelings and I got the knowledge how important detail. So I went 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,

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 to lecturing architecture and design. Did you ever give up? Did you ever lose faith on what you were building? Like what was the experience of how you persevered through giving up?

Not giving up, I'm saying. So that's an interesting time for me. I was discovering a lot of things. I was discovering the very strange and new situation. I am not listening but speaking. I tried to speak not too much. So I mainly used my hands and drawing for the kids what to do and so on. So not just by drawing.

by word is 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, you know. In the design school, you can find every different kind of workshops. They are working there with wood, with plastic, with metal and so on.

graphic designers, they 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 material. Well, and with the material, 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, The 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, you mentioned it's a nice and interesting world. 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.

to speak a lot and not to show, but that give it into your hands, your feelings. And, uh, and the cube is my, how can I say, uh, my, um, um,

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 we can dream of and there are writers who are speaking about the 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 and 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, but it was available, it is, and what is good for demonstrate the 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, so you know 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 has 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. On the 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 word and content of the word of problem, what it helps is to surpass and be efficient in the wrong way.

version as well. So really we can have

serious problems and to be able to solve that ones. Mainly they are generated by us, but that's the nature of people and us. But it's very important to be able to handle these kinds 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.

So 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 advice. 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 then 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've got the final result. So let's not give it up before that. So 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 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, theCUBE 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 gonna teach you how to solve a Rubik's cube and just said, go slash cube club, which is our internal link. And basically I said, no, no, no, I can't, I've never been able to solve a Rubik's cube.

and physical problem solving is really difficult for me. And then Emmanuel shared a perspective with me with that I shouldn't look at as a physical problem, I should just look at it as a computer problem. And he's gonna 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 looked back because my life has changed.

And just imagine like sitting on my meetings and off camera, I'm constantly solving the cubes and three, 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. Never mind. So it's part of my user guide. It's part of, you know, my has become the my existence has I'm always walking around with the cube and it and it and it's actually made my autistic life better because I

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 on in my brain. I constantly have to be fidgeting with something because the world is 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 a

you know, just another geek who works at Google. So I'm like, woo. But that's why it's so important. And, you know, and that's why the two of you are like, you know, some of my favorite people.

but you've affected many lives, many, many lives. And, um, I know we had the pleasure to meet and listen to, uh, Judith Pulgar, the Hungarian female, uh, grandmaster who was by the way, the youngest grandmaster at the age of 15, who beat, uh, who had the same, or who beat the distinction from Bobby Fisher. Um, so, uh,

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, and it's sometimes it's really not easy, but that's 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 the very beginning, it was my very first challenge, what created for myself, or discovered myself, I've done and created a structure that 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 a trivial question. All the time I see some mixture of colors. So how to find the way back, that's the basic question. And to find the order of the rules

That was my first task, what created for myself, and I wanted to solve it before I give it to somebody else because I thought there is 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 where I went to go and going back. That's simple.

But after a while, you discover it's not possible because you are not able to remember what you have done. After a while, nature, you can remember one move, two moves, three moves, four moves, if you have a very good mind, five moves, six moves, and it's ended. So that's what's 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

and in 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 that, 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

And after a while you will understand what you are doing. So that happened at once. And that's one thing. The other thing is the cube gives you a good example of how good to be able to beat a problem. So that's

If the problem is difficult and very hard to beat it, the more difficult the problem is, you become more and more happy to be able to beat it. So it's proved 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 create 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. I have a question about how you think about the cube and 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 your 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.

These processes are altogether very important and the most important thing, keep 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. But when I did the three by three, I was very happy. It was right. And if I was thinking above

I felt it takes more time and more things happen, but the quality of what has happened, it's less because it was, 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.

Just it takes time. You know, it's something like that. It's holding, you have a, how can I say, a volume of material that you need to bring from here to there. If there are many, 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 theories 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 it?

So, all the, in science, yeah, all the time there are some kind of discoveries about new and new questions and then the main parts of the science try to answering for that kind of questions. In that sense, it's a fundamental question, for example,

I designed 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 are great discussion about this in math, these

formulas which are finally the result of the work of mathematicians are designed by them or just discovered by them. So that's a very interesting, it's very 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,

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, which in my view is much more important than to answer them. So that's because the questions are

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 theCUBE's potential to become a wildly recognized cultural phenomenon?

The cube became the cultural phenomenon. - Well, you, you became the cultural phenomenon. - Oh, sorry. Two legs, two hands. - He's gonna beat me at table tennis again. - 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. If it happens at once, it's very dramatic. So 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 uh and they they sold out hundreds of millions in a very short time so that was a very very interesting time

And that was only 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 I would look after the appearance of the cube on different occasions. And I found, for example, in Popart,

In pop art, music is very important. Some elements of the process of music are the discs and you have the

graphic design on the disc and on the cover. And I found more than, I think, 1,500 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 that'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, the cube is there symbolizing the '80s and these colors.

Today you can find it and not speaking about the eight. It's speaking on so many things that is some kind of human contents of life and and

And it's 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 not 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 life.

abilities and contents. So I have about 300, 3,500 books on the cover. 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 for me to discover this type of effects for the Google. That's amazing. We have one question in the audience. Thank you, Dr. Rupi, 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?

So I never do it, I never did it for speed. So 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.

If you are running, you have no time 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 a car. So that's good if you are able to do it fast. But in general, I think time is not important. The important is the route 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 our neighbor. Thanks for listening. You can watch this episode and tons of other great content at youtube.com slash talks at Google. Talk soon.