Hi everyone, I am Wuxia Guji (无暇顾及). Welcome here to play.

Someone asked Steve Jobs: “How do you know which direction is the right one?” Jobs fell silent and then replied: “Ultimately, it comes down to taste.”

Einstein - “Subtle is the Lord”

One day (Nov 11, 2025), I was standing in the lobby of the Wenxuan Medical Building at Shanghai Jiao Tong University with a friend. I waved to him and pointed at an Einstein poster on the wall: “Look at this sentence.”

“Subtle is the Lord”

It was the first time I had seen this quote. I asked him what he thought it meant. He asked me back, and I said: “‘Subtle’ means delicate and hard to perceive; ‘Lord’ refers to God. This is actually very close to what Chen-Ning Yang means by ‘Taste’—it’s a delicate, intuitive perception of beauty that allows you to see through to the essence of things and decide on a direction without needing an exhaustive understanding.”

Later, I looked up Einstein’s quotes and found he indeed held similar views:

“To a certain extent, a scientist’s appreciation and love for the deep beauty of nature, along with their metaphysical aesthetic judgment, determines the height their research can reach.” “The only truly valuable thing is intuition. On the path of exploration, intellect plays a minor role.”

Chen-Ning Yang

“A person’s ‘taste,’ along with ability and opportunity, almost determines their style and achievements.”

Recently, after the passing of Mr. Chen-Ning Yang, I repeatedly watched his interviews and read his articles. He often mentioned the concept of “taste.” To quote him directly:

“Learning something is not just about acquiring knowledge or technical methods; it is even more about understanding and appreciating its meaning. If a person learns quantum mechanics and doesn’t feel that some things are important, some are wonderful, and some are worth arguing about until they are red in the face, then I don’t think they have truly learned it.”

I believe this is a cross-disciplinary intuitive insight, a bird’s-eye view. You don’t need to think or rely on deep logic; it is ‘intuition,’ the ability to perceive ‘beauty.’

Steve Jobs

“Ultimately, it comes down to taste.”

This reminds me of Steve Jobs. He repeatedly emphasized the need to pay attention to the intuition, passion, and perception of the moment.

When he was young, he took a calligraphy class. At the time, he had no idea what use it would be; he just loved the beautiful fonts. Later, these fonts were integrated into the Mac. He also encountered Zen and meditation, and these Eastern philosophies gave him a minimalist, peaceful aesthetic.

Someone asked Jobs: “How do you know which direction is the right one?” Jobs was silent and then replied: “Ultimately, it comes down to taste.”

He said: “You have to expose yourself to the best things humans have created and integrate those beautiful things into what you are doing.” The Apple team included musicians, poets, artists, zoologists, and historians, who were also top computer scientists.

If this seems hard to understand, let me use an analogy. You meet someone and, before even speaking, you catch a glimpse of them, feeling their expression, their state, and their magnetic field. Some people can immediately judge whether they can become close friends or if there will be a connection. This is what intuition brings—something that can be obtained without the grinding of time.

Or take your career. No matter how good it looks from the outside, if you know in your heart it’s not your calling, and you can’t feel maximum joy and immersion, then you should stop.

We often talk about the importance of logic, but “taste” and “intuition”—things that transcend everything and pull you forward without thinking—are what we should truly value. At that point, changing your trajectory becomes effortless because it is completely proactive, not passive.

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