How Do You Get to Stockholm--Keep a Certain Distance

"Network" theory says that weakly linked networks are more powerful than tight ones. For example, if you're job hunting, your casual acquaintances are more likely to come up with good leads than your close friends and family. It's the tale of the emperor's new clothes--the adults who were into the networks of power and expectations conformed to conventions, the child asked the right question.

Here's another instance--
Two Win Nobel Prize for Discovering Bacterium Tied to Stomach Ailments - New York Times:

"Dr. Marshall said that working in a 'weird' and academically obscure location aided in the discovery because he and Dr. Warren could pursue their observations without interference from the prevailing beliefs.

'If I had come up through the normal gastroenterology training schemes in the United States, I would have been so indoctrinated on the acid theory that I wouldn't have been considering anything else and might have skipped over Helicobacter, as everyone else had done,' Dr. Marshall said in a telephone interview yesterday."