Invented Only Once?

[dianahsieh]

By Paul Hsieh from NoodleFood,cross-posted by MetaBlog

In Ayn Rand's novel The Fountainhead, there's a scene where villain Ellsworth Toohey looks at the New York City skyline and muses about modern civilization:

...Look at it. A sublime achievement, isn't it? A heroic achievement. Think of the thousands who worked to create this and of the millions who profit by it. And it is said that but for the spirit of a dozen men, here and there down the ages, but for a dozen men -- less, perhaps -- none of this would have been possible. And that might be true.

(Part 2, Chapter 8)

When I first read that passage, I wasn't sure whether it was historically accurate or not.

But as it turns out, there a number of crucial innovations that some claim to have only been invented and/or discovered once in history, then spread to the rest of humanity from that single source.

I can't vouch for the accuracy of all of the following, but some purported examples include:

The wheel

The alphabet

Dog domestication

Iron smelting

And probably the most crucial to Western civilization:

Logic (Aristotle)

If these claims are true, then it may indeed be the case that our modern technological society (including my ability to compose this blog post on a MacBook Pro and upload it onto a remote web server where it can then be read by people around the world) would not exist were it not for a half-dozen mostly-anonymous innovators.

Cross-posted from Metablog

[Amaroq]

That's actually a logical fallacy known as the fallacy of columbus. "If Columbus had not discovered America, nobody would ever have."

If these people had not discovered the things they did, someone else probably would have.

Though you are right to say that we owe everything we have to the relatively small number of individuals who did discover/invent the things they did.

[phibetakappa]

That's actually a logical fallacy known as the fallacy of columbus. "If Columbus had not discovered America, nobody would ever have."

If these people had not discovered the things they did, someone else probably would have.

Though you are right to say that we owe everything we have to the relatively small number of individuals who did discover/invent the things they did.

There is a huge difference between discovering a metaphysically-given massive, land mass, and inventing a new value, (an invention). Given people were making longer voyages, it was likely someone would have run into the continent eventually. But Columbus did not set out to discover America, he set out to find a new route to another, entirely different location, i.e., it was an accident.

Edison on the other hand set out to discover man-made, persistent, controllable light (bulb), and chose to persistently dedicate himself to recombining thousands of combinations of ingredients, failure after failure after failure. The best combination for creating light wasn't a huge continent to run into. It required a very unique individual, with unprecidented virtue, persistence, dedication, intelligence, and marketing skill.

Besides her statement is that no one would not have ever would have or could have discovered the great inventions which we (now) can hardly imagine living without. She is stating just the fact that its true, that modern society can be attributed to but a hand full of individuals inventions, discoveries.

A greater and worse fallacy is repeating stupid non-fallacies that collectivists have invented and spouted off like the so-called "fallacy of Columbus."

[Amaroq]

You've got a good point there. I meant no attack when I posted what I did.

Yes, Edison was a great person to do what he did, dedicating himself to it for all those years and making it happen. I just think that if he had not, someone else would have come along, probably several years to hundreds of years later, and tried to harness electricity like he did.

America is much more obvious of a thing to discover than electricity. But given the nature of the universe, the potential to harness electricity has always been there. Edison was a great man for doing it first, but I think eventually, someone would have if he had not.

In the last sentence of my post, I meant to acknowledge that yes, we owe everything we have to that handful of individuals who did the discovering and inventing.

[freestyle]

...Look at it. A sublime achievement, isn't it? A heroic achievement. Think of the thousands who worked to create this and of the millions who profit by it. And it is said that but for the spirit of a dozen men, here and there down the ages, but for a dozen men -- less, perhaps -- none of this would have been possible. And that might be true.

(Part 2, Chapter 8)

It is interesting to think about the second part of that passage, but the first part is equally thought provoking. The "thousands" and "millions" who worked and profit.

In my estimation, this is the source of why so many supporters of capitalism find it so difficult NOT to argue for it without invoking the "greater good" justification. (think Milton Friedman / Leonard Read - Pencil Example).

[dianahsieh]

That's actually a logical fallacy known as the fallacy of columbus. "If Columbus had not discovered America, nobody would ever have." If these people had not discovered the things they did, someone else probably would have.

Let's pay attention to some pertinent distinctions, shall we?

Sometimes, otherwise relatively advanced and complex cultures fail to develop certain ideas or technology for thousands of years. They only acquire it when introduced from abroad. That's true of the American natives: they had thousands of years to invent the wheel, but they didn't. That's also true of the Chinese: they had a remarkably advanced culture for thousands of years, but never discovered logic. Those kinds of cases are candidates for "invented only once."

That's completely different from the case of Columbus, who lived in an era of ever-expanding exploration of the globe. Clearly, if he hadn't taken his voyage, someone else would have done so within a few decades, at most.

(Just to be clear, Paul wrote the original post, not me. For various technical reasons, it shows up under my OO.net account.)

[Jake_Ellison]

That's actually a logical fallacy known as the fallacy of columbus. "If Columbus had not discovered America, nobody would ever have."

If these people had not discovered the things they did, someone else probably would have.

Though you are right to say that we owe everything we have to the relatively small number of individuals who did discover/invent the things they did.

These jumps occured very rarely. I would assume because it involved the right person being in the right place to make the leap. Who knows when or if that would've happened, if the guy who decided to come up with the high temperature smelting technique to produce iron tools, right in the middle of a tin shortage (tin is one of the components in bronze tools), would've instead decided to obtain tin for his tools by using his brains to become king and take it by force, from others? I'd say it was quite an unusual step, for the time, to start experimenting with iron instead of doing that.

[Amaroq]

That's true. I think I jumped to a conclusion too quickly without considering that conditions had to be just right, and that if the chance is missed, it happening again like that is very unlikely.

[dianahsieh]

That's true. I think I jumped to a conclusion too quickly without considering that conditions had to be just right, and that if the chance is missed, it happening again like that is very unlikely.

I still think you're wrong: you're verging on cultural determinism by focusing on "conditions" while ignoring the unique powers and choices of individuals.

Undoubtedly, the potential heroic creator requires a reasonably fertile culture to make and propagate some a huge discovery or invention. Yet that culture might take many forms, and it's certainly not enough in and of itself. From the history of Greek philosophy, it's pretty clear that the laws of logic would not have been discovered absent the self-made, fact-oriented, this-worldly super-genius of Aristotle. Even though the culture was very rational, he was many, many heads and shoulders above everyone else. (Plato would have been capable, but he chose to busy himself with the world of Forms.)

Individuals -- and their choices -- are the driving force behind these monumental discoveries and inventions.

[RussK]

I still think you're wrong: you're verging on cultural determinism by focusing on "conditions" while ignoring the unique powers and choices of individuals.

Undoubtedly, the potential heroic creator requires a reasonably fertile culture to make and propagate some a huge discovery or invention. Yet that culture might take many forms, and it's certainly not enough in and of itself. From the history of Greek philosophy, it's pretty clear that the laws of logic would not have been discovered absent the self-made, fact-oriented, this-worldly super-genius of Aristotle. Even though the culture was very rational, he was many, many heads and shoulders above everyone else. (Plato would have been capable, but he chose to busy himself with the world of Forms.)

Individuals -- and their choices -- are the driving force behind these monumental discoveries and inventions.

No doubt culture and the self-made play a huge part in discovery. When you wrote about native americans above, the first concrete example that came to my mind was Newton's discoveries. There's no way the indian's could have formulated these discoveries or added much of anything to science. Even if there were a serious, fact oriented native american, the culture--the prior discoveries and building blocks--did not exist for him to integrate and use.

Edited December 4, 2009 by RussK

[D'kian]

That's actually a logical fallacy known as the fallacy of columbus. "If Columbus had not discovered America, nobody would ever have."

Let me introduce you to the Edison fallacy: "If Edison hadn't invented the light bulb, someone else would have." The peculiarity of this fallacy is that it may even be true. Maybe someone else would ahve invented the incandescent light bulb. there's no way to know, because Edison did invent it.

The fallacy is the false dismisal of Edison's genius. The man had over 1,000 patents for many inventions and improvements to existing technology. And I can state no one else would ahve amassed that many innovations, because no one else did (Telsa comes close, but even he falls far behind). Not to mention that Edison dind't stop at inventing lots of useful things, but also managed to comercialize them and to make them available to the buying public.

There have been other prolific innovators and inventors. Robert Browning, Issambard Kingdom Brunnel, Nicola Tesla, Hiram Maxim, Eli Whitney, Henry Ford, etc. Browning dedicated his mind almost exclusively to guns, but it's remarkable how many decades passed vefore someone improved on his designs.

Or consider inventors who only invented one thing, or only one thing that proved useful for many years. The foremost one would be Johannes Guttenberg. The principle behind the printing press, inverted chracters, had been known for centuries. before the printing press there existed such things as seals and dies and molds, all of which use a kind of form inversion. Yet only Guttenberg invented the printing press.

And what an invention it was! It literally changed the world, and his invention, much improved and modified, remains in use to this day, many centuries later. Time magazine named him Man of the Millennium for good reason.

Oh, as to Columbus, there are two facts worth mentioning:

1) The Protuguese had been carrying out an intensive and extensive exploration of the West coast of Africa, as well as some shipping round the Cape of Good Hope, at Africa's southernmost end. In such voyages they often strayed far west in the South Atlantic, sometimes barely glimpsing the easternmost coast of Brazil. So ebentually a Portuguese captain would have discovered the New World. All this happened around the time of Columbus' famous voyage.

2) As the multiculturalist like to point out when wrongfully dimminishing Columbus, the continent we call Americ had already been discovered by prehistoric nomads via the Bering strait, even if they failed to bring the news back to the other hemisphere. But given the mere presence fo people there, some kind of inter-hemispheric meeting was just a matter of time.

Bonus fact, Vikings had also traveled to parts of North America long before Columbus, but failed at establishing themselves there, or widely reporting their findings, or even furhter exploring the new land they found. Therfore Columbus stands forever as the man who discovered the other half of the world.

BTW he was trying to find a new route to Asia, but he also had a wrong figure for the Earth's circumference. If he'd had the right figure, he wold never have attempted such a voyage, as it would have been too long for the ships of the time.

[Amaroq]

I had no idea Edison invented so many things. I was only taught in school that he discovered electricity and invented the light bulb. Damn...

[Axiomatic]

I had no idea Edison invented so many things. I was only taught in school that he discovered electricity and invented the light bulb. Damn...

Ditto. state education is a bitch!

[D'kian]

I had no idea Edison invented so many things. I was only taught in school that he discovered electricity and invented the light bulb. Damn...

Look this up:

http://www.thomasedison.com/Inventions.htm

[DavidOdden]

I don't understand what the claim here really is. Is it that "the nature of modern technology is the result of pre-modern technology"? That seems pretty obvious: knowledge is accumulated hierarchically. Kilby and Noyce were (each) able to invent the integrated circuit because Shockley et al invented the transistor, which built on discoveries about germanium by Bardeen and Brattain plus the conceptual foundation established by vacuum tubes which were created by Fleming and De Forest (each, different types), relying on knowledge of thermionic emission discovered by (each of) Guthrie and Edison. A particular effect -- an individual creating a specific technological wonder or discovering a specific fact about the universe -- is caused by a choice by the agent to act in a particular way. As men of reason, they must integrate their knowledge in making this choice, so of course their choice depends on the knowledge created by others.

It is interesting to look at the development of modern technology, in terms of the very specific cause-and-effect relationships between discoveries. The "Edison effect" was apparently discovered twice, but it appears (and this may not be correct, so a historian may correct me on this point) that it was Edison's later discovery that "counts", in the same way that America was first discovered by Vikings, but with no lasting effect except how it caused Columbus to rediscover America. In my opinion, there is little point in speculating about "what might have happened if reality were different", unless you have a really good understanding of what actually causes a specific effect. It is sensible to talk about this w.r.t. modern technology because we have historical records (though even then, weak records) so that we can know what caused what. When speculating about the uniqueness of the wheel, the alphabet, the dog, or iron where we are for all intents and purposes historically ignorant of how these events came about, we have no basis in reason for claiming a necessary causal connection between an ancient event and a modern event.

[TuringAI]

I think that there are a few things to consider. Ayn Rand probably considered these things and dismissed them as irrelevant to her point about inventions. I consider them relevant because, despite history being one way and not another, it COULD HAVE BEEN another way. This is because we have free will. We're not talking about planetary formation. We're talking about series upon series of human created events. Anyway, here are the things to consider.

1. The kind of individuals CAPABLE of inventing anything is severely low. So were electricity not discovered, and the light bulb not invented, historical conditions might not have allowed a nation such as America to exist long enough for another individual with the same virtues to discover and invent those things, at least until another free nation were created, which itself isn't a guarantee. This is because free will allows people to invent or even to NOT invent these things.

2. Were there more inventive individuals there's nothing in this universe or in human history or anything anywhere that stops people from accidentally inventing the same thing more than once. So under those conditions, in the alternate world where inventors are plentiful, we may very well see multiple invention as a serious issue. Laws may have to change to consider co-invention, or re-invention in the face of deficient prior knowledge. Free will is the reason here too.

3. More important, then, than the issue of whether or not an invention would have existed otherwise - it always COULD have, but there is a subtle but important distinction between would and could, especially in this situation - is how to increase the proportion of inventors. It happens quite a bit in history where only a minimal amount of people can claim ownership of something, then something happens and ownership is abundant. Education reform might accomplish this goal.

On that note, something could be said for people's views of limited ownership time. Think about how invention might be different if there were unlimited ownership time for all inventions. Maybe that would be enough to make inventors out of non inventors, provided that rules be lenient enough to allow someone to shun specific knowledge of an invention and rediscover it themselves so there are more factors out there than simply if it could be invented by multiple different people.

[Amaroq]

I still think you're wrong: you're verging on cultural determinism by focusing on "conditions" while ignoring the unique powers and choices of individuals.

Undoubtedly, the potential heroic creator requires a reasonably fertile culture to make and propagate some a huge discovery or invention. Yet that culture might take many forms, and it's certainly not enough in and of itself. From the history of Greek philosophy, it's pretty clear that the laws of logic would not have been discovered absent the self-made, fact-oriented, this-worldly super-genius of Aristotle. Even though the culture was very rational, he was many, many heads and shoulders above everyone else. (Plato would have been capable, but he chose to busy himself with the world of Forms.)

Individuals -- and their choices -- are the driving force behind these monumental discoveries and inventions.

Ah, my mistake. I was assuming the type of person attempting the inventing as one of the conditions. The likeliness of another person like the previous attempted inventor stepping up to the plate.

[Grames]

1. The kind of individuals CAPABLE of inventing anything is severely low. So were electricity not discovered, and the light bulb not invented, historical conditions might not have allowed a nation such as America to exist long enough for another individual with the same virtues to discover and invent those things, at least until another free nation were created, which itself isn't a guarantee. This is because free will allows people to invent or even to NOT invent these things.

People invent and reinvent nearly every day, all the time. The opportunity, the economic context, to invent something earth-shakingly significant like AC electrical power transmission doesn't come along everyday. Apparently the vikings discovered North America centuries before Columbus but nobody cared at that time, not enough people to matter.

2. Were there more inventive individuals there's nothing in this universe or in human history or anything anywhere that stops people from accidentally inventing the same thing more than once. So under those conditions, in the alternate world where inventors are plentiful, we may very well see multiple invention as a serious issue. Laws may have to change to consider co-invention, or re-invention in the face of deficient prior knowledge. Free will is the reason here too.

Multiple patents happen all the time now and are easy to solve. Priority is awarded on a 'first come, first served basis' with 'first' variably defined as first to file or first to invent.

On that note, something could be said for people's views of limited ownership time. Think about how invention might be different if there were unlimited ownership time for all inventions. Maybe that would be enough to make inventors out of non inventors, provided that rules be lenient enough to allow someone to shun specific knowledge of an invention and rediscover it themselves so there are more factors out there than simply if it could be invented by multiple different people.

Life +70 years copyright terms are bad enough, and you want to make patents unlimited? Oh hell no. This would only be a bonanza for lawyers fighting out independent invention cases in court. All your fantasized economic gains would go straight into lawyers fees. And just imagine the problem of sorting out who gets paid when knowledge builds up hierarchically like in electrical applications. How different claims would exist on a microchip, and what would the total license fee burden be for a manufacturer? This would eventually actually strangle invention as anything new would necessarily cost more than an older, simpler, less patented method. Unlimited duration coercive monopolies are a bad idea.

[TuringAI]

People invent and reinvent nearly every day, all the time. The opportunity, the economic context, to invent something earth-shakingly significant like AC electrical power transmission doesn't come along everyday. Apparently the vikings discovered North America centuries before Columbus but nobody cared at that time, not enough people to matter.

Multiple patents happen all the time now and are easy to solve. Priority is awarded on a 'first come, first served basis' with 'first' variably defined as first to file or first to invent.

Life +70 years copyright terms are bad enough, and you want to make patents unlimited? Oh hell no. This would only be a bonanza for lawyers fighting out independent invention cases in court. All your fantasized economic gains would go straight into lawyers fees. And just imagine the problem of sorting out who gets paid when knowledge builds up hierarchically like in electrical applications. How different claims would exist on a microchip, and what would the total license fee burden be for a manufacturer? This would eventually actually strangle invention as anything new would necessarily cost more than an older, simpler, less patented method. Unlimited duration coercive monopolies are a bad idea.

Well my main point is that if there was no 'first come first serve' basis for patents, people would opt for competition, which means even IF someone tried to price gouge or act authoritarian, the competing providers would jump in and provide a better product for a decreased price.

The issue is that coercive monopolies are immoral, and that if patents worked on the basis that refusing to be a consumer of the information makes you a valid re-inventor, there would be sufficient competition to offset whatever problems might arise if such claims are unlimited. Furthermore, there would be a jury trial just like in regular theft cases, with presumed innocent until proven guilt.

Of course, this all relies on the premise that privacy is the intellectual property analog to possession in physical property. So rather than having a hundred different claims out there out of which the public is there to sort, they will all be private. So you couldn't violate a 'patent' by inventing the same thing on your own.