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ISBN-10: 0195341201
ISBN-13: 9780195341201
Edition: 2008
List price: $20.99
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Description:
In How Invention Begins, Lienhard reconciles the ends of invention with the individual leaps upon which they are built, illuminating the vast web of individual inspirations that lie behind whole technologies. He traces, for instance, the way in which thousands of people applied their combined inventive genius to airplanes, railroad engines, and automobiles. As he does so, it becomes clear that a collective desire, an upwelling of fascination, a spirit of the times--a Zeitgeist--laid its hold upon inventors. The thing they all sought to create was speed itself. Likewise, Lienhard shows that when we trace the astonishingly complex technology of printing books, we come at last to that which we… desire from books--the knowledge, the learning, that they provide. Can we speak of speed or education as inventions? To do so, he concludes, is certainly no greater a stretch than it is to call radio or the telephone an "invention." Throughout this marvelous volume, Lienhard illuminates these webs of insight or inspiration by weaving a fabric of anecdote, history, and technical detail--all of which come together to provide a full and satisfying portrait of the true nature of invention. "Lienhard is enthralled with invention, how it happens and how inventions both shape and are shaped by culture.... The author's personality permeates his writing, and it's impossible not to admire his optimism, his far-reaching knowledge and his enthusiasm for learning." --Publishers Weekly "Lienhard is a first-rate storyteller with a passion and talent for the byways of history. His stories build around two broad themes. The real motivation for invention, he argues, is not necessity but desire and pleasure. Second, taking aim at the deeply ingrained, and often deceitful concept of priority, he asks us to heed the echo of old voices in new machines." --Arthur P. Molella, Technology and Culture