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Eureka: How Invention Happens
Tracing the long pre-history of five twentieth-century inventions which have transformed our lives, Gavin Weightman reveals a fantastic cast of scientists and inspired amateurs whose ingenuity has given us the airplane, television, bar code, personal computer, and mobile phone. Not one of these inventions can be attributed to a lone genius who experiences a moment of inspiration. Nearly all innovations exist in the imagination before they are finally made to work by the hard graft of inventors who draw on the discoveries of others.
While the discoveries of scientists have provided vital knowledge which has made innovation possible, it is a revelation of Weightman’s study that it is more often than not the amateur who enjoys the “eureka moment” when an invention works for the first time. Filled with fascinating stories of struggle, rivalry, and the ingenuity of both famous inventors and hundreds of forgotten people, Weightman’s captivating work is a triumph of storytelling that offers a fresh take on the making of our modern world.
While the discoveries of scientists have provided vital knowledge which has made innovation possible, it is a revelation of Weightman’s study that it is more often than not the amateur who enjoys the “eureka moment” when an invention works for the first time. Filled with fascinating stories of struggle, rivalry, and the ingenuity of both famous inventors and hundreds of forgotten people, Weightman’s captivating work is a triumph of storytelling that offers a fresh take on the making of our modern world.
- GenresScienceNonfictionHistory
266 pages, Hardcover
First published July 23, 2015
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
August 15, 2015
The five inventions and how they happened have been elucidated in an inimitable style. The author has done prodigious research but his erudition on these topics sits lightly on his shoulders. The inventors are as unlikely as they come, starting with non - engineers working on aeroplanes to haphazard geeks on home computers. What is common is their passion and persistence against consistent failures to finally come out with the solution for what they set out in the first place. The imagination and far - sightedness of some of them (eg Graham Bell) is astounding to say the least. For anyone interested to know how these innovations came into being, this is a boon read.
August 17, 2017
There's an interesting point made by Gavin Weightman in Eureka - the way that many inventions were the brainchild of an amateur, a tinkerer, who managed to get the invention going pretty badly, before it was then picked up elsewhere, typically by a larger organization which carried it forward to become a commercial or practical product. It's certainly true of the five examples he focusses on in the book.
These are powered flight, television, the barcode, the PC and the mobile phone (cellphone). In each case, Weightman gives us a long section in which he introduces that individual (or small team) of amateurs, plunges back into their historical antecedents - because invention doesn't come from nowhere, there is plenty of groundwork that precedes it - and then takes us through the detailed work of the amateurs and the way that the invention was then taken up and commercialised.
For me, the two best sections were the ones on TV and the barcode, in part because I'd read more detailed books on the other topics. The TV section is interesting because it gives the best balance between Baird and Farnsworth I've seen. In my youth (in the UK) John Logie Baird was the only name you ever heard when it came to inventing the television, while more recently the magnificently named Philo T. Farnsworth has taken centre stage (because unlike Baird, his TV concept was not a dead-end mechanical approach), but Weightman puts both in their rightful positions.
The barcode section was particularly interesting because it's something I've never read about, and it's easy to overlook the barcode as an invention, even though it plays a major role every time we go shopping, not to mention its importance in inventory and stock control. It was fascinating to learn that it was inspired by Morse code. My only real criticism of this chapter is the way that it concentrates solely on the hardware, where the development of the software was equally crucial in the story.
These are, without doubt, interesting stories, but the reason I haven't given the book a higher star rating is that it's not a great read. The historical sections get rather dull and over-detailed (this is particularly the case in the flight section, not helped by jumping around wildly chronologically in a way that really doesn't help the reader). I also think that the central thesis that inventions come from isolated amateurs, which the author presents as if it's a new observation, would have been better if he had read more around the study of creativity and innovation. It's an observation dating back for decades that in the creative field ideas come from individuals, while development tends to come from teams, which is why in part there was a strong historical tendency for the more individual-oriented UK of the early to mid 20th Century to come up with inventions, while the US, where businesses tended to have a stronger team approach, was better at developing those inventions to finished products.
The other problem with the thesis is selectivity. It's certainly true that these inventions were the work of amateurs, but it's not true of, say, the laser and a whole host of modern inventions where the technology level is often too high for amateurs to get anywhere in a garage lab. An interesting set of stories, then, but could have been told better and the central thesis could do with some expansion and extra sophistication.
These are powered flight, television, the barcode, the PC and the mobile phone (cellphone). In each case, Weightman gives us a long section in which he introduces that individual (or small team) of amateurs, plunges back into their historical antecedents - because invention doesn't come from nowhere, there is plenty of groundwork that precedes it - and then takes us through the detailed work of the amateurs and the way that the invention was then taken up and commercialised.
For me, the two best sections were the ones on TV and the barcode, in part because I'd read more detailed books on the other topics. The TV section is interesting because it gives the best balance between Baird and Farnsworth I've seen. In my youth (in the UK) John Logie Baird was the only name you ever heard when it came to inventing the television, while more recently the magnificently named Philo T. Farnsworth has taken centre stage (because unlike Baird, his TV concept was not a dead-end mechanical approach), but Weightman puts both in their rightful positions.
The barcode section was particularly interesting because it's something I've never read about, and it's easy to overlook the barcode as an invention, even though it plays a major role every time we go shopping, not to mention its importance in inventory and stock control. It was fascinating to learn that it was inspired by Morse code. My only real criticism of this chapter is the way that it concentrates solely on the hardware, where the development of the software was equally crucial in the story.
These are, without doubt, interesting stories, but the reason I haven't given the book a higher star rating is that it's not a great read. The historical sections get rather dull and over-detailed (this is particularly the case in the flight section, not helped by jumping around wildly chronologically in a way that really doesn't help the reader). I also think that the central thesis that inventions come from isolated amateurs, which the author presents as if it's a new observation, would have been better if he had read more around the study of creativity and innovation. It's an observation dating back for decades that in the creative field ideas come from individuals, while development tends to come from teams, which is why in part there was a strong historical tendency for the more individual-oriented UK of the early to mid 20th Century to come up with inventions, while the US, where businesses tended to have a stronger team approach, was better at developing those inventions to finished products.
The other problem with the thesis is selectivity. It's certainly true that these inventions were the work of amateurs, but it's not true of, say, the laser and a whole host of modern inventions where the technology level is often too high for amateurs to get anywhere in a garage lab. An interesting set of stories, then, but could have been told better and the central thesis could do with some expansion and extra sophistication.
February 1, 2019
I had troubles rating this book. The scope of the research is really impressive, the background of all the 5 inventions described - very detailed. It's a kind of a mind opener, I wouldn't imagine how big input to these inventions had the amatours or enthusiasts, and how various inventors worked on the same problem independently. And the conclusion (one of them and all of them are worth considering), that if Bell wouldn't invent the telephone, somebody else would do - even if most of the world would find such thing irrelevant at that time.
However, reading Eureka I felt the lack of technical or scientific knowledge myself and at some point (especially when the TV is discussed) I couldn't visualize the elements of the process, which make the narration difficult to follow. I also sometimes got lost between the number of people involved in each invention :) but that was actually OK, it only emphasizes how many inventors stand behind each item of our everyday use.
However, reading Eureka I felt the lack of technical or scientific knowledge myself and at some point (especially when the TV is discussed) I couldn't visualize the elements of the process, which make the narration difficult to follow. I also sometimes got lost between the number of people involved in each invention :) but that was actually OK, it only emphasizes how many inventors stand behind each item of our everyday use.
December 15, 2018
Very interesting book but also rife with sexist bias. It understates the merits of Ada Lovelace in a quite insulting fashion, and systematically diminish women's activities. Among the many inventors who get focus, there isn't a single woman quoted for her achievements. For example Bowers funded Apple, Noyce did not. Yet in a single sentence in the book describes Noyce as an adventurous venture capitalist who "loves risk" and invests in all kinds of things; Bowers just "also liked to dabble a little in shares" and that's all the patronizing credit she gets. Repeat for every single female figure that gets a mention.
I recommend to read it, I learned a lot, but
- Its sexist bias is pervasive, if subtle
- The premise and conclusion read more like wishful thinking and selection bias than like something backed up by data.
I recommend to read it, I learned a lot, but
- Its sexist bias is pervasive, if subtle
- The premise and conclusion read more like wishful thinking and selection bias than like something backed up by data.
October 22, 2016
Weightman focuses on five significant inventions -- the airplane, television, bar code, personal computer, and mobile phone -- starting with what he calls the "eureka moment" and moving backwards to show the discoveries and innovations that paved the way for the invention. Pretty much every time a new person is introduced we get a short biography of them and often, somewhat distractingly, their parents or even their grandparents. I guess it fits with the whole "standing on the shoulders of giants" theme, but it does get a little silly and times, disrupting the flow and feeling a bit like the author was just trying to pad the book to a certain length.
As I was reading the book, I kept coming back to the "technological fallacy" that Mark Kurlansky dwells on his book Paper. Kurlansky contends that people believe that technology brings about changes in society whereas it is really changes in society that inspire the creation of new technologies. I argue that both are overly simplistic, and Weightman's book provides a great illustration of this, with its tales of technologies that are developed before anyone's quite sure what purpose they're going to serve and others that are developed as specific reactions to an evolving world.
Of the five sections, I found the one on the bar code the most fascinating, probably because it's the shortest and most focused, as well as the least well known story despite the bar code's ubiquity in modern society. Although its story is more often told, the chapter about the television was also well done, with an engaging cast of characters. The section on the airplane added nothing new to previous accounts and despite its length the section on the personal computer felt incomplete. Weightman is not the most engaging writer, and you really need to be if you're going to write a book for a lay audience that has whole sections on electronic circuits and transistors. Part of the problem is the loose chronology, which interrupted the flow of some sections, and I was also distracted by the dreadful copyediting, which allowed an abundance of typographical errors, including some inconsistencies in names, to sneak in.
There's a lot of great information here, and the examples are well-chosen, but ultimately the book disappointed me. In both his introductory and concluding remarks, Weightman claims that these examples illustrate that industry-creating inventions come from amateurs rather than employees of established companies, a persistent assertion in our culture, and who doesn't love the story of the lonely innovator toiling away in the garage, sinking the family's life savings into a dream that only they can see clearly? He sets out some reasonable hypotheses for why this is, although I hesitate to read too deeply into such a small sample size. Other distinctions that stand out are between the self-educated and the formally trained, and the theoretical scientist and the practical inventor. Ultimately, as illustrated by the stories here, the development of these technologies of course relied on a combination of all these groups. If nothing else, the stories are a testament to the powers of curiosity, determination, and a certain type of bravado.
As I was reading the book, I kept coming back to the "technological fallacy" that Mark Kurlansky dwells on his book Paper. Kurlansky contends that people believe that technology brings about changes in society whereas it is really changes in society that inspire the creation of new technologies. I argue that both are overly simplistic, and Weightman's book provides a great illustration of this, with its tales of technologies that are developed before anyone's quite sure what purpose they're going to serve and others that are developed as specific reactions to an evolving world.
Of the five sections, I found the one on the bar code the most fascinating, probably because it's the shortest and most focused, as well as the least well known story despite the bar code's ubiquity in modern society. Although its story is more often told, the chapter about the television was also well done, with an engaging cast of characters. The section on the airplane added nothing new to previous accounts and despite its length the section on the personal computer felt incomplete. Weightman is not the most engaging writer, and you really need to be if you're going to write a book for a lay audience that has whole sections on electronic circuits and transistors. Part of the problem is the loose chronology, which interrupted the flow of some sections, and I was also distracted by the dreadful copyediting, which allowed an abundance of typographical errors, including some inconsistencies in names, to sneak in.
There's a lot of great information here, and the examples are well-chosen, but ultimately the book disappointed me. In both his introductory and concluding remarks, Weightman claims that these examples illustrate that industry-creating inventions come from amateurs rather than employees of established companies, a persistent assertion in our culture, and who doesn't love the story of the lonely innovator toiling away in the garage, sinking the family's life savings into a dream that only they can see clearly? He sets out some reasonable hypotheses for why this is, although I hesitate to read too deeply into such a small sample size. Other distinctions that stand out are between the self-educated and the formally trained, and the theoretical scientist and the practical inventor. Ultimately, as illustrated by the stories here, the development of these technologies of course relied on a combination of all these groups. If nothing else, the stories are a testament to the powers of curiosity, determination, and a certain type of bravado.
September 17, 2015
There's an interesting point made by Gavin Weightman in Eureka - the way that many inventions were the brainchild of an amateur, a tinkerer, who managed to get the invention going pretty badly, before it was then picked up elsewhere, typically by a larger organization which carried it forward to become a commercial or practical product. It's certainly true of the five examples he focusses on in the book.
These are powered flight, television, the barcode, the PC and the mobile phone (cellphone). In each case, Weightman gives us a long section in which he introduces that individual (or small team) of amateurs, plunges back into their historical antecedents - because invention doesn't come from nowhere, there is plenty of groundwork that precedes it - and then takes us through the detailed work of the amateurs and the way that the invention was then taken up and commercialised.
For me, the two best sections were the ones on TV and the barcode, in part because I'd read more detailed books on the other topics. The TV section is interesting because it gives the best balance between Baird and Farnsworth I've seen. In my youth (in the UK) John Logie Baird was the only name you ever heard, while more recently the magnificently named Philo T. Farnsworth has taken centre stage (because unlike Baird, his TV concept was not a dead-end mechanical approach), but Weightman puts both in their rightful positions.
The barcode section was particularly interesting because it's something I've never read about, and it's easy to overlook the barcode as an invention, even though it plays a part every time we go shopping, not to mention its role in inventory and stock control. It was fascinating to learn that it was inspired by Morse code. My only real criticism of this chapter is the way that it concentrates solely on the hardware, where the development of the software was equally crucial in the story.
These are without doubt interesting stories, but the reason I haven't given the book a higher star rating is that it's not a great read. The historical sections get rather dull and over-detailed (this is particularly the case in the flight section, not helped by jumping around wildly chronologically in a way that really doesn't help the reader. I also think that the central thesis that inventions come from isolated amateurs, which the author presents as if it's a new observation, would have been better if he had read more around the study of creativity and innovation. It's an observation dating back for decades that in the creative field ideas come from individuals, while development tends to come from teams, which is why in part there was a strong historical tendency for the more individual-oriented UK of the early to mid 20th Century to come up with inventions, while the US, where businesses tended to have a stronger team approach, was better at developing those inventions to finished products.
The other problem with the thesis is selectivity. It's certainly true that these inventions were the work of amateurs, but it's not true of, say, the laser and a whole host of modern inventions where the technology level is often too high for amateurs to get anywhere in a garage lab. An interesting set of stories, then, but could have been told better and the central thesis could do with some expansion and extra sophistication.
These are powered flight, television, the barcode, the PC and the mobile phone (cellphone). In each case, Weightman gives us a long section in which he introduces that individual (or small team) of amateurs, plunges back into their historical antecedents - because invention doesn't come from nowhere, there is plenty of groundwork that precedes it - and then takes us through the detailed work of the amateurs and the way that the invention was then taken up and commercialised.
For me, the two best sections were the ones on TV and the barcode, in part because I'd read more detailed books on the other topics. The TV section is interesting because it gives the best balance between Baird and Farnsworth I've seen. In my youth (in the UK) John Logie Baird was the only name you ever heard, while more recently the magnificently named Philo T. Farnsworth has taken centre stage (because unlike Baird, his TV concept was not a dead-end mechanical approach), but Weightman puts both in their rightful positions.
The barcode section was particularly interesting because it's something I've never read about, and it's easy to overlook the barcode as an invention, even though it plays a part every time we go shopping, not to mention its role in inventory and stock control. It was fascinating to learn that it was inspired by Morse code. My only real criticism of this chapter is the way that it concentrates solely on the hardware, where the development of the software was equally crucial in the story.
These are without doubt interesting stories, but the reason I haven't given the book a higher star rating is that it's not a great read. The historical sections get rather dull and over-detailed (this is particularly the case in the flight section, not helped by jumping around wildly chronologically in a way that really doesn't help the reader. I also think that the central thesis that inventions come from isolated amateurs, which the author presents as if it's a new observation, would have been better if he had read more around the study of creativity and innovation. It's an observation dating back for decades that in the creative field ideas come from individuals, while development tends to come from teams, which is why in part there was a strong historical tendency for the more individual-oriented UK of the early to mid 20th Century to come up with inventions, while the US, where businesses tended to have a stronger team approach, was better at developing those inventions to finished products.
The other problem with the thesis is selectivity. It's certainly true that these inventions were the work of amateurs, but it's not true of, say, the laser and a whole host of modern inventions where the technology level is often too high for amateurs to get anywhere in a garage lab. An interesting set of stories, then, but could have been told better and the central thesis could do with some expansion and extra sophistication.
July 23, 2015
This summary of five inventions is an easy, engaging read, but it feels a bit disorganized at times. By the author's account, he simply set out to explore the inventions that influence our daily lives, but he emerged with a tale of invention by outsiders. He concludes that we cannot expect innovation from scientists or industry, but must rely on those outside the system.
His thesis of outsiders doesn't exactly work. He mentions the invention of the transistor (Bell Labs) in passing and portrays Faraday as an outsider to academia. Yes, certainly Faraday started outside academia, but lived most of his career inside it. Most people who end up in industry and academia in the last couple hundred years were not born into them -- they came from somewhere else. So I don't find his stories to really support his thesis.
So let's put that argument aside for the time being and just concentrate on the stories themselves. To tell the story of the cell phone, for instance, Weightman goes back to catch the invention of magnetic induction and then radio itself. He weaves together the development of the requirements for cell phones throughout history and shows how they worked in harmony to arrive at the invention of the cell phone. Same thing with the other inventions. Starting with the eureka moment of invention, he goes back and reviews what all had to happen to make that moment possible. Of course he can't cover everything, but he succeeds in putting these inventions in context.
But context is, inevitably, complicated. He ends up sharing unnecessary details of many people's lives in order to establish them as characters in the narrative, and this practice at times led the story to feel too big and complex. It was a little difficult to hold onto the main idea of what invention he was working toward in his story. This is somewhat to be expected. Any one of these 5 stories of invention could easily take up the whole book. History is indeed complicated, and none of these eureka moments arose out of the isolated genius of one man. Many inventions had to happen in order for each one to move forward.
In the end, I appreciated the story telling method, and it helped me see the development of these inventions in context, which is a good thing to do from a historical point of view. So this book is valuable and fun to read. It tells stories that are, in their essence, complicated and back-story-rich.
His thesis of outsiders doesn't exactly work. He mentions the invention of the transistor (Bell Labs) in passing and portrays Faraday as an outsider to academia. Yes, certainly Faraday started outside academia, but lived most of his career inside it. Most people who end up in industry and academia in the last couple hundred years were not born into them -- they came from somewhere else. So I don't find his stories to really support his thesis.
So let's put that argument aside for the time being and just concentrate on the stories themselves. To tell the story of the cell phone, for instance, Weightman goes back to catch the invention of magnetic induction and then radio itself. He weaves together the development of the requirements for cell phones throughout history and shows how they worked in harmony to arrive at the invention of the cell phone. Same thing with the other inventions. Starting with the eureka moment of invention, he goes back and reviews what all had to happen to make that moment possible. Of course he can't cover everything, but he succeeds in putting these inventions in context.
But context is, inevitably, complicated. He ends up sharing unnecessary details of many people's lives in order to establish them as characters in the narrative, and this practice at times led the story to feel too big and complex. It was a little difficult to hold onto the main idea of what invention he was working toward in his story. This is somewhat to be expected. Any one of these 5 stories of invention could easily take up the whole book. History is indeed complicated, and none of these eureka moments arose out of the isolated genius of one man. Many inventions had to happen in order for each one to move forward.
In the end, I appreciated the story telling method, and it helped me see the development of these inventions in context, which is a good thing to do from a historical point of view. So this book is valuable and fun to read. It tells stories that are, in their essence, complicated and back-story-rich.
November 20, 2016
Five essays focusing on inventions that have changed the world; powered flight, television, barcodes, the home computer and the mobile phone. As always the histories, from Gavin Weightman, give credence to how developments were never reliant on just one individual; they were instead dependent upon discoveries and new ideas that were just waiting for the right time and place to coalesce into something more than the sum of their parts. To emphasise this reliance on ideas converging, the essays start at the 'Eureka' moment and then work backwards to understand the innovations that had come before, some of which were admitted to by the final patent owners, many others forgotten.
Whilst each invention differs greatly there are narrative similarities, such as the reliance of amateurs or those not engaged in similar businesses having the ability to step out of a narrow way of thinking and being able to apply new technology to old problems. It's also interesting to get insight on some of the lesser known stories. Whilst powered flight is quite well documented is was good to read the story of the humble barcode, a piece of technology we take for granted but one that has completely changed the way we shop and interact with goods.
From Think Piece http://www.thinkpiece.info/single-pos...
Whilst each invention differs greatly there are narrative similarities, such as the reliance of amateurs or those not engaged in similar businesses having the ability to step out of a narrow way of thinking and being able to apply new technology to old problems. It's also interesting to get insight on some of the lesser known stories. Whilst powered flight is quite well documented is was good to read the story of the humble barcode, a piece of technology we take for granted but one that has completely changed the way we shop and interact with goods.
From Think Piece http://www.thinkpiece.info/single-pos...
November 19, 2015
I received this book a part of the Goodreads first reads giveaways. I really found it interesting. I like that the book looks at the eureka moments of different inventions and traces them back through various historical developments. I was so interested to learn for example, how Muybridge's photographs assisted in the development of the television. It drew connections between various inventions that aren't always so clear and shows how invention doesn't happen in a vacuum but is a continuum of development and discovery throughout history. I just wish the book included more diagrams and images, especially when they are referred to in the book, for example some of the preliminary designs for various flying machines were a little hard to visualize from the description and probably would have been clarifyed by including images.
December 7, 2019
Those months of reading, googling, noting down science, brainpower, life and chances of inventors - I loved this book and the author's afterword. This doesn't overly romanticize the amateurs and undermined scientists in academia. It puts inventors on pedestal and powers the dare to try and experiment.
Invention is a creative process, taking a bit here and there, mixing things in your brain and create your vision and belief strong enough to persistently work till the end. Even though the end of your life brings no financial success or fame, surely it does inspire others. Like the Talkin Machine of Faber.
Invention is a creative process, taking a bit here and there, mixing things in your brain and create your vision and belief strong enough to persistently work till the end. Even though the end of your life brings no financial success or fame, surely it does inspire others. Like the Talkin Machine of Faber.
January 25, 2016
I entered the contest for my wife. She is a big history major. She thoroughly appreciated it. She said she enjoyed the back story of all the inventions in the book. She didn't know some of that information.
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March 30, 2016Before I read this , I wonder if this will seem like the same old stories I heard before or if it will be new and interesting to me..........
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews