The Science of Innovation

1Innovation

These things, indeed, you have articulate,

proclaim’d at market crosses, read in churches,

to face the garment of rebellion

with some fine colour that may please the eye

of fickle changelings and poor discontents,

which gape and rub the elbow at the news

of hurlyburly innovation.

from: Henry IV, Part 1, Act V, Scene 1, by William Shakespeare 1597

An innovation is a particular novelty. The prefix “in” indicates that a new item does not just somehow occur but is deliberately introduced “in-to” the world. Therefore intention, purpose, and effort, have gone hand in hand with innovations such as the printing press around 1450, the steam engine in 1712, the phonograph in 1877, or the synthesis of ammonia in 1909. Mere occurrences, like ...