Innovation

“ While the legislator is horrified at the thought of innovation, the inventor, the discoverer, and the artisan are electrified by the discovery of a new principle in physics, and delighted at its application in a new invention, and its practical operation in a new and useful machine. ”

“ At the same time as you are developing your culture, you want a flourishing economy—and not just in literature or film. You want innovation and invention. You want drugs that cure terrible diseases, and designs for more fuel-efficient stoves, and useful little doodads, like mousetraps, or Post-it notes, or solar- powered backscratchers. To be exact, you want lots of innovation but you do not know exactly what innovation or even what types of innovation you want. ”

“ This indisposition to innovation, even in science, may possibly have its use, by tending to check crude and premature theories; but it is obvious that, if carried too far, it strikes at the root of all improvement. ”

“ The complex of technological ways and means grows by increments that come into the scheme by way of improvements, innovations, expedients designed to facilitate, abridge or enhance the work to be done. Any such innovation that fits workably into the technological scheme, and that in any appreciable degree accelerates the pace of that scheme at any point, will presently make its way into general and imperative use, regardless of whether its net ulterior effect is an increase or a diminution of material comfort or industrial efficiency. ”

“ Science, technology and innovation will drive the quality and competitiveness of our workforce, as well as our manufacturing, export, creative, and service industries, in existing markets and in new ones waiting to be explored. ”

“ Assuredly I will never shrink from innovation where I see reason to believe that innovation will be improvement. That the present Government does not shrink from innovations which it considers as improvements the bill now before the House sufficiently shows. ”

“ Even in America, where the adoption of improvements and innovations is regarded as so prompt and sure, and where the huge tolls of the Patent Office and the courts bear witness to the ceaseless efforts of the inventor, it is impossible to deny the sad truth that unconsciously society discourages invention rather than invites it. Possibly our national optimism as revealed in invention—the seeking a higher good—needs some check. ”

“ We will reinforce the principal position of enterprises in innovation, continue promoting breakthroughs in core technologies in key fields, promote greater synergy between industry, academia, research, and application, and facilitate the commercialization and application of advances in science and technology. ”

“ For whatsoe'er their sufferings were before,
That change they covet makes them suffer more.
All other errors but disturb a state;
But innovation is the blow of fate. ”

“ Surely, every medicine285 is an innovation, and he that will not apply new remedies must expect new evils, for time is the greatest innovator; ”

“ Everywhere there is a class of men who cling with fondness to whatever is ancient, and who, even when convinced by overpowering reasons that innovation would be beneficial, consent to it with many misgivings and forebodings. We find also everywhere another class of men, sanguine in hope, bold in speculation, always pressing forward, quick to discern the imperfections of whatever exists, disposed to think lightly of the risks and inconveniences which attend improvements and disposed disposed to give every change credit for being an improvement. ”

“ We know that the nation that goes all-in on innovation today will own the global economy tomorrow. This is an edge America cannot surrender. ”

“ You spoke of innovations, and I also believe it is ill to try experiments in states, unless the need be urgent, and unless it be the reformation that draweth on the change, and not the love of change that urgeth the reformation. Is not time the greatest innovator?—is he not always changing? ”

“ We also claim that patents suffocate innovation. By creating a monopoly on knowledge, they stifle competition and prevent development, not to mention the ways they are being abused by patent holders.
Last but definitely not least is the question of privacy. Sweden is on course for a society where every citizen is being constantly supervised by the government. ”

“ The high degree of accuracy which results from intensive work will tend to spread by contagion to that portion of the work which must necessarily be done in a more summary fashion.
This principle, which underlies all others, leaves the door open for new devices, new methods, and improvements on the old ones. It leaves us free to welcome and to adopt all sorts of innovations, provided such innovations are likely to prove of value. ”

“ Pure innovation is more grosse than error. ”

“ "Certainly we've made important innovations, chief among them the scientific method," he said at one point, "but the primitive groundwork is still there, dominating the pattern of our lives. We're modified anthropoid apes inhabiting night clubs and battleships. What else could you expect us to be?" ”

“ No invention in ancient or modern times has wrought such a revolution—a revolution in all business, in commerce, [Pg 277] trade, manufacturing and the mechanic arts, in politics, government, and in religious affairs. It is not given to mortal man to comprehend the greatness, to duly appreciate the grandeur, or to measure the utility of this remarkable invention. Over the mountains, through the valleys, under the seas flies the electric current, conveying all-important items of news from place to place, from country to country, from continent to continent. ”

“ Some of the large brewers, chemical manufacturers, candle companies, and many others, constantly employ scientific men in this way to examine their materials, processes and products, and keep them acquainted with the progress of discovery and invention in relation to their own particular trades.
No art or manufacture is so perfect as to be exempt from the influence of discovery and invention, and no man can produce so perfect an article but that, by the aid of science, a better may be produced. ”

“ This projection of new possibilities leads to search for new means of execution, and progress takes place; while the discovery of objects not already used leads to suggestion of new ends.
That science is the chief means of perfecting control of means of action is witnessed by the great crop of inventions which followed intellectual command of the secrets of nature. The wonderful transformation of production and distribution known as the industrial revolution is the fruit of experimental science. ”

“ So far has scientific discovery, and its practical applications to human benefit by invention, now progressed, that every one considers this to be, par excellence, the scientific age. And as discovery and invention continue to progress with accelerated speed, we are encouraged to hope, not only that scientific principles will ultimately be universally recognised as the regulators of all technical industry, but also as a fundamental basis of morality. ”

“ Every discovery or new invention in whatever branch of industry it may be, is the property of the inventor, and its enjoyment is guaranteed to him in the form and for the time specified in the following articles. Art. 2. Every means of giving to a production already in existence a greater degree of perfection shall be considered as a new discovery. ”

“ You who have worked at the application of science to industry, come and tell us frankly what has been the outcome of your discoveries. Convince those who dare not march boldly towards the future what new inventions the knowledge we have already acquired carries in its womb, what industry could do under better conditions, what man might easily produce if he produced always with a view to enhance his own productions. ”

“ Invention, then, of the highest kind must be composed of four qualities—imagination, to conceive a new and complicated machine; knowledge, to gather materials; judgment, to select and combine them; and perseverance without wearying till the truth be obtained. Those things which commonly go by the name of new inventions are very often mere modifications of what has been done before. “Improvements” is the technical term applied to them. ”

“ This field is to-day attracting inventors of eminent ability, with the prospect that soon motive powers will be much cheapened, with incidental abridgment of drudgery, a new expansion of cities into the country, and the production of light at perhaps as little as one-third its present cost. A page or two are next given to a few social aspects of invention, its new aid and comfort to craftsmen, farmers, householders comparatively poor. It will appear that forces working against the undue centralization of industry grow stronger every day. ”

“ The change that comes first to mind, the one that overshadows and even controls all others, is the industrial one—the application of science resulting in the great inventions that have utilized the forces of nature on a vast and inexpensive scale: the growth of a world-wide market as the object of production, of vast manufacturing centers to supply this market, of cheap and rapid means of communication and distribution between all its parts. ”

“ And if we reflect what a stock of knowledge may be accumulated by the constant progress of industry and observation, fed with fresh supplies from the stores of nature, assisted sometimes by those happy strokes of chance which mock all the powers of invention, and sometimes by those superior characters which arise occasionally to instruct and enlighten the world, it is difficult even to imagine to what height of improvement their discoveries may extend. ”

“ The habit of research into the origin of improved industrial method must therefore help to strengthen the impression of the importance of gradual growth, and of general tendencies, as being the prime factors in promoting social advancement through the success of invention. ”

“ In such cases, though the individual merit of the inventor is small, the benefit conferred may be important, and may operate influentially in promoting the progress of civilization.
Scientific discovery goes hand in hand with invention, and they mutually assist each other's progress. Every discovery in science may be applicable to some new purpose, or give greater efficiency to what is old. ”

“ Never in the history of the world, have the opportunities been as numerous and the rewards as great as they are now for any and every kind of meritorious invention. Our advanced civilization, the complex intricacies of our social fabric, the enormous general increase in wealth and the consequent general ability, to greater or less extent, to gratify our numerous and various desires, has created an unlimited field of opportunity for the ingenious, fertile and enterprising brain. ”

“ In the multiplicity of modern human contrivances by which the sweat and drudgery of life are saved, and time economised for worthier objects, we are apt to overlook the painful and laborious steps by which they were reached, and to regard with impatience, or at least with indifference, the story of their evolution; and yet no correct or profound knowledge of the growth of humanity to its higher planes can be obtained without noting to what extent the minor inventions, as well as the startling ones, have aided the upward progress. ”

“ MODERN industry is characterized by the extent to which scientific research and technique based on precise study have contributed to progress. So complete has been the adaption of and reliance on scientific research in many industries that it is difficult at this time to visualize the state of affairs of two or three decades ago, when substantially all industry on its technical side was dependent for advancement on cut-and-try, rule-of-thumb, methods of development. ”

“ Civilization begets new needs and wants; opportunities for new invention are multiplying at a tremendous rate. In other words, where an inventor, two centuries ago, would have had one hundred chances to "make good," today the chances are multiplied many thousand-fold. ”

“ Indeed there can hardly be conceived a quicker way for the average person to attain independence andp. 14 wealth than by inventing something of real worth and merit that can be quickly turned into money. The inventive field is large, and each invention opens up a new field for improvements, and it is the "improver," without question, that reaps the greatest benefit from any invention. Owing to the ever forward progress of civilization, there is no limit to the possible improvements in the sciences, arts, and manufactures. ”

“ To be convinced of the importance of the subject, we need only reflect on the vast number of toothed [91] wheels that are daily revolving in this active and populous district, and on the share which they take in the quantity and value of its productions; and it is obvious that any invention tending to divest these instruments of their imperfections, whether it be by lessening their expence, prolonging their duration, or diminishing their friction, must have a beneficial influence on the general prosperity. ”

“ Yet, despite this and other fields of inventive activity, what we have said appears to hold good, that one by one each of the varied lines of invention will reach its ultimatum, and gradually the activity of man in this direction decrease. While the twentieth century may be as active in the development of mechanism as the nineteenth has been, it seems unlikely to be more so, and in succeeding centuries, inventive activity must decline for want of fields in which to exercise itself. ”

“ The point is not that John or Paul, because they want to make an invention and because they work on it, shall make an invention; but where thousands want an invention and work on it, the invention must appear, as surely as an unsupported rock must fall to the ground. ”