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An article in British newspaper The Observer recently said true innovation has disappeared from our society.
The writer was Peter Watson, author of the book "Ideas - A History from Fire to Freud".
Watson began:"The year 2005 can't begin to compete with 1905 in terms of important innovations."
"Writing a history of ideas over the past three years, I have been struck time and again by the fact that, contrary to what we tell ourselves all the time - on TV, in newspapers and magazines, in advertising and in government propaganda - our present world is nowhere near as interesting and innovative as it thinks it is, certainly in comparison with past ages.
"Yes, we are dazzled by mobile phones, cameras, iPods, digital-interactive TV, laptops and the www, by laser-guided surgery and bombs, by DNA fingerprinting, and now by cloning. These are not small things but do they change the way we think in important - in fundamental - directions?"
Watson quotes Richard Southern, an Oxford University historian who died last year:"Southern thought the most interesting times in history were 1050-1250 and 1750-1950."
"The former saw the amalgamation of Aristotelianism and Christianity, fashioning the possibility of a secular world it saw cathedrals and universities, the invention of the experiment, the rise of accuracy - in counting, measuring, punctuation - the introduction of equal hours, the widespread adoption of Hindu numerals, and the development of musical notation.
"The latter period saw the introduction of the factory, the steam engine, a change in the experience of work, the birth of modern chemistry and electricity, the rise of sociology, geology, evolution, statistics, particle physics, and Freudianism. For the first time people thought 'new' things better than old ones."
"Each of these periods transformed our understanding of ourselves radically."
"But what great ideas or transformations have been introduced in the half-century since 1950?" Watson asked, pointing out that except for a few innovations such as the Internet, most scientific research merely modifies previous studies.

Is innovation dead? 21st Century Wednesday,August 10,2005

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