Invention

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For other uses, see Invention (disambiguation).

An invention is a form, a composition of matter, or a process that has an element of novelty. Some inventions are based on pre-existing forms, compositions, processes or ideas. Other inventions are radical breakthroughs which may extend the boundaries of human knowledge or experience. An invention that is novel and not obvious to those who are skilled in the same field may be able to obtain the legal protection of a patent.

The process of invention

Invention can come about in many ways. Invention can be seeing a new possibility and pursuing it. Invention is often arises from trying to solve a problem. As the saying goes, necessity may be the mother of invention. An invention may come about from the desire for a composition or a method that realizes a purpose in a faster, more efficient, easier, cheaper, more ecologically friendly, aesthetically novel, or otherwise different way. Or an invention may be a composition or a process created to accomplish a new purpose. Invention can also begin by recognizing that an accident is useful or that it opens a new avenue for exploration. For example, the metallic color of plastic made by accidentally adding a thousand times too much catalyst led scientists to explore its metal-like properties, inventing electrically conductive plastic and light emitting plastic - invention that won the Nobel Prize in 2000 (see conductive polymer, and organic light-emitting diode or PLED). [1]

Inventions may be great concepts, but figuring them out and making them work can be another story. Invention may involve trial and error. In the process of developing an invention on paper, with models, by experimenting, by testing or in its whole form, the original idea often changes. It may for example become simpler or more practical, or it may expand. Some inventions are not created in the order that enables them to be most useful. For example, the parachute was invented before powered flight. The history of invention is also full of creative ideas which do not reach fruition due to practical considerations. There are inventions that are too expensive to produce, inventions that solve problems for which there is no economic incentive to solve, and inventions that require scientific advancements that have not yet occurred. Such barriers can disappear as the economic situation changes or as science develops. But history shows that turning an invention that is only a visionary idea into reality can take any amount of time, even centuries as demonstrated by inventions originally conceived by Leonardo da Vinci which are now in physical form and commonplace in our lives. [2] Interestingly, some inventions that are only ideas and have never been made in reality can obtain patent protection. [3]

Artistic invention

Invention has a long and important history in the arts. Inventive thinking has always played a vital role in the creative process. While some inventions in the arts are patentable, others are not because they cannot fulfill the strict requirements governments have established for granting them, (see patent).

In visual art

Many artists, designers, and architects think like inventors. As they create, they may for example: explore beyond that which is known or obvious, push against barriers, change or discard conventions, and/or break into new territory. Though few visual artists are inventors, among their inventions are important contributions to visual art and to other fields.

Some visual artists like Picasso become inventors in the process of creating art. Inventions by other artists are separate from their art, such as the scientific inventions of Leonardo da Vinci. Inventions originally created as art also develop other uses, as the mobile invented by Alexander Calder is commonly used over babies' cribs today. Among other artists, designers and architects who are or were inventors are: Georges Braque, Marcel Duchamp, Le Corbusier, Naum Gabo, Louis Comfort Tiffany, John La Farge, Buckminster Fuller, Jackson Pollock, Man Ray, Yves Klein, Henry N. Cobb, I. M. Pei, Kenneth Snelson, Robert Rauschenberg, Frank Stella, Helen Frankenthaler and Chuck Hoberman. Some of their inventions have been patented. Others might have fulfilled the requirements of a patent, like Cubism invented by Picasso and Braque. There are also inventions in visual art that do not fit into the requirements of a patent, such as Duchamp's Readymade and inventions where is it unclear who the inventor or inventors are, such as the invention of abstract art or abstract painting, oil painting, Process Art, Installation art and Light Art.

Inventions in the visual arts that may be patentable might be new materials (e.g., new mediums or compositions), they might be new processes, they might be novel designs, or they may be a combination of these. Inventions by Louis Comfort Tiffany, John La Farge, Buckminster Fuller, Kenneth Snelson, Yves Klein and others are in patents. For example, Klein patented a particular blue color known as "Kleinian Blue" or International Klein Blue. [4] [5] [6]

In music

Music has been expanded by invention over the course of thousands of years.

In other arts

Invention is important in other arts. Its value in acting was noted by Paul Newman when discussing his reasons for retiring, "You start to lose your memory, your confidence, your invention. So that's pretty much a closed book for me."[7]

Getting inventions out into the world

"Make a better mousetrap, and the world will beat a path to our door." -Ralph Waldo Emerson


"One of the greatest pains to human nature is the pain of a new idea. It...makes you think that after all, your favorite notions may be wrong, your firmest beliefs ill-founded... Naturally, therefore, common men hate a new idea, and are disposed more or less to ill-treat the original man who brings it." -Walter Bagehot, Physics and Politics


"Every herd of wild cattle has its leaders, its influential heads." -Gabriel Tarde, The Laws of Imitation [8][9]


Inventions get out into the world in different ways. Some of them are sold, licensed or given away as products or services. Simply exhibiting visual art, playing music or having a performance gets many artistic inventions out into the world. Believing in the success of an invention can involve risk, so it can be difficult to obtain support and funding. Grants, inventor associations, clubs and business incubators can provide the mentoring, skills and resources some inventors need. Success at getting an invention out into the world often requires passion for it and good entrepreneurship skills. See Resources provided below.

In economic theory, inventions are one of the chief examples of "positive externalities," a beneficial side-effect that falls on those outside a transaction or activity. One of the central concepts of economics is that externalities should be internalized - unless some of the benefits of this positive externality can be captured by the parties, the parties will be under-rewarded for their inventions, and systematic under-rewarding will lead to under investment in activities that lead to inventions. The patent system captures those positive externalities for the inventor (or the party that hired the inventor), so that the economy as a whole will invest a more-closely-optimum amount of resources in the process of invention.

Invention and Innovation

Main article: Innovation

The exact distinction between invention and innovation is debatable, see innovation. According to www.Dictionary.com, innovation is "something new or different introduced." [1]

In the social sciences, an innovation is anything new to a culture, whether it has been adopted or not. The theory for adoption (or non-adoption) of an innovation called diffusion of innovations considers the likelihood that an innovation will ever be adopted and the taxonomy of persons likely to adopt it or spur its adoption. This theory was first put forth by Everett Rogers. [10] Gabriel Tarde also dealt with the adoption of innovations in his Laws of Imitation. [11]

Resources

▪ Inventors Assistance League (Non-profit organization operating since 1963) http://www.inventions.org/

▪ Inventor Spot.com Website for independent inventors with forums. Articles and advice related to inventing and the creative process http://inventorspot.com/

▪ United Inventors Association, http://www.uiausa.org/

▪ Licensing Executives Society (USA and Canada), http://www.usa-canada.les.org/

▪ United States Patent and Trademark Office, e.g., Inventor’s Assistance Center, http://www.uspto.gov

▪ Service Corps of Retired Executives (SCORE), http://www.score.org/index.html

References

  1. ^ Nobelprize.org, The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2000
  2. ^ Simona Cremante (2005). Leonardo da Vinci: Artist, Scientist, Inventor. Giunti. ISBN 88-09-03891-6
  3. ^ These references describe the inventive process from different perspectives. Thomas P. Hughes, "Inventors: The Problems they Choose, The Ideas They Have, and the Inventions They Make," in Patrick Kelly and Melvin Kranzberg, eds., Technological Innovation: A Critical Review of Current Knowledge (1978); Robert J. Weber and David N. Perkins, eds., Inventive Minds: Creativity in Technology (1992); Vera John-Steiner, Notebooks of the Mind: Explorations of Thinking (1985); George Basalla, The Evolution of Technology (1988); Wiebe E. Bijker and John Law, eds., Shaping Technology/Building Society: Studies in Sociotechnical Change (1992); Eugene Ferguson, "The Mind's Eye: Nonverbal Thought in Technology," Science 197 (1977): 827-36; Michael Gorman and W. Bernard Carlson, "Interpreting Invention as a Cognitive Process: The Case of Alexander Graham Bell, Thomas Edison, and the Telephone," Science, Technology, and Human Values 15 (1990): 131-164; Louis C. Hunter, "The Heroic Theory of Invention," in Edwin T. Layton, Jr., ed., Technology and Social Change in America (1973), pp. 25-46; Reese Jenkins, "Elements of Style: Continuities in Edison's Thinking," in Margaret Latimer, et al., eds, Bridge to the Future (1984), pp. 149-162; John Jewkes, David Sawers and Richard Stillerman, The Sources of Invention (1958; 2nd ed., 1969); Arthur Koestler, Act of Creation (1964); Winston E. Kock, The Creative Engineer: The Art of Inventing (1978); David Noble, America by Design (1977); Henry Petroski, The Evolution of Useful Things (1992); Jacob Schmookler, Invention and Economic Growth (1966); Robert J. Weber, Forks, Phonographs, and Hot Air Balloons: A Field Guide to Inventive Thinking (1992) [vague]
  4. ^ http://www.indielondon.co.uk/events/out_barbican_colour_klein.html; and Tate Collection | IKB 79 by Yves Klein
  5. ^ Pepe Karmel, Picasso and the Invention of Cubism (2003); Simona Cremante (2005). Leonardo da Vinci: Artist, Scientist, Inventor. Giunti. ISBN 88-09-03891-6; See www.Calder.org and Prather, Marla. Alexander Calder 1898 - 1976. National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., 1998, ISBN 0894682288, ISBN 0300075189; Hulten, Pontus (editor): Marcel Duchamp: Work and Life, The MIT Press, 1993. ISBN 0-262-08225-X; Le Corbusier (1960), by Françoise Choay, George Braziller, Inc. ISBN 0-8076-0104-7; Constructing Modernity: The Art and Career of Naum Gabo by Martin Hammer and Christina Lodder (2000); Louis Comfort Tiffany held Patent #237,416 and John La Farge held Patent #224,831 (1880), see http://www.invent.org/Hall_Of_Fame/367.html and http://www.jlsloan.com/lct2.htm, as well as Marilynn A. Johnson, Louis Comfort Tiffany: Artist for the Ages (2006); Jackson Pollock by Kirk Varnedoe, Pepe Karmel, Museum of Modern Art New York (1998); Man Ray: Photography and its Double(1998) by Emmanuelle de I'Ecotais and Alain Sayag; For Henry N. Cobb see http://www.pcfandp.com/a/f/fme/hnc/b/b.html; The Architecture of I.M. Pei by Carter Wiseman (2001); Kenneth Snelson's US patents: #3,169,611 Discontinuous Compression Structures (1965), #3,276,148 Model for Atomic Forms (1966), #4,099,339 Model for Atomic Forms (1978), #6,017,220 Magnetic Geometric Building System, and #6,739,937 Space Frame Structure Made by 3-D Weaving of Rod Members (2004); For Rauschenberg's invention of the combine see http://encarta.msn.com/encnet/refpages/RefArticle.aspx?refid=761568672&pn=5 and http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1E1-RauschenR.html as well as the book: Robert Rauschenberg: Combines by Robert Rauschenberg and Paul Schimmel (2005); Frank Stella: An Illustrated Biography by Sidney Guberman (1995) and Frank Stella by William Stanley Rubin (1990); For Helen Frankenthaler see http://www.aacwebkiosk.com/Art2323$%7BClientIP%7D and the book: Helen Frankenthaler by John Elderfield (1997); For Charles (Chuck) Hoberman see http://www.hoberman.com/home.html and these twelve US patents: #7,125,015 Transforming puzzle, #7,100,333 Loop assemblies having a central link, #6,834,465 Folding covering panels for expanding structures, #6,739,098 Retractable structures comprised of interlinked panels, #6,219,974 Reversibly expandable structures having polygon links, #6,190,231 Continuously rotating mechanisms, #6,082,056 Reversibly expandable structures having polygon links, #5,234,727 Curved pleated sheet structures, #5,024,031 Radial expansion/retraction truss structures, #4,981,732 Reversibly expandable structures, #4,942,700 Reversibly expandable doubly-curved truss structure, and #4,780,344 Reversibly expandable three-dimensional structure;
  6. ^ See R. Buckminster Fuller at http://bfi.org/. Also, these are Buckminster Fuller's 28 US patents from 1927-1983: #1,633,702 Stockade (Building Structure) (1927); #1,634,900 Stockage (Pneumatic Process) (1927), #1,793 4D House (1928), #2,101,057 Dymaxion Car (1937), #2,220,482 Dymaxion Bathroom (1940), #2,343,764 Dymaxion Deployment Unit (sheet) (1944), #2,351,419 Dymaxion Deployment Unit (frame) (1944), #2,393,676 Dymaxion Map (1946), Dymaxion House (Witchita), #2,682,235 Geodesic Dome (1954), #2,881,717 Paperboard Dome (1959), #2,905,113 Plydome (1959), #2,914,074 Catenary (Geodesic Tent) (1959), #2,986,241 Octet Truss (1961), #3,063,521 Tensegrity (1962), #3,080,583 Submarisle (Undersea Island) (1963), #3,139,957 Aspension (Suspension Building) (1964), #3,197,927 Monohex (Geodesic Structures) (1965), #3,203,144 Laminar Dome (1965), Case No. - 349.021 Octa Spinner (1965), #3,354,591 Star Tensegrity (Octohedronal Truss) (1967), #3,524,422 Rowing Needles (Watercraft) (1970), #3,810,336 Geodesic Hexa-pent (1974), #3,863,455 Floatable Breakwater (1975), #3,866,366 Non-symetrical Tensegrity (1975), #4,136,994 Floating Breakwater (1979), #4,207,715 Tensegrity Truss (1980), and #4,377,114 Hanging Storage Shelf Unit (1983).
  7. ^ http://www.boston.com/news/globe/living/articles/2007/05/26/newman_says_hes_done_with_acting/
  8. ^ Les lois de l'imitation Gabriel Tarde (1890)
  9. ^ http://www.ciadvertising.org/studies/student/98_fall/theory/hornor/paper1.html
  10. ^ Diffusion of Innovations, 5th Edition by Everett Rogers (2003), also see http://www.ciadvertising.org/studies/student/98_fall/theory/hornor/paper1.html
  11. ^ Les lois de l'imitation Gabriel Tarde (1890)

See also

Bibliography

  • Asimov, Isaac. Asimov's Chronology of Science and Discovery, Harper & Row, 1989. ISBN 0-06-015612-0
  • De Bono, Edward, "Eureka! An Illustrated History of Inventions from the Wheel to the Computer", Thames & Hudson, 1974.
  • Gowlett, John. Ascent to Civilization, McGraw-Hill, Inc., 1992. ISBN 0-07-544312-0
  • Platt, Richard, "Eureka!: Great Inventions and How They Happened", 2003.

External links

Look up invention in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
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