IV. The Restless Animal ↑
31. We invent new things.
We humans design and build things that never before existed. We figure things out, and apply that knowledge to creating things that operate in new ways, and perform new functions in aid of humanity.
Design is a fundamental element of invention, applying purpose and values to technology and resources in order to organize materials and activities to fashion our tools, our environments, and even our societies and ourselves.
Design is the process of finding out what works and what doesn’t, and also making judgments about how to best balance often competing concerns to create the best possible outcomes. We can and do and must apply design to products and services, to the built environments in which we work and play and live, to our institutions and social norms, and even to our ecosystems. What this means is that we don’t just accept things as they are, but consider how they could be improved, and then set out to improve them. It also means that we humans, singly and often collectively, take responsibility for the way these things work (and the ways in which they fail), and do our best to better them.
A fundamental part of the design process is the consideration of trade-offs between competing concerns, and finding appropriate balance points. As just one example, when designing new models of modern smart phones, there are trade-offs to be made between weight and battery life.
Words from Others on this Topic
Beavers build houses; but they build them in nowise differently, or better, now than they did five thousand years ago…. Man is not the only animal who labors; but he is the only one who improves his workmanship. These improvements he effects by Discoveries and Inventions.
Abraham Lincoln, 1858, from the lecture “Lecture on Discoveries and Inventions”
Don’t worry about what anybody else is going to do…. The best way to predict the future is to invent it. Really smart people with reasonable funding can do just about anything that doesn’t violate too many of Newton’s Laws.
Alan Kay, 1971, from the remarks “Meeting of the Palo Alto Research Center”
If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.
The whole difference between construction and creation is exactly this: that a thing constructed can only be loved after it is constructed; but a thing created is loved before it exists, as the mother can love the unborn child.
G. K. Chesterton, from Appreciations and Criticisms of the Works of Charles Dickens
Relevant Reference Models
- An element of The Tribal Instincts
Next: 32. We improve things