Invention?

Invention, the act of bringing ideas or objects together in a novel way to create something that did not exist before. An invention is a unique or novel device, method, composition or process. The invention process is a process within an overall engineering and product development process. It may be an improvement upon a machine or product or a new process for creating an object or a result. An invention that achieves a completely unique function or result may be a radical breakthrough. Such works are novel and not obvious to others skilled in the same field. An inventor may be taking a big step in success or failure.

Some inventions can be patented. A patent legally protects the intellectual property rights of the inventor and legally recognizes that a claimed invention is actually an invention. The rules and requirements for patenting an invention vary from country to country and the process of obtaining a patent is often expensive.

Building models what it might be

Ever since the first prehistoric stone tools, humans have lived in a world shaped by invention. Indeed, the brain appears to be a natural inventor. As part of the act of perception, humans assemble, arrange, and manipulate incoming sensory information so as to build a dynamic, constantly updated model of the outside world. The survival value of such a model lies in the fact that it functions as a template against which to match new experiences, so as to rapidly identify anything anomalous that might be life-threatening. Such a model would also make it possible to predict danger. The predictive act would involve the construction of hypothetical models of the way the world might be at some future point. Such models could include elements that might, for whatever reason, be assembled into novel sub models (inventive ideas).

One of the earliest and most literal examples of this model-building paradigm in action was the ancient Mesopotamian invention of writing. As early as 8000 BCE tiny geometric clay models, used to represent sheep and grain, were kept in clay envelopes, to be used as inventory tallies or else to represent goods during barter. Over time, the tokens were pressed onto the exterior of the wet envelope, which at some point was flattened into a tablet. By about 3100 BCE the impressions had become abstract designs marked on the tablet with a cut reed stalk. These pictograms, known today as cuneiform, were the first writing. And they changed the world.

Inventions almost always cause change. Palaeolithic stone weapons made hunting possible and thereby triggered the emergence of permanent top-down command structures. The printing press, introduced by Johannes Gutenberg in the 15th century, once and for all curtailed the traditional authority of elders. The typewriter, brought onto the market by Christopher Latham Sholes in the 1870s, was instrumental in freeing women from housework and changing their social status for good (and also increasing the divorce rate).