What Really Is Invention?
Ever heard of Wilbur and Orville Wright? Likely. I have always been fascinated by the amazing story of these two brothers who are doubtless front-line pioneers and inventors in aviation.
I would love to tell you about their amazing feat and groundbreaking invention which changed the face of transportation, and how their idea has over the years evolved into a billion dollar sector, but hey, don’t get carried away. This is more about a powerful principle I’ve observed that led to their success.
I read this great piece on the Wright brothers from history.com and it captured the very principle I’ll briefly discuss.
Wilbur and Orville set to work trying to figure out how to design wings for flight. They observed that birds angled their wings for balance and control, and tried to emulate this, developing a concept called “wing warping.” When they added a moveable rudder, the Wright brothers found they had the magic formula-on December 17, 1903, they succeeded in flying the first free, controlled flight of a power-driven, heavier than air plane. Wilbur flew their plane for 59 seconds, at 852 feet, an extraordinary achievement.
Here’s a little formula
THE EXISTING + THE ADDITION = THE INVENTION
Birds had always existed but Wilbur and Orville, intrigued by their functionality and how they were able to sustain flight without falling off, reasoned that if they birds could transport themselves that way, humans could too. They developed the wing warping concept and introduced the moveable rudder- this defines the addition in our formula- and the invention was the airplane.
I do not doubt that inventions can come as a result of novel ideas giving rise to the development of something entirely new, but more often than not, inventions come as a result of useful additions on already existing ideas, resulting in better ways of doing things or redefining the way that things are done already.
The discipline, therefore, is to cultivate the kind of thinking that allows one to look at an already existing idea and see it from a completely different light, an attitude of seeing the existing and visualizing the possibility of a new and better way of accomplishing the same thing or even something entirely new. I believe we pass by ideas and inventions every day as we engage in the mundane, but we fail to recognize them because we are encumbered by the many things that demand our attention.
I believe we possess limitless abilities locked up in us and harnessing this principle can take us into a completely different experience.
