Review
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"[Inventology] offers a new perspective into the process of
invention that will inform and illuminate."
—Publishers Weekly
"'Inventology'" may be a real science; researchers are beginning
to study it, and teachers are teaching it. Some 21st-century
creations (crowdfunding, 3D printing) are breaking down barriers
(money, time) between new ideas and a useful product, so a golden
age of innovation seems in the offing. A delightful account of
how inventors do what they do."
—Kirkus, Starred
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From the Inside Flap
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Find out where great ideas come from.
A doctor realizes that an innocent-looking tube is killing his
patients. A her cleans up after his toddler and builds a
sippy cup that wont spill. An engineer dreams of a different
world and pioneers the cell phone.
By studying breakthroughs like these, we can learn how people
imagine their way around impossible problems to discover
groundbreaking answers. Pagan Kennedy reports on how enduring
methods of invention can be adapted to the twenty-first century,
as millions of us deploy tools like crowdfunding, big data, and
3-D printing to address our needs or realize our dreams.
Inventology draws on fresh research and the surprising stories
behind many inventions old and new to reveal the steps that most
reliably produce discovery. As Kennedy shows, recent advances in
technology and communication have placed us at the cusp of a
golden age; its now more possible than ever before to transform
ideas into actuality. This myth-shattering book is a must-read
for anyone who is eager to understand how the most amazing,
important new things come into the world.
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From the Back Cover
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A delightful account of how inventors do what they do.Kirkus
Reviews, starred review
People often become convinced they have to make a tradeoff
between two desirable qualities that are impossible to achieve
at the same time. Imagine youre building an electric car; you
will require a lot of battery power so that the car can travel
for hundreds of miles before it has to charge up again. But as
soon as you begin adding batteries, you also add weight, making
the car so heavy that it wont go very far. The obvious solution
(add more batteries) seems to cancel itself out. Faced with this
paradox, your imagination may shut down, and you may find you
cant seem to generate any ideas. When we believe that we must
pick between A and B, our mind failsbecause we forget to search
for a third or fourth or fifth possibility that skirts the
seeming conundrum. For instance, what if you could transform the
entire car into a giant battery and use its structural partslike
the hood and the doorto store energy? Indeed, several groups of
researchers are now investigating this ingenious work-around;
theyre developing carbon-fiber material that would transform the
cars body into a power-storage system. This approach involves a
whole new way of thinking about batteriesno longer would the
power-storage devices be considered a burden on the car.
Instead, the batteries would become the car (or the laptop, or
the phone).
from INVENTOLOGY
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About the Author
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PAGAN KENNEDY was the New York Times Magazine’s “Who Made That?”
columnist, and is the author of the New York Times Notable Book
Black Livingstone, the Barnes & Noble Discover pick Spinsters,
and other books. Her work has appeared in the Boston Globe,
Dwell, The Nation, and elsewhere.
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