Innovation is much of a byword. Climate crisis, feeding the world, ending wars, curing disease, creating endless energy, conquering space – they can all be done if someone, somewhere, just invents something smart right now. We are greater believers in the power of “invention” than we have ever been. Doesn’t matter if sitting on the right or left of politics.
Invention and discovery are not the same. Discovery is to uncover something we had not known or understood before. However, that something was always there waiting to be discovered.
Invention is for makers and dreamers. A contraption, a connection, a way of doing business, a machine or a crazy idea. Invention has a huge spectrum. I’ve never been to the Heath Robinson Museum[1]. Now, I mean to go.
To un-invent presupposes that it can be done. It has been done in the past. The classical world benefited from inventions that were lost in the dark ages. Later to be rediscovered.
Genuinely to uninvent is hard. Human imagination, with so many people on the planet, mitigates against it. Uninventing may be a short-lived move.
My view is that it would be best to try to un-invent a damaging idea or process. For example, let’s uninvent slavery or subjugation.
[1] https://www.heathrobinsonmuseum.org/
John Vincent 