The Power of Desire: A Brief History of Scientific & Technological Innovation

Why do humans innovate? From three meals a day and shelter against the cold to travel, entertainment, and the exploration of the unknown, desire has ceaselessly given birth to new technologies — and quietly changed the course of history. A Brief History of Scientific and Technological Innovation draws on a database of major scientific and technological firsts to trace, along the thread of human needs, the development of agriculture, medicine, transportation, materials, energy, computing, and artificial intelligence. It compares the character of innovation across regions and eras, and explores the natural, cultural, economic, and institutional forces behind it.

The book attends both to the breakthroughs that changed entire eras and to the power of countless small innovations in kitchens, fields, and workshops: How did agriculture become a trap that later generations could not escape? How did eating habits shape power technologies? How did greed, love, and conspiracy drive the spread of knowledge? This edition updates the database and charts, incorporates new developments such as large language models and robotics, and offers bold predictions on AI's restructuring of manufacturing and service supply chains, U.S.–China technological competition, and innovation trends amid demographic change. This is a work that begins with the wishes of ordinary people, toward understanding how technology writes history — and creates the future.

English edition · 6 × 9 in · 484 pages · PDF format, available for download immediately after purchase.

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