Introduction: The Infinite Improbability Drive 1
1. Energy
Of heat, work and light 13
What Watt wrought 24
Thomas Edison and the invention business 26
The ubiquitous turbine 32
Nuclear power and the phenomenon of disinnovation 36
Shale gas surprise 41
The reign of fire 48
2. Public health
Lady Mary's dangerous obsession 50
Pasteur's chickens 55
The chlorine gamble that paid off 57
How Pearl and Grace never put a foot wrong 61
Fleming's luck 64
The pursuit of polio 69
Mud huts and malaria 73
Tobacco and harm reduction 75
3. Transport
The locomotive and its line 80
Turning the screw 87
Internal combustion's comeback 89
The tragedy and triumph of diesel 94
The Wright stuff 95
International rivalry and the jet engine 103
Innovation in safety and cost 107
4. Food
The tasty tuber 112
How fertilizer fed the world 118
Dwarfing genes from Japan 129
Insect nemesis 136
Gene editing gets crisper 141
Land sparing versus land sharing 147
5. Low-technology innovation
When numbers were new 149
The water trap 155
Crinkly tin conquers the Empire 159
The container that changed trade 162
Was wheeled baggage late? 170
Novelty at the table 173
The rise of the sharing economy 176
6. Communication and computing
The first death of distance 178
The miracle of wireless 183
Who invented the computer? 189
The ever-shrinking transistor 196
The surprise of search engines and social media 204
Machines that learn 211
7. Prehistoric innovation
The first farmers 216
The invention of the dog 222
The (Stone Age) great leap forward 227
The feast made possible by fire 234
The ultimate innovation: life itself 237
8. Innovation's essentials
Innovation is gradual 240
Innovation is different from invention 245
Innovation is often serendipitous 246
Innovation is recombinant 250
Innovation involves trial and error 253
Innovation is a team sport 255
Innovation is inexorable 257
Innovation's hype cycle 261
Innovation prefers fragmented governance 264
Innovation increasingly means using fewer resources rather than more 267
9. The economics of innovation
The puzzle of increasing returns 271
Innovation is a bottom-up phenomenon 275
Innovation is the mother of science as often as it is the daughter 282
Innovation cannot be forced upon unwilling consumers 286
Innovation increases interdependence 287
Innovation does not create unemployment 289
Big companies are bad at innovation 294
Setting innovation free 297
10. Fakes, frauds, fads and failures
Fake bomb detectors 300
Phantom games consoles 303
The Theranos debacle 304
Failure through diminishing returns to innovation: mobile phones 310
A future failure: Hyperloop 313
Failure as a necessary ingredient of success: Amazon and Google 317
11. Resistance to innovation
When novelty is subversive: the case of coffee 324
When innovation is demonized and delayed: the case of biotechnology 328
When scares ignore science: the case of weedkiller 335
When government prevents innovation: the case of mobile telephony 337
When the law stifles innovation: the case of intellectual property 342
When big firms stifle innovation: the case of bagless vacuum cleaners 350
When investors divert innovation: the case of permissionless bits 356
12. An innovation famine
How innovation works 359
A bright future 360
Not all innovation is speeding up 363
The innovation famine 365
China's innovation engine 368
Regaining momentum 371
Sources and further reading 375
Acknowledgements 389
Index 391