The Great Hall of Possible Inventions
Imagine a cavernous hall stretching before you as far as the eye can see.
Sitting on towering oak shelves is every invention conceivable. Billions upon billions of artifacts and documents spanning wall to wall, floor to ceiling.
This incredible cathedral is the Great Hall of all Possible Inventions.
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Walking through the hall, the inventions are not distributed randomly. Instead, they are placed with a particular organisation, a defined structure. In one area sits all possible types of axe - from rudimentary stone age axes of hunter gatherers to today's alloyed steel blades. To axes yet to be discovered - axes woven from nano-materials, and grown from diamonds.
Beside this area is a huge set of chainsaws, lazers and other evolutions and off-shoots of the axe.
And so it is for every other possible invention.
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Now, three things are noteworthy about the Great Hall.
Most items near other items are almost identical with only very minor modifications. Our alloyed steel axe blade could have slight variations in size or shape or composition.
A lot of items are fairly poor. Weird variations that don't do much or are very suboptimal for the problem they intend to solve. The good stuff is rare.
Most of the items have never existed. They have yet to be invented. Even near artifacts that you are familiar with, most items have never been brought out of the Great Hall and into the world. On top of this, whole swathes of the Great Hall have never even been explored. Nobody has ever walked past those shelves - or even near them. The overwhelming majority of items have yet to be invented.
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Invention is a search of the Great Hall.
This search began deep into our sapien past. Exploration has accelerated with the birth of civilisation and again into the Internet Age. Each invention shedding light on the shelves around it.
Drawing our attention to what is possible to create.
The more we explore the room, the more possibilities open before us.
Spend enough time wandering between the shelves of the Great Hall and you may begin to see where the most interesting possibilities sit.
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Sources & Inspiration
Why Greatness Cannot be Planned by Kenneth Stanley and Joel Lehman