maurog.earth

I've recently read 3 books that touch on similar topics but felt so different that I thought it would be interest to comment them together.

Invention and Innovation by Vaclav Smil

In his very dry and matter-of-fact style, Smil gives us a tour of failed technological developments. Whether they started as a good idea but turned out to be terrible (like leaded gasoline or CFCs), they never really took off (like zeppelins or supersonic planes) or we are still waiting for them (like nuclear fusion or nitrogen-fixing cereals). The book is short and to the point, it's a very well reasoned and researched argument to Curb Your Techno-optimism (a much better title, if you ask me, the guy who came up with it).

I would recommend it because the topic is very interesting, it uses very good examples and it has no filler and it has no filler. But I wouldn't say I enjoyed the act of reading it. I don't blame Smil, he doesn't pretend he has beautiful prose, it's all about the facts, and that's okay.

Beyond Measure by James Vincent

This book is a lot more journalistic and less academic. It aims to tell the story of measurement and it does it in a fun way, following the author's own learning adventure, interviewing experts around the world. The book does a good job at not only telling the history of the technological developments (which is already very interesting and could have been enough), but it also talks about the cultural, political and economical ramifications of said developments. I particularly enjoyed the chapters about the adoption of the metric system, which turns out to be less of a practical no-brainer as I thought, and more of a political move to benefit certain classes (guess which ones).

The book starts very strong but, like most popular science books of this style, it has maybe 100 pages too many. I thought the topic was very interesting and I did learn a lot, so I can't not recommend it, but I wouldn't say it's a must read.

Exactly by Simon Winchester

This is a love letter to precision engineering, an area of technological development that the book convinces you is the unsung hero of our modern world. Winchester's passion and romanticism for the topic (based on his own life's experiences) is contagious and it makes even the dryest topics a joy to read. The book is cleverly organised by the tolerance that was achievable at each point in history and it revolves around the engineers that pushed precision engineering forward.

Even though this is the longest of the 3, it's the one I breezed through the most, by ~miles~ kilometers. I finished it thinking that it should be required reading for 1st year engineering students. It is that good.