MEPX
Chapter 10 of 10All chapters
  1. 1How invention happens
  2. 2Ancient technologies
  3. 3Printing and paper
  4. 4Power and machines
  5. 5Medical breakthroughs
  6. 6Communication
  7. 7Computing
  8. 8Feeding more people
  9. 9Scientific discoveries
  10. 10Credit and consequences

Chapter 10 of 10

Credit and consequences

Who gets remembered.

Misattribution

Names attached to inventions often belong to whoever commercialised, patented or publicised them. Contributors who were women, colonised or junior are systematically underrecorded.

  • Franklin's data was essential to the DNA structure.
  • Patent records reflect legal strategy more than invention.

Unintended effects

Refrigerants, leaded petrol and social media all solved real problems while creating new ones at scale. Assessing consequences is now part of the engineering, not an afterthought.