Engineering a Nation with Guru Madhavan

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Welcome to AMSEcast, coming to you from Oak Ridge, Tennessee,

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a global leader in science, technology, and innovation.

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My name is Alan Lowe, director of the American Museum

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of Science and Energy, and the K-25 History Center.

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Each episode of AMSEcast presents world-renowned authors,

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scientists, historians, policymakers, and everyone in between,

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sharing their insights on a variety of fascinating topics.

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Welcome to a special edition of AMSEcast as

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we celebrate 250 years of American innovation.

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With much appreciated support from the Institute of Museum and Library Services,

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or IMLS, we’re undertaking a series of AMSEcast interviews focusing on American

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innovations as part of our commemoration of the nation’s semi-quincentennial.

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On this episode, I’m honored to be joined in person at the National Academy

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of Sciences in Washington, DC, by our good friend, Dr. Guru Madhavan.

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Guru is the Norman Augustine senior scholar and Senior

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Director of Programs at the National Academy of Engineering.

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With his MS and PhD in Biomedical Engineering and an MBA from the State

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University of New York, he was a leader in the medical device industry

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who now brings his talents to the vital work of the National Academies.

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He is the author of Applied Minds: How Engineers Think

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and Wicked Problems: How to Engineer a Better World.

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And very importantly, Guru is a member of our National Advisory Committee,

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and was the 2024 winner of the AMSE Foundation’s National Excellence Award.

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He’s been so very helpful to our mission in many ways, including

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connecting us during this visit with both Dr. Sudip Parikh and

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Al Romig, whose interviews you’ll hear on AMSEcast as well.

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So Guru, it’s great to be joined again by you on AMSEcast.

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Thanks so much.

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Alan, wonderful to see you.

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And welcome to Washington, DC, and importantly, the

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National Academy of Sciences Building, which is historic,

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and I’m just so honored that we could host you here.

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You’re at the, “Temple of Science,” as President Calvin Coolidge called it.

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And of course, it was a thrill to take you on a little bit of a

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tour, and I was delighted to see the awe [laugh] that you had.

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And you know, just so our listeners get a little bit of an audio tour here, I

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mean, we just visited the Great Hall of the National Academy of Sciences, and it

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shows how perfectly symbiotic and harmonious sciences and arts are in society.

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I mean, and I invite all the listeners to visit the

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National Academy of Sciences the next time they are in DC.

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We are right across the Lincoln Memorial on Constitution Avenue.

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And the Great Hall, as you just witnessed,

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it’s a space that just takes your breath away.

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And I’ve worked here for many years, and I feel exactly the same as

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I felt the very first time when I came here on a fellowship here.

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You know, there’s some fascinating history here.

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The architect Bertram Goodhue, he took a chance on a

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relatively unknown muralist named Hildreth Meière and gave

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her her first big break to decorate this incredible space.

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So, the dome tells the story of science as people understood it back in 1922.

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And at the center of the dome is the Sun, which is

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surrounded by symbols of eight planets they knew back then.

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So, Pluto is not in that list [laugh]

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Around those planets mirror painted eight figures representing different

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branches of sciences, from astronomy to chemistry to geology to zoology,

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and there’s this powerful inscription running around the edge, which

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captures the spirit of science, “Pilot of industry, conqueror of

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disease, multiplier of the harvest, explorer of the universe, revealer of

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nature’s laws, eternal guide to truth.” And I was told that originally,

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instead of, “Conqueror of disease,” the phrase was, “Healer of the

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sick,” but I’m glad that they focused on prevention [laugh] rather than

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treatment, so I think that’s also a little bit of a foresight there.

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They also made sure to honor the great scientific institutions

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of history that the National Academies borrowed from.

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And there are emblems of the French Academy of Sciences, the Lincean

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Academy of Rome, the Museum of Alexandria, and the Royal Society of London.

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And the pendulum that you saw, that was hanging

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from the ceiling, that’s a Foucault pendulum.

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The originals are in Paris.

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It actually shows the Earth’s rotation.

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If you watch it swing throughout the day, and I’ve done that once or

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twice, its path seems to change on its own, just as our planet spins.

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So, it’s a very therapeutic experience, even as it is a scientific one.

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And of course, you are struck by the incredible

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mural of Prometheus on the north wall.

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The artist was Albert Herter, who created a version

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where Prometheus and Athena swiped the divine fire from

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Helios’s sun chariot to give humans a gift of knowledge.

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Herter really did his homework.

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I mean, you see how accurately he gets the ancient Greek and Egyptian

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artistic traditions in that portrait, so he was very impressive.

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And now, of course, we are sitting in the historic boardroom, and you

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see another stunning portrait by Herter from 1924, exactly a century ago.

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This group portrait, completely fictional, depicts President

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Abraham Lincoln on March 3, 1863, where he’s signing

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legislation to create the National Academy of Sciences.

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So, if you look at the prominent figures from left to right, you see Benjamin

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Pierce, who was a librarian of Harvard University at that time; you see

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Engineer Alexander Bache, who was a superintendent of the US coastal survey.

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It was incredible, he did some of the earliest coastal surveys and also studied

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possibilities for coastal fortification and so forth, real practical work.

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You see Joseph Henry, then the secretary of the Smithsonian

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Institution and a brilliant scientist, and he laid the

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foundation for electromagnetics, independent of Maxwell.

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So, the last name Henry is, of course, the unit of electrical inductance [laugh]

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. Louis Agassiz, who, again, from Harvard; Then you have Lincoln; you have Senator

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Henry Wilson from Massachusetts; and then you have Admiral Charles Davis, who

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was with the US Naval Observatory; and then you have astronomer Benjamin Gould.

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So, here you have a bunch of people who are creating

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an institution that was born out of a crisis.

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So, the organization was founded in 1863 during the heart

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of the Civil War, and it was created to address some

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urgent military and technological challenges of the time.

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So, there’s an engineering origin for this Science Academy.

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Lincoln, too, from a technological angle, is very interesting.

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He was and he—I think he’s still—the only US president to hold a patent.

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And he invented a device, I think, in the

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1840s to lift river boats over shallow waters.

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And so, here is a patent holder, who becomes a wartime president, and

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faces an engineering crisis [laugh] . So, this kind of, this deep,

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practical focus shapes the National Academy of Sciences mission.

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We were homeless since we were created back in 1863 till the 1920s.

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So, we just had meetings around the country.

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And I think they first met at a chapel at New York University.

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I think in the 1870s, DC is chosen as a headquarter city.

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And then in Fall 1922, they laid the cornerstone, and

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then the building is publicly dedicated in April 1924.

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So, this year, we’re also celebrating the 100th anniversary of this building.

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And we are very proud of it, and we invite everyone to come visit

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us because it is their scientific academy [laugh] in this country.

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Every step along the way in the tour today, Guru, from

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outside, throughout the building, I was overwhelmed.

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Everywhere you look, are symbols of science

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and of progress inspiring us along the way.

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And we’re going to post some of this, some photos on our website.

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Specifically, Lincoln is looking down at me right now as we record this.

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You know, I have a great affection for Abraham Lincoln, and as you said,

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Guru, that act was signed in the middle of a civil war, and to think obviously

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there was a necessity to do this, there was a need for that practical

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engineering, but there’s also a great hope and a great optimism that our

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nation would survive and that they would have a very prosperous future.

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You look at Lincoln doing that, but also pushing

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the transcontinental railroad, for example.

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Always grand vision for what our future held

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after we made it through that horrible civil war.

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It’s also interesting because Lincoln trusted the

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scientists around him and the engineers around him.

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He took valuable advice.

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So, it was not just they chose to create an organization in the

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middle of a war because they needed some practical solutions for it,

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but how do you also evolve an institution that has independence, and

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objectivity, and impartiality to take on weighty issues of the time?

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And that’s where the visions of the scientific minds

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around Lincoln—for example, Louis Agassiz, right?

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He brought European scientific standards to inform our work here.

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And you know, the National Academy of Sciences also elects

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membership for scientific excellence, and he established a strict

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membership criteria, and excellence was just non-negotiable for him.

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He was a purist and he was a perfectionist on that matter.

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I’m glad that those strict standards were set up, up front.

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Alexander Bache, he actually is Benjamin Franklin’s great-grandson, and

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he created a model in which scientific organization such as ours works

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to support the federal government on matters that they find perplexing.

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And sometimes we also tell the government what they don’t like to hear.

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And I think that is the value of independence

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here, which is balanced with public service.

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And Joseph Henry, a very important personality when it comes to the

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National Academies, he actually started as a skeptic because he was

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worried about potential political interference in our work, but then

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eventually he, himself as the president, transformed the Academies,

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and he built protocols to protect scientific integrity of our work.

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And he, I think, over time, helped create an

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independent framework that still guides our work.

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There are these influences that are worth observing here.

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Do we call this foresight?

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I mean, how do you create an organization 160 years later?

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I mean, you have to look back and see what were these founders thinking,

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and where do we go through states of great uncertainty and so forth.

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So, I think it’s worth reflecting.

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I think these anniversaries are good points for us to reflect on.

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And of course, the United States is going to be 250 years old,

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and I’m delighted to be having that conversation with you.

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I know in our previous discussion with Sudip Parikh, we talked about

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that moving into the future, he referenced the Bush Report right

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after World War II, of looking at the future of science in America.

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I’m trying to remember the name of the report now.

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That will come to me—

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Vannevar Bush, ‘The Endless Frontier.’

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“Endless Frontier,” thank you.

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You know this, Guru.

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Of course you know this.

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But how that was a very important report, but also it’s changed so much

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as we’ve gone forward because things have happened that we could not

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have envisioned, that we’ve progressed in ways that were not envisioned.

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I think that’s going to be certainly part of the story as we move

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forward in all areas of science and engineering in the next 250 years.

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How do you set, then, those principles when you’re setting up something

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like the National Academies, or a plan for, you know, the nation moving

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forward, how do you set that up to still be valid in some way at that time?

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I think part of that’s just underlying principles of things like

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non-interference of scientific and engineering integrity, those types of things.

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Yeah, Vannevar Bush, it’s interesting, he titled the book Science:

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The Endless Frontier, but he was an engineer by background.

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He was a former dean of engineering at MIT.

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I’d like to point this out because I think, in this way, we were all, I

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think engineering, I think, as we have talked about in a prior conversation,

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engineering is, I think, one of the earliest, maybe even the original,

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cultural choice that we took, even before scientific frameworks were available.

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And engineering has enabled sciences in a significant way.

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And this is evident even in the earliest stages of the technical work,

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that the National Academies were commissioned by the federal government.

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And we talked about the founding during, kind of, the war time here, and one

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of the earliest projects that we did, maybe the first one or two projects we

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did was when the United States was facing, let’s call it the Ironclad Crisis,

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okay, when iron-hulled warships really wreaked havoc on magnetic compasses.

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And this was the transition time from wooden ships to iron ships, right?

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So, there were critical navigation issues

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during active civil war operations, right?

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I mean, if you can’t navigate, you can’t fight.

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I mean, that was a real practical problem, and the engineers were

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[laugh] held to task, and they were really struggling with this.

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And there were a lot of amateur solutions.

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Now, we can say that retrospectively because they tried to come up

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with some casings to protect the compasses, but they all failed.

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And this was a very important technical problem,

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and the Academies were consulted for advice.

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So NAS, as it still does, the National Academies, we do a broad ranging

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survey of the current state of affairs, and at that time, they studied all

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of the iron ship experiences and designs abroad, carefully analyzed what

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are the technical possibilities, weighed alternatives, did the trade-offs

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and analysis, and they came to a recommendation that we need to precisely

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position what they call compensating magnets to alleviate the interference.

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Then that led to an application, too.

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So, they successfully fixed navigation on, like,

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oh about 27 vessels across major shipyards.

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So, this was a real practical problem that the

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Academies just jumped right in and to provide advice on.

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A year later, 1864, the Surgeon General asked us to provide

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advice on developing reliable purity tests for whiskey.

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Thank you for that effort, Guru [laugh]

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.
[laugh] . I was not personally involved in this, as a—here, and then

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the investigation revealed that complex age testing for alcohol was

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just impossible with the science of that day, but they suggested some

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simple tests that could easily spot common adulterants in whiskey.

235
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And I think the Academies even gave back the money.

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I think at that point the federal government gave us, like, $3,500 or

237
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something, which comes down to, what, $75,000 in modern worth here.

238
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So, talk about fiscal responsibility and scientific advice going hand-in-hand.

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But another interesting political thing, I think it may have been very

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controversial back then—I can only imagine—is the Academies, I think,

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a couple years later, recommended a comprehensive plan for adopting

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metric system in America, and that included detailed technical standards,

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distribution systems and also how they would implement over many phases.

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So, this all started because the Academy was working on weights and measures.

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So, that kind of led them to this metric system debate, and a

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committee established standardized measurements that became very

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crucial for commerce, scientific research, and also commercial trade.

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They made sure that the measurements were consistent across state lines.

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Imagine, measurements differing across states, and how

250
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do you make them compatible with international standards?

251
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So, huge problem, foundational problem.

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I think, several years later, based on the Academy’s

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recommendations, the United States became the first signatory

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to a 18-nation treaty on international standardization.

255
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And this, of course, established common practices for scientific

256
00:16:00,320 --> 00:16:04,009
and commercial measurements, but ironically, US remained the one

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of the nations that didn’t adopt the metric system, eventually.

258
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And then I think the history takes on very interesting dimensions overall.

259
00:16:11,459 --> 00:16:15,930
And because the Academies, the National Academy of Sciences as it was

260
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originally created, led to the creation of the National Research Council

261
00:16:20,220 --> 00:16:23,949
as we call it, which is now known as the National Academies of Sciences,

262
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Engineering and Medicine, when the other two Academies were founded later.

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This was in 1916 and the National Research Council, or NRC, became the Academy’s

264
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operational arm to conduct studies, and they did analysis on a whole range of

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subjects, like submarine detection technologies—and this is all during, like,

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World War I—then military aviation, Battlefield care, so military medicine,

267
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essentially, chemical warfare, military communications, a lot of really, you

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can see the engineering, military, and scientific advice thing at a nexus here.

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And during the inter-war period, and that’s between one and two,

270
00:17:04,339 --> 00:17:08,270
so the Academy is significantly expanded in scope and influence.

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We established fellowship programs, we have many scientific divisions

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and committees that still exist, we increased our focus on industrial

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research, substantial involvement in social sciences, and that

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kind of ties in with also the Vannevar Bush model that comes in.

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So, there’s some overlap there, international scientific cooperation.

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And it became a principal Scientific Advisor to the US government.

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In World War II and Cold War, right—so we are in the 1940s to ’70s—did major

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work advising the Manhattan Project: radar, material sciences, medical research,

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operations research, all of those works have direct connection to our work here.

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And then it was in the 1960s the National Academy of Engineering

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was formed with an exclusive focus on engineering, six years later.

282
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What is now the National Academy of Medicine, then called the Institute

283
00:17:57,840 --> 00:18:01,990
of Medicine, was formed, and then the Academy substantially expanded work

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in environmental sciences, international security issues, climate work,

285
00:18:06,940 --> 00:18:11,000
computational technologies, and my own technical work at the National Academies

286
00:18:11,980 --> 00:18:17,020
relating to vaccine development, prescription drugs, and big-ticket healthcare

287
00:18:17,020 --> 00:18:21,590
items like cancer control and so forth, they all over time have kept up.

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And we now have programs studying demographic shifts, human rights,

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00:18:27,170 --> 00:18:32,129
pandemic preparedness, also on revitalizing the Gulf region.

290
00:18:32,420 --> 00:18:37,310
So, think of anything and everything relating to science,

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00:18:37,570 --> 00:18:40,790
engineering, and medicine, we do it here at the National Academies.

292
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And of course, we just walked past four different colloquiums

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on four very different subjects, and that is just a

294
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pretty normal afternoon for us here at the Academies.

295
00:18:49,359 --> 00:18:51,170
[laugh] . I was going to ask, is that normal?

296
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Because it’s a very busy place today.

297
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It is.

298
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And I think we operate in two different buildings here in DC.

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We are in the older building on Constitution Avenue.

300
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We also have another center called the Keck Center

301
00:19:03,679 --> 00:19:06,349
in the judiciary square, near the Chinatown area.

302
00:19:06,500 --> 00:19:10,799
And we have about 1400 staff members, bulk of them work

303
00:19:10,799 --> 00:19:14,370
from the other building, and far more meetings happen there.

304
00:19:14,370 --> 00:19:20,280
And we also have a phenomenal cultural program that brings together artists,

305
00:19:20,280 --> 00:19:25,969
scientists, historians, and they organize programs of general interest as well.

306
00:19:26,000 --> 00:19:29,509
So, we take a deep role in local community engagement as well.

307
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And you mentioned artists.

308
00:19:31,390 --> 00:19:34,050
Hallway after hallway, room after room here, decorated

309
00:19:34,050 --> 00:19:37,665
with amazing exhibits of art, a real connection with what

310
00:19:37,900 --> 00:19:40,430
we would call the STEAM world, putting the A in STEM.

311
00:19:40,430 --> 00:19:41,890
Can you tell us about that?

312
00:19:42,080 --> 00:19:45,269
I think it goes back to the famous saying, Arts and Sciences being

313
00:19:45,280 --> 00:19:50,070
branches of the same tree, and I think how they form and inform the other.

314
00:19:50,450 --> 00:19:54,129
By excluding arts, and of course, I mean you can only think of the

315
00:19:54,130 --> 00:19:59,640
culture that we will be living in, [laugh] and again, also without science

316
00:20:00,210 --> 00:20:03,819
informing the humanistic dimensions, we are also left deficient here.

317
00:20:04,080 --> 00:20:07,050
So, we take that synergy very seriously, very directly,

318
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that at least has personally influenced my own work,

319
00:20:09,560 --> 00:20:12,879
and my own writing, and thinking on these subjects.

320
00:20:12,930 --> 00:20:16,130
Really, really exciting and impressive how that’s done here.

321
00:20:16,370 --> 00:20:19,360
Let’s get into the role of the National Academies

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00:20:19,360 --> 00:20:21,370
in our topic of the day, and that’s innovation.

323
00:20:21,400 --> 00:20:24,930
How specifically have the National Academies

324
00:20:25,000 --> 00:20:26,800
supported and encouraged innovation?

325
00:20:27,170 --> 00:20:30,510
We have produced reports after reports, and in fact, some of the examples

326
00:20:30,510 --> 00:20:36,120
that I gave earlier, whether it is military technologies or geospatial imaging

327
00:20:36,259 --> 00:20:41,070
or even advising NASA on how to conduct missions and so forth, pretty much

328
00:20:41,119 --> 00:20:48,050
every aspect of our scientific work is toward guiding American innovation.

329
00:20:48,090 --> 00:20:50,860
In fact, we also live in a very competitive world.

330
00:20:50,880 --> 00:20:55,170
Other countries have learned significantly from the American innovation

331
00:20:55,179 --> 00:21:00,620
ecosystem and are proving to be a competition, but it’s also collaborative in

332
00:21:00,620 --> 00:21:04,990
a way because we cannot just isolate ourselves from the rest of the world here.

333
00:21:04,990 --> 00:21:10,840
So, we are living in a time where innovation itself proves to be kind of

334
00:21:11,220 --> 00:21:16,840
a vital concept for our lives, but also for our societal cohesion here.

335
00:21:17,240 --> 00:21:22,510
I think, so every report that we publish on any subject matter, allows you

336
00:21:22,510 --> 00:21:27,750
to kind of zoom in and zoom out on that subject, if we want to do that.

337
00:21:28,139 --> 00:21:32,800
So, the Academies really are promoters of science, engineering, and

338
00:21:32,800 --> 00:21:37,290
medicine, and therefore the innovation, and the related functions that

339
00:21:37,330 --> 00:21:43,150
we sometimes forget [laugh] in the process of doing innovation, or maybe

340
00:21:43,390 --> 00:21:47,450
we exclude, deliberately or unconsciously, in the name of innovation.

341
00:21:47,450 --> 00:21:50,379
And I think we need to think carefully about that, too.

342
00:21:50,700 --> 00:21:54,679
Innovation is a means to achieve greater good, but that alone

343
00:21:54,869 --> 00:21:59,210
isn’t going to be helpful because it is still done by, let’s say,

344
00:21:59,510 --> 00:22:02,880
a small fraction of people in science, engineering, and medicine.

345
00:22:02,920 --> 00:22:06,269
And ultimately, do we want to have a society filled with innovators or just

346
00:22:06,270 --> 00:22:10,060
running around breaking things apart and, like, changing the status quo?

347
00:22:10,149 --> 00:22:14,000
And I think there are some deeper issues that we could

348
00:22:14,050 --> 00:22:18,400
think about, contemplate on, as we reach 250th anniversary

349
00:22:18,840 --> 00:22:21,170
of America, and what innovation in America means.

350
00:22:21,230 --> 00:22:21,580
Right.

351
00:22:21,630 --> 00:22:26,239
You mentioned other societies, and progress being made there, innovations

352
00:22:26,259 --> 00:22:30,199
being made there, and the need to, at times, be collaborative.

353
00:22:30,270 --> 00:22:31,360
Where is the line drawn?

354
00:22:31,379 --> 00:22:34,540
How is that line drawn between seeing that as a collaborative

355
00:22:35,110 --> 00:22:41,080
possibility versus a threat, in some way, to our national well-being,

356
00:22:41,090 --> 00:22:44,700
our ability to lead in certain areas of science and engineering.

357
00:22:45,130 --> 00:22:46,889
I think there is no line.

358
00:22:46,990 --> 00:22:53,189
I think that’s the question here, the di—wherever we draw it, or used to

359
00:22:53,730 --> 00:22:57,270
demarcate it, I mean, I think it is, at least the way I see the world,

360
00:22:57,270 --> 00:23:02,409
it is increasingly blurry, or at least it’s in the border of what Steve

361
00:23:02,410 --> 00:23:06,229
Rayner, the late scholar, called kind of the uncomfortable knowledge.

362
00:23:06,309 --> 00:23:09,700
I mean, it’s the kind of the information that’s available

363
00:23:09,720 --> 00:23:12,680
between boundaries and boundlessness kind of thing.

364
00:23:12,690 --> 00:23:16,550
And what do we do with that information is the question.

365
00:23:16,969 --> 00:23:20,459
Because ultimately, you’re talking about different mediums trying to mix with

366
00:23:20,460 --> 00:23:24,820
one another, perhaps in competition [laugh] or in concert [unintelligible]

367
00:23:24,910 --> 00:23:28,159
.
So, countries operate that way, too, because these are all complex

368
00:23:28,170 --> 00:23:33,104
systems, and we are no longer in the era of just doing a narrow

369
00:23:33,260 --> 00:23:37,350
technical fix, even though such problems do exist in engineering.

370
00:23:37,740 --> 00:23:43,020
But the kinds of science doesn’t operate in vacuum; it influences everyone, and

371
00:23:43,020 --> 00:23:47,860
everyone influences it [laugh] . I think we need to think about this little bit

372
00:23:48,630 --> 00:23:55,170
more differently as we enter an era of deeper connection, or hyper-connection.

373
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And I don’t think we have gotten to that

374
00:23:57,400 --> 00:23:59,960
level of reflection that subject deserves.

375
00:24:00,889 --> 00:24:06,310
And I’m hoping the 250th anniversary provides us this opportunity to reflect.

376
00:24:06,520 --> 00:24:08,770
A good time for us to reflect on many things.

377
00:24:08,770 --> 00:24:13,080
I think… I’m going to ask you now, Guru, probably an unfair question.

378
00:24:13,309 --> 00:24:17,430
Looking back over the past 250 years, what would you call out,

379
00:24:17,430 --> 00:24:20,880
single out, as perhaps the most significant American innovations,

380
00:24:20,900 --> 00:24:25,040
when you look at anything from materials and products to engineering

381
00:24:25,060 --> 00:24:29,230
successes to processes, what are the most significant or perhaps

382
00:24:29,230 --> 00:24:32,139
fundamentally important innovations we’ve made in this nation?

383
00:24:32,349 --> 00:24:33,359
Where do I start?

384
00:24:33,389 --> 00:24:37,010
I mean, it’s like my colleagues and I often chat about this, and then

385
00:24:37,010 --> 00:24:41,220
occasionally I ask a version of this question to some of my audiences as well.

386
00:24:41,400 --> 00:24:44,610
I mean, one of my team members likes to say that electricity

387
00:24:44,610 --> 00:24:48,800
wasn’t invented by attempting to produce better lamps.

388
00:24:49,270 --> 00:24:50,500
I mean, where do we begin?

389
00:24:50,500 --> 00:24:54,909
I mean, like, Harold Evans has done majestic work on this subject here.

390
00:24:54,920 --> 00:24:59,710
I mean, I’ve written about barcodes, ATMs, cell phones, digital cameras,

391
00:24:59,710 --> 00:25:05,420
disposable diapers, human factors in the design of automobiles, phones,

392
00:25:05,429 --> 00:25:09,870
photocopiers, and, of course, my recent book on flight trainers.

393
00:25:09,870 --> 00:25:12,520
I mean, that birthed modern aviation, right?

394
00:25:12,520 --> 00:25:15,260
I mean, so I’m constantly looking for inspiration from

395
00:25:15,270 --> 00:25:19,650
these divergent and ultimately convergent types of work.

396
00:25:20,139 --> 00:25:23,970
But if you want to really look at subject matter type,

397
00:25:24,000 --> 00:25:27,900
and of course, we can get into communications, right?

398
00:25:27,900 --> 00:25:31,819
I mean, telephone, personal computer revolution, internet,

399
00:25:31,859 --> 00:25:36,200
World Wide Web, smartphone, GPS, I think they all, as

400
00:25:36,200 --> 00:25:40,100
a cluster, have dramatically altered our way of life.

401
00:25:40,370 --> 00:25:45,800
Transportation, going back to Wright Brothers, Model T, space

402
00:25:45,800 --> 00:25:50,010
exploration, commercial aviation, there’s another group of

403
00:25:50,610 --> 00:25:54,650
technologies or systems that have influenced our life importantly.

404
00:25:55,300 --> 00:25:59,119
Then you got the material revolution over the past century alone, right?

405
00:25:59,250 --> 00:26:02,860
Mass produced steel, even though with significant side effects.

406
00:26:03,280 --> 00:26:06,149
It got synthetic materials, fiber optics,

407
00:26:06,760 --> 00:26:09,550
composites, semiconductors, and so forth.

408
00:26:09,560 --> 00:26:11,689
So, there’s another group of technologies here.

409
00:26:11,860 --> 00:26:15,700
And of course, my background in biomedical engineering, I’m biased

410
00:26:15,719 --> 00:26:20,860
to some of the incredible life-saving technologies: polio vaccine.

411
00:26:20,860 --> 00:26:23,280
We saw the portrait of one of the Sabins

412
00:26:23,309 --> 00:26:26,940
there outside, anesthesia, MRI, pacemakers.

413
00:26:26,940 --> 00:26:30,170
We saw the book by Wilson Greatbatch in our Member Center,

414
00:26:30,520 --> 00:26:35,520
drug development process, gene editing, mRNA, I mean, Covid.

415
00:26:35,520 --> 00:26:39,649
We basically took care of that pandemic for now with these things.

416
00:26:39,929 --> 00:26:45,450
But I think, you know, each of these have incredible value on their

417
00:26:45,510 --> 00:26:49,429
own, and when they start to interact, it’s even more profound.

418
00:26:49,810 --> 00:26:53,159
But perhaps to answer your question, maybe I should focus on

419
00:26:54,059 --> 00:26:58,339
the process-level innovation that often gets forgotten because

420
00:26:58,369 --> 00:27:03,570
it is kind of the background work that enables this thing.

421
00:27:03,940 --> 00:27:08,820
If you look at interchangeable parts, that was pioneered by Eli Whitney,

422
00:27:08,830 --> 00:27:13,250
or scientific management, even the structure of modern corporation.

423
00:27:13,299 --> 00:27:16,110
The way we look at it, I mean, the modern

424
00:27:16,670 --> 00:27:18,749
org chart came from the railroad industry.

425
00:27:18,770 --> 00:27:20,830
It hasn’t really changed much, [laugh] still now.

426
00:27:20,830 --> 00:27:23,810
And I think good or bad, I think we need to have a debate about that.

427
00:27:23,820 --> 00:27:25,420
Quality control systems.

428
00:27:25,710 --> 00:27:28,820
And this is something of personal passion for me because

429
00:27:28,820 --> 00:27:33,360
I spent a lot of my industry time in clean rooms.

430
00:27:33,630 --> 00:27:37,470
It originated at Sandia National Labs in the 1960s.

431
00:27:38,840 --> 00:27:42,469
It revolutionized how we controlled airborne particles.

432
00:27:43,000 --> 00:27:46,510
It was initially met with skepticism, but again, proved revolutionary.

433
00:27:46,510 --> 00:27:48,330
And pretty much every cluster of technologies

434
00:27:48,330 --> 00:27:50,469
that I talked about has a story like that.

435
00:27:50,480 --> 00:27:52,520
It starts with skepticism.

436
00:27:52,680 --> 00:27:56,090
It’s dismissed even—fairly, unfairly—and then boom,

437
00:27:56,760 --> 00:27:59,520
you see the effects that are more durable here.

438
00:27:59,520 --> 00:28:03,230
But of course, can you imagine pharmaceutical manufacturing,

439
00:28:03,250 --> 00:28:06,940
semiconductor production, medical devices, nanotech, space

440
00:28:06,969 --> 00:28:10,070
tech, all of this without clean room, I mean, production?

441
00:28:10,070 --> 00:28:13,770
So, these are all kind of the—all happened, some of them in recent

442
00:28:13,770 --> 00:28:17,990
past, some of them were present in different forms and formulations

443
00:28:18,000 --> 00:28:21,699
that have led to these major technological breakthroughs here.

444
00:28:21,770 --> 00:28:24,260
And I think it’s interesting, I mean, there’s an inventor’s

445
00:28:25,920 --> 00:28:29,139
view of the world, and then there’s a process view of the world.

446
00:28:29,150 --> 00:28:32,660
And we touched a little bit upon the processes, but I think we’re also

447
00:28:32,660 --> 00:28:37,200
at a time where the way we recognize the inventors also deserves a

448
00:28:37,200 --> 00:28:40,870
little bit of reflection because invariably, one person gets left out,

449
00:28:40,870 --> 00:28:44,060
and one person probably gets greater glory than the other, and so forth.

450
00:28:44,520 --> 00:28:48,960
But still, they are helpful to point out the essential

451
00:28:49,010 --> 00:28:52,930
ingenuity in the work that have led to the [province]

452
00:28:53,060 --> 00:28:55,140
that the United States can be very proud of, right?

453
00:28:55,140 --> 00:28:57,170
I mean, for example, Samuel Colt.

454
00:28:57,270 --> 00:28:59,909
I mean, he just didn’t invent a revolver, but

455
00:28:59,920 --> 00:29:02,030
he revolutionized precision manufacturing.

456
00:29:02,030 --> 00:29:04,189
So, there’s something else going on there.

457
00:29:04,219 --> 00:29:08,080
You cannot just pinpoint only do a single

458
00:29:08,080 --> 00:29:10,570
factor [laugh] attribution to this thing.

459
00:29:10,580 --> 00:29:12,980
And similarly, Isaac Singer, right, he transformed the

460
00:29:12,980 --> 00:29:16,159
sewing machine from a curiosity to a practical tool, and

461
00:29:16,490 --> 00:29:19,149
see what happened: total business process innovation.

462
00:29:19,160 --> 00:29:22,939
And then it was not just an improvement to the mechanics of a

463
00:29:22,940 --> 00:29:27,460
machine, but the product and the process itself are revolutionary.

464
00:29:27,540 --> 00:29:30,129
Same with the Willis Carrier, for example.

465
00:29:30,660 --> 00:29:36,090
He exemplified how American innovation, or the air conditioning, notably, the

466
00:29:36,090 --> 00:29:41,330
work that led to—it began as a solution for a printing plant’s humidity problem.

467
00:29:41,590 --> 00:29:45,080
So, one has to just carefully track how these

468
00:29:45,100 --> 00:29:47,990
things emerge into what they ultimately became same.

469
00:29:48,000 --> 00:29:51,580
With the Edwin Land and Polaroid, the instant photography.

470
00:29:51,639 --> 00:29:55,939
Or let’s even talk about Ray Kroc, fast food preparation, franchise operations.

471
00:29:55,940 --> 00:30:00,459
These are all, like, there’s something going on or the past century or two here.

472
00:30:00,510 --> 00:30:03,630
You can look at case study after case study if you’re still trying

473
00:30:03,630 --> 00:30:07,740
to understand what [went] in the context of these creations.

474
00:30:07,740 --> 00:30:11,879
It’s not just about the inventor, but the milieu that they operated in, and

475
00:30:11,889 --> 00:30:16,300
the processes that supported—that enabled—the inventions that ultimately

476
00:30:16,300 --> 00:30:21,660
became innovations that propelled American economies and the quality of life.

477
00:30:21,720 --> 00:30:23,340
And you anticipated my next question.

478
00:30:23,340 --> 00:30:28,500
In terms of that cultural, economic, political framework, of that

479
00:30:28,700 --> 00:30:33,730
amazing list you gave us, what supported that list from that framework?

480
00:30:33,730 --> 00:30:37,650
But that’s still a, I assume, a debatable question of what has

481
00:30:37,650 --> 00:30:41,570
helped America, from a structural point of view, be so innovative?

482
00:30:41,910 --> 00:30:42,940
Yeah, definitely.

483
00:30:43,100 --> 00:30:44,960
But let me just add one more point which

484
00:30:44,980 --> 00:30:47,919
kind of helps establish maybe my answer here.

485
00:30:48,130 --> 00:30:53,630
Bernie Carlson, the historian—he wrote a phenomenal biography of Tesla,

486
00:30:53,630 --> 00:30:58,110
and he has written papers on Edison’s working method, and they’re very

487
00:30:58,320 --> 00:31:02,629
instructive papers, if you look at them—and shall we call it, I mean,

488
00:31:02,710 --> 00:31:08,020
Edison operated at multiple levels at once—so, I mean, call it a principle

489
00:31:08,020 --> 00:31:11,729
of multiplicity or something—he was testing out multiple solutions

490
00:31:11,730 --> 00:31:17,280
simultaneously, he was systematically documenting things that didn’t work—so

491
00:31:17,280 --> 00:31:21,400
failures, failure mode analysis, shall we call it—and then learning from

492
00:31:21,400 --> 00:31:25,480
those unsuccessful attempts, and then he would rapidly iterate those designs.

493
00:31:25,480 --> 00:31:27,400
So, he had multiple things going on.

494
00:31:27,860 --> 00:31:34,370
But it was not merely an intuitive understanding of the technical work,

495
00:31:34,810 --> 00:31:39,630
but he was also astute in his market awareness, and the manufacturing

496
00:31:39,630 --> 00:31:45,330
considerations, and the methodical experimentation that made him what

497
00:31:45,339 --> 00:31:49,060
he is, that a century later, we are still trying to understand, but

498
00:31:49,060 --> 00:31:52,830
ultimately they all had to be integrated to the business realities here.

499
00:31:53,250 --> 00:31:57,139
So Edison, I think, understood that very clearly.

500
00:31:57,260 --> 00:32:02,170
You know, former member of the National Academy of Sciences, and he clearly

501
00:32:02,210 --> 00:32:06,850
knew that innovation requires kind of the support of the business system.

502
00:32:07,150 --> 00:32:13,240
Patents require commercial application, and manufacturing capability is crucial.

503
00:32:13,250 --> 00:32:15,280
Without it, it was not going to be successful.

504
00:32:15,580 --> 00:32:20,559
And market, whether it exists or not, its development matters.

505
00:32:21,089 --> 00:32:25,730
So, that’s how he was able to very successfully create complete systems:

506
00:32:26,150 --> 00:32:30,830
electric light, power, motion picture production, sound recording, playback.

507
00:32:31,080 --> 00:32:36,110
It’s so diverse, but you can see where these broader forces, as you mentioned,

508
00:32:36,120 --> 00:32:41,300
the political, legal, economic, and educational forces, come into play here.

509
00:32:41,779 --> 00:32:46,890
So, when it comes to what makes the United States special—and again, I think

510
00:32:46,890 --> 00:32:52,869
the anniversary allows us to reflect on some of these fundamental forces

511
00:32:52,870 --> 00:32:57,740
here—the patent system and intellectual property here, I think that’s essential.

512
00:32:57,790 --> 00:33:01,180
It incentivizes innovation by protecting inventors rights.

513
00:33:01,200 --> 00:33:04,070
In fact, we began our conversation with Abraham Lincoln’s patent, right?

514
00:33:04,100 --> 00:33:05,409
I mean, so way back.

515
00:33:05,450 --> 00:33:09,670
But again, by people also get very creative with the patent system, and

516
00:33:09,670 --> 00:33:13,499
we see some complications, problems in the pharmaceutical patenting.

517
00:33:13,860 --> 00:33:17,470
We have this concept of evergreening, where people make very

518
00:33:17,470 --> 00:33:20,040
minor modifications, even questionable modification, to a

519
00:33:20,040 --> 00:33:22,879
product, to retain their market exclusivity and so forth.

520
00:33:22,880 --> 00:33:28,250
So, it kind of presents the dual dimensions of intellectual property protection.

521
00:33:28,670 --> 00:33:30,569
Research funding is critical as well.

522
00:33:30,570 --> 00:33:33,079
I mean, I think the United States government has been particularly

523
00:33:33,080 --> 00:33:37,860
special in supporting fundamental and applied research: NSF, NIH, DARPA,

524
00:33:37,870 --> 00:33:42,760
Department of Energy, NASA, so they’re all major supporters of research.

525
00:33:42,830 --> 00:33:46,570
Antitrust laws, for example, they prevent monopolies,

526
00:33:46,590 --> 00:33:49,170
promote competition, and I think there’s an economic

527
00:33:49,670 --> 00:33:52,060
variable there that allows companies to be competitive.

528
00:33:52,260 --> 00:33:55,449
Importantly, people like me, immigration policies.

529
00:33:55,490 --> 00:33:59,320
I mean, we benefited from higher education in this country

530
00:33:59,320 --> 00:34:03,149
here, and the country has just historically attracted global

531
00:34:03,150 --> 00:34:08,039
talent, right, and high proportion of STEM PhDs and researchers.

532
00:34:08,040 --> 00:34:10,379
Many, I think a significant fraction of the members

533
00:34:10,379 --> 00:34:12,810
of the National Academies are even foreign born.

534
00:34:12,820 --> 00:34:16,530
A significant number of patents filed by immigrant inventors.

535
00:34:16,690 --> 00:34:20,500
Economically, I mean, there’s venture capital system, robust private sector

536
00:34:20,500 --> 00:34:24,940
investments that support startups, new technologies, free market capitalism.

537
00:34:24,949 --> 00:34:27,129
And again, a source of controversy here.

538
00:34:27,130 --> 00:34:30,590
I mean, I think societally speaking, it has encouraged

539
00:34:30,610 --> 00:34:33,250
competition and rewarded successful innovations.

540
00:34:33,260 --> 00:34:36,159
A strong banking, loan systems.

541
00:34:36,159 --> 00:34:40,679
Financial systems provide capital access, tax incentives for R&D,

542
00:34:40,750 --> 00:34:45,660
large domestic market, even, to allow companies to scale their work.

543
00:34:46,469 --> 00:34:50,629
And importantly, educational factors like research universities,

544
00:34:51,239 --> 00:34:55,870
land grant universities, and the sheer academic freedom to explore

545
00:34:55,870 --> 00:35:00,199
new ideas, STEM education, including, importantly, by museums

546
00:35:00,210 --> 00:35:03,860
such as AMSE, and Smithsonian, and numerous science museums.

547
00:35:03,860 --> 00:35:06,549
They deserve—not just from universities, but other

548
00:35:06,560 --> 00:35:09,970
organizations that have an important role in this.

549
00:35:10,570 --> 00:35:15,919
And how the current system allows for collaboration

550
00:35:15,920 --> 00:35:17,840
between academia and the private sector.

551
00:35:18,139 --> 00:35:22,339
So, these are some of the forces here, but I think fundamentally—and

552
00:35:22,340 --> 00:35:25,340
I’ve thought about this a little bit over the past several

553
00:35:25,340 --> 00:35:28,810
years—I think, as the saying goes, “In America, failure isn’t

554
00:35:28,810 --> 00:35:32,820
fatal; it’s feedback.” There’s something about this culture

555
00:35:32,840 --> 00:35:36,750
that just tolerates failure—acceptable failures that is [laugh]

556
00:35:36,820 --> 00:35:41,620
.
In many other societies, failure carries lasting stigma.

557
00:35:42,170 --> 00:35:46,950
And here constructively, we see this as a learning experience.

558
00:35:47,020 --> 00:35:52,960
And I think that just provides such flexibility, whether it is nationally

559
00:35:52,960 --> 00:35:56,140
speaking, how many wars we have learned from, or Thomas Edison working

560
00:35:56,140 --> 00:36:00,249
in his lab, and other garage inventors doing this, there’s that aspect.

561
00:36:00,529 --> 00:36:05,259
Risk-taking mentality is, I think, something to admire.

562
00:36:05,310 --> 00:36:09,089
I mean, not the reckless ones, but responsible ones, [laugh] I would say.

563
00:36:09,410 --> 00:36:12,550
And we don’t socially judge people for failing

564
00:36:12,550 --> 00:36:15,020
adventures or attempting new ventures, even.

565
00:36:15,030 --> 00:36:20,780
So, I think in addition to, I mean, all the economic, educational and the market

566
00:36:20,780 --> 00:36:26,490
forces, these cultural forces enables this nation to work very effectively.

567
00:36:26,490 --> 00:36:31,070
And we just touched on it, we just surveyed a whole bunch of things in this.

568
00:36:31,270 --> 00:36:33,670
And there are scholars who have written on each of these subjects,

569
00:36:33,670 --> 00:36:38,860
but I think this kind of gives the, just, so many countries have tried

570
00:36:38,880 --> 00:36:44,170
to directly adapt the models that are working in this country, right?

571
00:36:44,170 --> 00:36:47,690
I mean, there are ‘innovation hubs,’ as they call it, are

572
00:36:47,770 --> 00:36:50,990
Silicon Valley replicas that they’ve tried in Israel, China,

573
00:36:51,380 --> 00:36:55,890
London’s Tech City is an example, or Singapore has a Smart Nation

574
00:36:55,940 --> 00:36:59,840
Initiative, and of course, my home country, Bangalore, in India.

575
00:36:59,980 --> 00:37:02,910
So, a lot of research universities are increasingly modeled

576
00:37:02,910 --> 00:37:06,520
after the US system, same with industry-academia partnerships.

577
00:37:06,590 --> 00:37:09,460
And again, the emphasis on the full continuum from

578
00:37:09,460 --> 00:37:13,430
fundamental research to applications, even though these

579
00:37:13,430 --> 00:37:15,860
technologies don’t proceed in a straight line like that.

580
00:37:16,240 --> 00:37:20,540
Funding mechanisms, venture support, accelerators, incubators,

581
00:37:21,440 --> 00:37:24,020
combinators, whatnot, and then patent system reform.

582
00:37:24,020 --> 00:37:28,020
So, a lot of countries have learned from the United States, and therein comes,

583
00:37:28,830 --> 00:37:31,780
kind of, the collaboration-competition thing that you brought up earlier.

584
00:37:31,880 --> 00:37:33,090
Now, where do we go?

585
00:37:33,100 --> 00:37:34,170
What else do we have?

586
00:37:34,170 --> 00:37:38,270
What is our next gen or what is our next step as American society?

587
00:37:38,270 --> 00:37:39,270
Something to think about.

588
00:37:39,270 --> 00:37:42,609
But the results are very heavily around the world.

589
00:37:42,679 --> 00:37:46,670
Not everyone could just brute-force copy and paste in their context.

590
00:37:46,680 --> 00:37:50,670
So there’s, I think the United States is still special in that regard.

591
00:37:51,550 --> 00:37:55,400
You think that results from perhaps a critical mass

592
00:37:55,410 --> 00:37:57,420
of all those elements you’ve talked about today?

593
00:37:57,420 --> 00:38:00,270
And I know you’ve spoken of the ideology of innovation; is

594
00:38:00,270 --> 00:38:04,790
that kind of a mindset, a philosophical background to why

595
00:38:04,790 --> 00:38:07,720
we’ve been so productive and so innovative over the years?

596
00:38:08,040 --> 00:38:10,590
Something about the American mindset, or am I

597
00:38:11,010 --> 00:38:13,920
speaking to too broadly and too stereotypically?

598
00:38:14,240 --> 00:38:15,970
No, just let’s look around here, right?

599
00:38:15,970 --> 00:38:19,469
I mean, like, every university has an innovation center—almost

600
00:38:19,469 --> 00:38:22,450
every university; every company seems to have an innovation

601
00:38:22,450 --> 00:38:26,160
officer; every nation has an innovation strategy.

602
00:38:26,380 --> 00:38:31,570
But if you look back a few hundred years, like, 400, 500 years

603
00:38:31,570 --> 00:38:35,959
ago, if you look at the journey of innovation, it’s pretty wild.

604
00:38:36,750 --> 00:38:40,470
There was a time when there are royal proclamations

605
00:38:40,930 --> 00:38:43,310
in the 1500s that outlawed innovation.

606
00:38:43,780 --> 00:38:46,620
In fact, you would be arrested for using the word innovation [laugh]

607
00:38:46,940 --> 00:38:48,090
.
It sounds crazy, almost.

608
00:38:48,090 --> 00:38:56,160
I mean, so how did it go from being a crime to a crusade, [laugh] in a way?

609
00:38:56,160 --> 00:39:00,810
I mean Francis Bacon, I mean, one of the smartest people in science,

610
00:39:00,810 --> 00:39:05,729
right, I mean, he routinely dodged the I word, innovation word.

611
00:39:05,730 --> 00:39:09,649
I mean, he used other words like advancement, improvement,

612
00:39:09,650 --> 00:39:13,210
and he knew that using the word innovation was dangerous.

613
00:39:13,520 --> 00:39:16,900
But now we can’t imagine an industrial revolution without

614
00:39:16,900 --> 00:39:20,570
innovation that’s profitable, [laugh] where progress is respectable.

615
00:39:21,340 --> 00:39:24,580
And the resulting economic revolution is just irresistible

616
00:39:24,740 --> 00:39:28,890
[laugh] . It’s almost like in a Silicon Valley, as we like to

617
00:39:28,950 --> 00:39:32,310
connote to—at least in the past few decades—it’s like, innovation has

618
00:39:32,310 --> 00:39:36,549
become its new religion, we found a new faith [laugh] . In America.

619
00:39:36,560 --> 00:39:38,980
I think we have turned innovation into a national identity.

620
00:39:39,190 --> 00:39:41,120
What’s the trinity in this new faith?

621
00:39:41,180 --> 00:39:45,259
You got technology, you got disruption, innovation as a means for salvation.

622
00:39:45,790 --> 00:39:50,020
And then the product launches, you see, I mean, how much

623
00:39:50,520 --> 00:39:54,039
visibility they get, how many business schools that rely on it.

624
00:39:54,070 --> 00:39:56,090
I mean, startups are basically becoming missionary

625
00:39:56,090 --> 00:39:59,390
organizations and trying to promulgate this viewpoint.

626
00:39:59,720 --> 00:40:01,120
So, it’s interesting.

627
00:40:01,120 --> 00:40:02,069
I mean, going back to how it

628
00:40:04,090 --> 00:40:07,940
was once outlawed, to now it is becoming personal,

629
00:40:07,969 --> 00:40:10,360
even a cultural identity for our countries here.

630
00:40:11,109 --> 00:40:12,970
But here’s the uncomfortable truth here: in the

631
00:40:12,970 --> 00:40:14,850
name of innovation, what are we leaving out?

632
00:40:15,090 --> 00:40:19,470
And that’s something that I’ve been recently interested in writing about here.

633
00:40:19,470 --> 00:40:22,160
If you look at the twin of innovation—if we

634
00:40:22,160 --> 00:40:24,490
can even say it—maintenance, it’s hidden.

635
00:40:24,700 --> 00:40:26,499
It’s actually the enabler of innovation.

636
00:40:26,929 --> 00:40:28,319
Without it, everything crumbles.

637
00:40:28,609 --> 00:40:31,850
So, when I sometimes give talks and ask people what they

638
00:40:31,850 --> 00:40:37,500
think is their favorite technology, invariably answers go, AI,

639
00:40:38,180 --> 00:40:42,849
iPhone, electricity, railroad, and everything, and I go back to

640
00:40:43,150 --> 00:40:47,319
sanitation, which, without it, everything else is irrelevant.

641
00:40:47,330 --> 00:40:49,789
None of those things will work [laugh] . Imagine

642
00:40:49,790 --> 00:40:52,299
if there’s an outbreak in [laugh] the sewer system.

643
00:40:52,830 --> 00:40:55,870
It doesn’t matter whether whatever gizmo you have in your hand.

644
00:40:55,880 --> 00:40:59,409
Well, I will tell our listeners that in my recent visit to Rome, I sent

645
00:40:59,410 --> 00:41:04,740
Guru a photo of the Cloaca Maxima, right, and we talked about going back

646
00:41:04,740 --> 00:41:08,230
to the very beginnings of Rome, the importance of that sewage system.

647
00:41:08,590 --> 00:41:10,650
Even before the civilizations that influenced

648
00:41:10,660 --> 00:41:12,750
the Cloaca Maxima, the Indus Valley.

649
00:41:12,980 --> 00:41:16,249
So, my ancestors back home, then Northwest India and present day

650
00:41:16,250 --> 00:41:20,749
Pakistan, the cities of Harappa and Mohenjo-daro, and how they would

651
00:41:20,750 --> 00:41:27,230
think about sanitation as the primordial, as a preeminent creation, the

652
00:41:27,230 --> 00:41:31,530
city planning, like the grid-type planning, agricultural innovations.

653
00:41:31,530 --> 00:41:35,490
And how did they get that sensibility in a pre-zero society, when

654
00:41:35,490 --> 00:41:39,669
now everything is quantified, has to result in metrics and so forth?

655
00:41:39,700 --> 00:41:45,330
So, I wish I could ask my forefathers [laugh] what they were thinking back then.

656
00:41:45,720 --> 00:41:50,040
But then we also need to talk about the hidden costs

657
00:41:50,500 --> 00:41:56,630
of constantly pursuing newness, novelty, niftiness,

658
00:41:57,759 --> 00:42:01,520
and what is the social cost of this perpetual change?

659
00:42:01,660 --> 00:42:05,640
This kind of takes us into the arena of doing responsible engineering.

660
00:42:05,780 --> 00:42:08,660
Does one has to create something new only by disrupting?

661
00:42:08,670 --> 00:42:11,480
I mean, in fact, if you look at the origins of the word

662
00:42:11,500 --> 00:42:14,520
innovation, it has deeper connections to maintenance.

663
00:42:14,549 --> 00:42:18,639
In fact, the word has relation to renewal, restoration,

664
00:42:18,939 --> 00:42:21,650
that we now associate with care and maintenance.

665
00:42:21,780 --> 00:42:26,949
So, there’s something even in the very etymology [laugh] of the word that

666
00:42:26,950 --> 00:42:31,680
could be—and ultimately, what is the human cost of this endless adaptation?

667
00:42:32,090 --> 00:42:34,369
We are not asking these questions.

668
00:42:34,770 --> 00:42:38,170
In engineering, especially, or even sciences at large, I think we

669
00:42:38,170 --> 00:42:44,740
need to be probing more about it as we get to the 250th anniversary.

670
00:42:44,740 --> 00:42:50,230
I mean, if you consider the more modern innovation race, I

671
00:42:50,230 --> 00:42:53,459
mean, I’ve heard people talk about AI as a new atomic bomb.

672
00:42:53,459 --> 00:42:57,169
And I’ve heard, I mean, someone compared it, AI is as fundamental as water.

673
00:42:57,360 --> 00:43:01,330
You hear all these talks everywhere, and I don’t know whether people

674
00:43:01,330 --> 00:43:04,700
are passionate about something or whether they actually believe that

675
00:43:04,700 --> 00:43:08,660
is the case, and I think we need to take a very critical look at this

676
00:43:09,410 --> 00:43:13,620
because the innovation agenda is not set for us; it is set by us.

677
00:43:13,850 --> 00:43:17,570
So, I think we need to really think about this and do a very comprehensive

678
00:43:17,570 --> 00:43:23,200
analysis of innovation here because I think with more perspectives,

679
00:43:23,219 --> 00:43:26,309
I think we can become better and responsible innovators here.

680
00:43:26,660 --> 00:43:31,799
Do you think that need for continuing innovation is driven in part—of

681
00:43:31,800 --> 00:43:35,150
course, part of it’s based upon needs of society and so forth—but is

682
00:43:35,170 --> 00:43:39,179
part of it driven on a fear of getting behind, perhaps to other nations?

683
00:43:39,429 --> 00:43:43,410
Or is there a fear that if you stop pushing innovation in certain

684
00:43:43,410 --> 00:43:48,230
fields, then you lose the urge, the need to innovate long-term?

685
00:43:49,279 --> 00:43:50,840
What is driving that momentum?

686
00:43:51,130 --> 00:43:52,109
It’s a profound question.

687
00:43:52,110 --> 00:43:53,120
I don’t know.

688
00:43:53,410 --> 00:43:59,910
But the one way to understand how societies grow, develop, or

689
00:43:59,910 --> 00:44:02,689
even the Indus Valley was a relatively short-lived civilization.

690
00:44:02,719 --> 00:44:04,949
I mean, they went out of business, so to speak.

691
00:44:04,949 --> 00:44:07,180
And so, one has to really think through this.

692
00:44:07,180 --> 00:44:11,589
And I’ve, of late, found solace [laugh] in history.

693
00:44:11,770 --> 00:44:14,910
Call it even understanding… deep time.

694
00:44:15,099 --> 00:44:17,590
Like you know, I think ancient technologies provide us a

695
00:44:17,610 --> 00:44:23,539
perspective, and we can see what kinds of work, what kinds of

696
00:44:23,539 --> 00:44:30,009
systems have long-lasting value and logic that makes sense to us.

697
00:44:30,170 --> 00:44:33,070
How can we better examine these enduring systems here?

698
00:44:33,080 --> 00:44:38,430
And I think that kind of may provide some frameworks to

699
00:44:38,450 --> 00:44:41,800
formulate our next steps here because what is the point

700
00:44:41,800 --> 00:44:46,480
of constantly rushing into new markets and so forth?

701
00:44:46,480 --> 00:44:51,189
I think humans have reached beyond their own capabilities to

702
00:44:51,190 --> 00:44:54,460
consume technology, and I think this is a very human… this

703
00:44:54,460 --> 00:44:57,790
is a very human condition [laugh] that we need to deal with.

704
00:44:57,940 --> 00:45:02,049
So, we need to do our own failure analysis to understand what has

705
00:45:02,070 --> 00:45:07,780
led to this mania, paranoia [laugh] of falling behind and so forth.

706
00:45:07,780 --> 00:45:09,969
And I’m getting a little bit abstract here, but

707
00:45:10,590 --> 00:45:14,649
it’s a question that gets to the human condition.

708
00:45:15,299 --> 00:45:18,730
You think part of it—and tell me, Guru, maybe I’m off base here—but

709
00:45:19,090 --> 00:45:22,590
is part of it the fact that much of the fundamental systems that

710
00:45:22,590 --> 00:45:26,069
you’re talking about are somewhat invisible to many of us during

711
00:45:26,070 --> 00:45:29,119
the normal day, so we almost take them so much for granted.

712
00:45:29,540 --> 00:45:32,789
We don’t think necessarily about sanitation, that

713
00:45:32,790 --> 00:45:35,400
type of thing unless there’s a problem with it.

714
00:45:35,789 --> 00:45:39,980
Is that part of the issue, maybe, part of our job as an educational

715
00:45:39,980 --> 00:45:44,759
institution is to shine a light on those parts of our societies

716
00:45:44,760 --> 00:45:48,870
that may be taken for granted but undergird the whole process?

717
00:45:49,830 --> 00:45:51,549
You’re exactly correct.

718
00:45:51,549 --> 00:45:55,350
I like to say that maintenance is, in this case, to depict

719
00:45:55,490 --> 00:46:01,319
the role of sanitation and care is not sexy, but [vexy] , and

720
00:46:01,330 --> 00:46:03,930
those are the ones that have durable value in society.

721
00:46:04,429 --> 00:46:07,940
I used to have a Motorola flip phone, that was given to me as part of

722
00:46:07,940 --> 00:46:13,420
my phone service, what was it, 20 years ago maybe, and it seems like a

723
00:46:13,430 --> 00:46:17,970
geological blip compared to Cloaca Maxima, which is still functioning.

724
00:46:18,150 --> 00:46:24,650
And some of these cathedrals built in the Middle Ages, [laugh] still standing.

725
00:46:24,660 --> 00:46:29,059
And I think the question now becomes, how do we responsibly

726
00:46:29,070 --> 00:46:33,410
appropriate these new technologies to ensure these durable

727
00:46:33,420 --> 00:46:39,750
systems of faith, function, practice, have greater value in

728
00:46:39,750 --> 00:46:44,679
society, they can inspire us to take us to a different level?

729
00:46:45,360 --> 00:46:48,790
And while we’re thinking about this, I think we can also

730
00:46:49,340 --> 00:46:52,250
take engineering back to its foundations, which, there is

731
00:46:52,930 --> 00:46:56,660
a more inclusive view than what it is practiced right now.

732
00:46:56,660 --> 00:47:00,879
I mean, we unfortunately still drive out a lot of people from

733
00:47:00,969 --> 00:47:06,509
engineering by presenting a specific worldview that may not

734
00:47:06,510 --> 00:47:11,109
appeal to a lot of people, and that happens even in sciences.

735
00:47:11,160 --> 00:47:15,820
And I’m glad that, you know, museums like AMSE and many others in this

736
00:47:15,820 --> 00:47:22,680
country and abroad are taking that on and presenting science and engineering

737
00:47:22,680 --> 00:47:28,620
as more intuitive, inquisitive forms of engaging with the world here.

738
00:47:28,620 --> 00:47:34,360
And you’re right, and I think we need to really think deeply about the system.

739
00:47:34,360 --> 00:47:39,600
And I believe that by taking this so-called archeological approach, right,

740
00:47:39,620 --> 00:47:43,540
where you dig through these technological layers, and we talked about—I

741
00:47:43,540 --> 00:47:46,410
mean, in this case, I mentioned Indus Valley, so I think archeology

742
00:47:46,410 --> 00:47:52,390
makes a perfect metaphor, here—you dig through the tech layers and study

743
00:47:52,770 --> 00:47:57,670
these systems that are no longer in use or practice, and what they did

744
00:47:57,670 --> 00:48:01,490
when they were in practice, and what they led to in terms of what we

745
00:48:01,490 --> 00:48:06,660
now practice, and analyze how these patterns have an adaptive behavior.

746
00:48:06,900 --> 00:48:09,730
Complexity scientists and evolutionary biologists have done a

747
00:48:09,730 --> 00:48:14,459
lot of work in this area, connecting to trends that we see in

748
00:48:15,049 --> 00:48:18,359
natural selection, biological evolution, cultural evolution.

749
00:48:18,410 --> 00:48:23,100
And in parallel, we can also apply those frameworks to

750
00:48:23,420 --> 00:48:27,890
technological innovation and how they evolve and how they affect us.

751
00:48:27,990 --> 00:48:29,320
Very few people are studying that.

752
00:48:29,360 --> 00:48:32,269
I wish more people did that, especially engineers, and I think

753
00:48:32,269 --> 00:48:35,399
we would bring some practical perspectives on this subject.

754
00:48:35,980 --> 00:48:39,180
So, in a way, I think we need to do this

755
00:48:39,380 --> 00:48:42,080
archeological, deep-time [laugh] analysis.

756
00:48:42,080 --> 00:48:42,790
How do we do it?

757
00:48:42,830 --> 00:48:44,090
I don’t know, personally.

758
00:48:44,090 --> 00:48:46,430
I’m trying to teach myself how to do it.

759
00:48:46,469 --> 00:48:48,810
Of course, I rely on a lot of literature on this subject.

760
00:48:48,969 --> 00:48:54,269
It’s a very different form of work than building, let’s say, a robot, [laugh]

761
00:48:54,350 --> 00:48:58,350
or coding the next app that makes my life more efficient and so forth.

762
00:48:58,650 --> 00:49:02,140
So, there are some opportunities here for us to think through.

763
00:49:02,309 --> 00:49:04,830
And we’d like to be part of that discussion going forward.

764
00:49:04,830 --> 00:49:09,589
I know, Guru, you’ve been a great friend of ours and an amazing communicator.

765
00:49:09,690 --> 00:49:12,620
We’re sitting here in the cathedral of engineering, as you say.

766
00:49:12,930 --> 00:49:15,870
We so appreciate your time, your support of what we do,

767
00:49:15,870 --> 00:49:19,070
and an amazing tour today of this very special place.

768
00:49:19,080 --> 00:49:20,120
Thank you so much, Guru.

769
00:49:20,370 --> 00:49:22,880
Thank you, Alan, and it’s, as always, a joy.

770
00:49:22,969 --> 00:49:26,539
I’ll just conclude by saying there’s a Zen maxim which

771
00:49:26,540 --> 00:49:31,519
says that, “Before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water.

772
00:49:32,370 --> 00:49:36,990
After enlightenment, chop wood, carry water.” I think

773
00:49:36,990 --> 00:49:41,110
there’s something to apply here when it comes to innovation.

774
00:49:41,330 --> 00:49:46,220
“Before innovation, maintain what works. After innovation, maintain what works.”

775
00:49:46,760 --> 00:49:47,319
Very good.

776
00:49:47,590 --> 00:49:49,580
With that Zen moment, thank you, sir.

777
00:49:54,630 --> 00:49:57,100
Thank you for joining us on this episode of AMSEcast.

778
00:49:57,700 --> 00:50:02,020
For more information on this topic or any others, you can always visit us at

779
00:50:02,270 --> 00:50:08,660
AMSE.org or find, like, and follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.

780
00:50:09,160 --> 00:50:11,480
I invite you to visit the American Museum of Science

781
00:50:11,480 --> 00:50:14,270
and Energy and the K-25 History Center in person.

782
00:50:14,599 --> 00:50:18,720
You can also shop at our online store and become a member at AMSE.org.

783
00:50:19,230 --> 00:50:22,669
Thanks to our production team with Matt Mullins, plus our supportive colleagues

784
00:50:22,670 --> 00:50:26,509
at the Department of Energy’s Office of Science, Office of Environmental

785
00:50:26,510 --> 00:50:30,500
Management, and Office of Legacy Management, as well as Oak Ridge National

786
00:50:30,500 --> 00:50:36,340
Laboratory, the Y-12 National Security Complex, NNSA, and the AMSE Foundation.

787
00:50:36,840 --> 00:50:38,570
And of course, thanks to our wonderful guests

788
00:50:38,570 --> 00:50:40,410
today, and to all of you for listening.

789
00:50:40,889 --> 00:50:43,720
I hope you’ll join us for the next episode of AMSEcast.

790
00:50:46,300 --> 00:50:49,259
If you’ve enjoyed this podcast, I would like to ask that you consider

791
00:50:49,260 --> 00:50:53,840
becoming a member of the 117 Society, the newest membership opportunity

792
00:50:53,889 --> 00:50:57,350
offered by the American Museum of Science and Energy Foundation.

793
00:50:58,119 --> 00:51:01,299
By joining the 117 Society, you will help us continue

794
00:51:01,300 --> 00:51:04,100
this podcast and our other innovative programming.

795
00:51:04,490 --> 00:51:07,420
You will support the expansion of our vitally important educational

796
00:51:07,420 --> 00:51:11,290
outreach, including virtual classes, and you will help ensure that both

797
00:51:11,300 --> 00:51:15,919
the American Museum of Science and Energy and the K-25 History Center can

798
00:51:15,920 --> 00:51:19,960
continue to provide world-class exhibits to our community and to the world.

799
00:51:20,840 --> 00:51:23,700
Benefits of membership includes special access to video

800
00:51:23,700 --> 00:51:27,920
and audio content, and 117 Society merchandise, as well

801
00:51:27,920 --> 00:51:30,840
as all the benefits of our Atom Splitter Membership Level.

802
00:51:31,440 --> 00:51:33,730
To learn more, go to AMSE.org.

803
00:51:34,820 --> 00:51:39,609
The 117 Society is vital to the future of AMSE and the K-25 History Center.

804
00:51:40,000 --> 00:51:42,600
I hope you will consider joining, and thank you very much.