Paradigm Shifts

So that’s that: Babbage realized machines could do math. Turing added that they could also run programs. Von Neumann figured out how to build the hardware, and Shannon showed how the software could do things that didn’t at first look like math problems.

Parsons’s steam turbine: both had their genesis in understanding the laws of thermodynamics. Consequently, both of these developments are excellent examples of fundamental innovations that appeared for the first time only during the Age of Synergy: inventions driven and directed by practical applications of advanced scientific knowledge, not discov

Jusque-là, l’utilisation de la radio avait été limitée par le fait que ses signaux baissaient rapidement. Avec l’Audion pour augmenter leur force, la transmission sans fil à longue distance devint possible, ce qui permit le développement de la diffusion par radio.

He could remember, too, that as the tubes became increasingly common—in the phone system, radios, televisions, automobiles, and the like—they had come down to price levels that once seemed impossible. He had long understood that innovation was a matter of economic imperatives. As Jack Morton had said, if you hadn’t sold anything you hadn’t innovate