"The whole educational and professional training system is a very elaborate filter,
which just weeds out people whoare too independent, and who
think for themselves, and who don't know how to be submissive, and so on
-- because they're dysfunctional to the institutions."
-Noam Chomsky

New Scientist: Emerging dark age of innovation

By John Moravec | 7/2/2005 | Filed under: Articles, Innovation, Technology

New Scientist’s Robert Adler writes:

“…we are fast approaching a new dark age. That, at least, is the conclusion of Jonathan Huebner, a physicist working at the Pentagon’s Naval Air Warfare Center in China Lake, California. He says the rate of technological innovation reached a peak a century ago and has been declining ever since. And like the lookout on the Titanic who spotted the fateful iceberg, Huebner sees the end of innovation looming dead ahead. His study will be published in Technological Forecasting and Social Change.

…
“Huebner draws some stark lessons from his analysis. The global rate of innovation today, which is running at seven “important technological developments” per billion people per year, matches the rate in 1600. Despite far higher standards of education and massive R&D funding “it is more difficult now for people to develop new technology”, Huebner says.

Read the full article.

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About John Moravec

Dr. John Moravec is a faculty member in the Department of Organizational Leadership, Policy, and Development and the Innovation Studies/Master of Liberal Studies graduate programs at the University of Minnesota. He is the principal of Education Futures LLC; a co-founder of the Horizon Forum, a roundtable on the future of education at all levels; and is the editor of Education Futures. He can be emailed at john@educationfutures.com.

http://www.educationfutures.com/john

Tags: Accelerating Change, futures, Innovation

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