Diversity#
See also: distribution
Joseph Heinrich#
Podcast interview with Ezra Klein
Yeah. So my story is that most ideas are recombinations of existing ideas already circulating in the cultural milieu. So the more diverse minds are able to interact and share ideas, the more likely you are to create novel recombinations and lead to the diffusion of ideas. Even the famous geniuses like Einstein, if you look at special relativity, it’s a combination of a set of ideas that others were in the process of putting together, and he just happened to be the first guy to really congeal them together.
Proceeds to describe data that shows
- all patents are actually combinations of existing technologies.
- larger cities...tend to produce more patents per capita.
- spread of Starbucks seems to energize patenting
References#
Henrich, J., & Muthukrishna, M. (n.d.). What Makes Us Smart? Topics in Cognitive Science, n/a(n/a). https://doi.org/10.1111/tops.12656