from R&D Innovator Volume 1, Number 5
Loehle is a mathematical ecologist at the Environmental Research
Division, Argonne National Laboratory.
He is writing a book to be called "Chaotic Science:
The Search for Pattern in Ecology."
Greek mythology, Prometheus broke into Olympus, stole fire from
the gods, gave it to mankind and was punished for his arrogance.
If modern technology firms are to survive, they must
likewise depend on regular infusions of "fire from the
gods" --something we call inventions.
What lessons can we technologists glean from the myth of
has struck me over the years that individuals and organizations
that successfully innovate tend to have their own arrogance. This
is neither the arrogance of ability, something we see among people
with outstanding talent, whether in sports, music or elsewhere.
These individuals are the best--they know it, and it shows. Nor is it personal arrogance, which consists of emphasizing
oneself at the expense of others.
This arrogance may be unrelated to ability.
arrogance is the belief that one can, by one's own powers, solve
mysteries that have puzzled great minds.
This arrogance is necessary for scientific breakthroughs. Prometheus, remember, not only dared to challenge the
conventional wisdom--that mankind was not intended to have
fire--he also disregarded the authorities in his quest.
is exactly what a scientist or a technological innovator must be
willing to do. Yet
science is conservative--old ideas are abandoned only when new
evidence is overwhelming.
And technology is even more conservative--many inventions
have been ignored just because the public could not be convinced
to use them. Many
useful inventions that ultimately succeeded were not initially
pursued because the scientist or organization was not willing to
take the risk.
corporations, even those devoted to innovation, an invention may
be seen as risky. It
could make other company products obsolete and thereby arouse
corporate opposition beyond the research lab.
It could force a rearrangement of the research group.
Thus any innovating unit, whether an individual, research
team or corporation, must fight conventional wisdom about what is
possible, what is needed and what is useful.
In other words, just like Prometheus, it must challenge the
power structure and overcome inertia.
his fellow mortals, Prometheus was confident that fire was worth
stealing and that he was capable of stealing it.
The Promethean innovator has this same belief and
all, constant scientific and technological progress demonstrates
that the state of knowledge at any given moment is at best
incomplete or even wrong. New
discoveries constantly prove that we have missed connections
between existing knowledge, failed to find exceptions to our rules
or failed to generalize accurately.
Lasers, for example, were once considered an amusing toy;
now we use them to perform eye surgery and measure the distance to
put this in practical terms, every time a researcher, team or
company believes that its device is about as good as possible,
someone else comes out with a better idea or product.
I'm forced to conclude that most experts are wrong on many
crucial issues and habitually overlook discoveries right beneath
their noses. The key
discoveries that are being overlooked are not necessarily
Prometheus showed, it's not hard to break into Olympus, but it
does take courage.
Promethean innovator, then, begins by questioning every
assumption. What if genes are not fixed in place on the
chromosome? Barbara McClintock dared ask this question and found
jumping genes in maize, yet her discoveries were unintelligible to
colleagues for decades afterward, due to their rigid mindsets. The
discovery of retroviruses suggested the bizarre notion that DNA
could be transmitted between species via a retrovirus, yet some
evidence now supports this possibility.
Everyone knows you can't get blood from a stone, but the
Promethean scientist asks "Why not?" and finds that
crystallized blood in the crevices of stone tools can be studied
thousands of years after the tool was last used to scrape a hide!
grave danger facing an innovator
is that Promethean arrogance, though a prerequisite to
discovery, may become transmuted into personal arrogance. This is
a natural tendency after a significant innovation, particularly
one that was made despite ridicule from peers.
But personal arrogance --the feeling of invincibility that
arises from overcoming adversity --is anathema to the discovery
process. It creates a
rigid mindset that inhibits self-criticism and instills disdain
for outside ideas or methods.
because the next innovation may be
in a new field or even supplant a
previous innovation, the greatest enemy of innovation can be an
individual's or organization's previous success.
For example, in the 1950s manufacturers of vacuum tubes
were busily perfecting their product, ignored the transistor and
went out of business. The cure for personal arrogance is
remembering that the key to success--that "experts"
frequently ignore the obvious--applies to everybody.
Prometheus' fate also applies to the R&D process: in
retribution, the Gods chained Prometheus to a cliff and directed
eagles to peck eternally at his liver.
Today's truly innovative work is often so far beyond the
accepted wisdom that it's difficult to assimilate and likely to
cause misunderstanding, controversy and animosity.
innovative individuals or groups tend to be considered loose
cannons. They are viewed as critical, they "have an
attitude." Because innovators tend to view the consensus as
wrong or incomplete (as they've proven in the past), they have no
use for committees and they chafe under close supervision.
Although these scientists are more apt to make useful
discoveries, those discoveries tend, by the same token, to be
disruptive, unauthorized and contrary to organizational
objectives. As a
result, organizations find it too easy to punish the Promethean
lip service to the contrary, ignoring, punishing and exiling
innovators gives a loud and clear message to the organization:
Do not take the initiative.
Do not stick your neck out.
the myth of Prometheus is full of lessons for modern innovators.
Prometheus was not the three-piece-suit type.
He was an audacious thief, or in modern lingo, an
entrepreneur. He was
not someone who would feel comfortable in an organization with
full-cost accounting efficiency, five-year plans and
He would be a troublemaker, and likely to be punished or
an organization that's lucky enough to have someone who can steal
fire from the gods should wake up and take advantage of that
the modern-day Prometheus will take that fire elsewhere.