Elegant Innovations. Can you beat these?
What’s the most elegant invention or innovation of the past few centuries? I challenge anyone to beat the two I put at the top of my list. Before I reveal them, let me set what I think makes an innovation elegant.
- Simplicity. Little or no alteration or maintenance of the materials used.
- Efficiency. Creative use of natural forces and materials.
- Funcion. Effective solution to the problem the innovation is meant to solve.
And now, my nominations:
Number 2: Ye Olde Fashioned Door Slam Silencer
I can’t find an illustration, so please imagine a rubber ball (about 1″ diameter) suspended on a short pendulum on the inside of your storm door near its outside edge. When your door swings closed from a wide-open position, the ball swings out (centrifugal force) and ends up in between the door and the jamb as they meet. No slam! Just a light bounce. On the door’s second and much slower return to the jamb, the ball no longer swings out and the door closes quietly.
One moving part. Smart use of gravity. Problem solved easily and inexpensively.
Number 1: The P-Trap
Look under the bathroom, kitchen, or any sink in your house or anywhere else. You’ll see that the waste pipe is shaped like an S or a P. The pipe from your sink heads south, seems to change its mind and turn north, then decides to go south anyway. There’s purpose to this apparent vacillation. It keeps the stink from the sewer below from running you out of your house. That’s because some of the water and waste you’ve just used remains in the U shape or the trap of the waste pipe. Better yet, every time you use your sink, the trap is automatically refreshed.
No moving parts. Little to no maintenance with normal use. Brilliant application of gravity and re-use of refuse. Problem solved.
Not only do my nominees solve problems, I don’t think anyone will ever solve them more elegantly. Can you top either one? Comments and nominations welcome.
Peter Lloyd writes Right Brain Workouts for IdeaConnection.
Reader Comments
Nick,
Thanks for the history lesson. I limited the scope of this discussion to recent times, so that we wouldn't have to deal with the wheel, sundial, and all the elegant early innovations you name. All brilliantly exquisite.
The golf tee, I agree, belongs in the finals.
Peter
Posted by Peter on August 12, 2008
Physics/engineering gives us 6 simple machines - the wedge, the inclined plane, the screw, the lever, the wheel and axle and the pulley. These are elegant, simple and time-tested (depending on where one stands on the great creationism debate, these simple machines are either several thousand years old or several hundred thousand years old). Further, these are the machine equivalents to the atom - all other rube goldberg machines since have included at least one of these. In fact, they are so fundamental to our existence that we forget these machines were ever actually invented - doors, door knobs, elevators, clocks (real clocks, not those digital ones), even roads are all made from (or to function like) these simple machines.
If I had to limit my choice, and pick only something invented in the last 100 years, I'd have to pick something that is almost ridiculous in its simplicity. A golf tee - it's perfect in its function, simplicity and elegance. What's more. it was invented by a doctor!
Posted by nick on August 12, 2008
Add your Comment
[LOGIN FIRST] if you're already a member.fields are required.