It All Started with a Wheel: The Evolution of Inventions from the Axe to the Laser

Are brilliant inventions the result of random flashes of inspiration, or the product of long, painstaking work? Sometimes wonderful things appear simply from the desire to do a favor to one’s contemporaries. With this book, you’ll travel through a sequence of eras—from stone tools to humanoid robots, from the cradle of humanity in Africa to the place where digital technologies flourish in California. Your fellow travelers will be Archimedes, Ibn al-Haytham, Leonardo da Vinci, Alfred Nobel, Mikhail Kalashnikov, and Steve Jobs. You’ll learn how people used to live without clocks and what temperature the first thermometer measured. Why is the programming language Ada83 named after Byron’s daughter—and when will we finally be able to wear clothes made from spray and talk to our pets through a translator? Denis Gutleiben’s captivating, slightly ironic stories about inventors and inventions will introduce you to unexpected historical facts and let you look anew at the things we use today without thinking about them.