​Which race has the best inventions?

Or – do we really invent anything?

Different races, same potential. Innovation doesn’t live in our genes—it lives in our environment.

If you have read my book on how to be a Global Engineer, then you will recall that I cited an interview with the rapper Azealia Banks. In this interview, she noted the stereotype that Africans have not invented anything because history is taught to focus on white history (and the associated inventions). You can see that excerpt of the interview below - go to 36:37.

You will note two things:

1. She notes that there are things that were invented in Africa that are often assumed to have been invented elsewhere.
2. She gets very emotional about it because of the effect it can have on people when they are told (even if only implicitly) that they are from a less inventive race.

This brings us to the topic of how the way technological history is taught to you. And how that could affect the way you assume (maybe even only unconsciously) your race affects your inventiveness – or how you might assume others’ inventiveness might be affected by their race.
You can imagine how someone not from the stereotypically inventive race would have limiting beliefs about their own inventive ability. Further, you can imagine how people would assume others could be less inventive if they themselves are from the stereotypically inventive race.
Both above assumptions are anathema to being a global engineer. And neither assumption is actually supported by reality.
If you read How we Got to Now by Steve Johnson and Guns, Germs and Steele by Jared Diamond, then you will realise two things:

1. Invention is limited by your environment more than it is by your ability.
2. Each invention is a result of prior inventions and often shows up in multiple places independently, but under similar conditions.

That means, effectively, we are not the bold inventors driving innovation forward – as we like to think we are – but the mechanism by which one technology provides the need or opportunity for the next.
When you take on this perspective, you no longer think of some latent ability within us (one that could be more common in some races than others) that brings about innovation. Instead, you think of us following a process that is the means by which technology evolves form one invention to the next.
With this perspective, where we see innovation as a product of the situation (including prior innovations), we no longer have to worry about our race – or even our sex, nationality, or any other innate properties of a person – as an indicator of inventiveness. Instead, we simply focus on the processes that allow for ingenuity in ourselves and others. That’s the expectation a global engineer has of themselves and others.
Get the 10 minute audio summary of the book here.