Garry Kasparov and Peter Thiel, in a recent column for the Financial Times, argue that true innovation-led economic and social progress is a thing of the past. Ever since the breakthroughs of the 1950s and '60s (jet aviation, the integrated circuit, nuclear power, communications satellites), this country has "discarded a century of can-do ambition built on rapid advances in technology and replaced it with a cautiousness far too satisfied with incremental improvements," the authors argue.
The column is breathtaking in its sweeping, unsupported generalizations and its omission of countless examples to the contrary. Apparently lost on Kasparov, a former chess champion beaten in his prime by a masterfully programmed supercomputer, and Thiel, a co-founder of PayPal, a product of the Internet revolution that has transformed how people pay for goods and services, is the irony of their untenable position given their own run-ins and rich experiences with innovative technology.
To read the full, original article click on this link: Is Technology Innovation Too Incremental? - Global-cio - Executive
