Lucas Blogs About How to Invent Everything

Huh, it's like a textbook about everything for grown-ups who aren't enrolled in a class.

So, what's this book's deal?

You remember those books from when you were a kid that explain how things work?

Of course.

So, this book is kinda like that but for grown-ups. It's sort of a wide-ranging guide to the basics of science, technology, art, and philosophy (various philosophical schools are pithily described by their attitudes toward high fives). Oh, and it's also a work of science-fiction.

So it's non-fiction and science fiction?
Yeah. The subtitle is "A Survival Guide for the Stranded Time Traveler." The author, Ryan North, has an introductory note explaining that he found the text embedded in Pre-Cambrian rock, and that it appears to have been written by one Ryan North, a technical writer from a different timestream. The text itself claims to be a repair manual for an FC3000™rental time machine. Only the thing is, when you open up the section about repairing your rented FC3000™, there's just an apology explaining that you're stuck in the past forever.

This does not sound like the text you have described.

No, but the remainder of the book explains how you can become the most consequential individual in human history by reinventing the world you left behind. North breaks down the five technologies he deems necessary for recreating the modern world (spoken language, written language, non-sucky numbers, the scientific method, and a calorie surplus) and shows how you can use those as a starting point to invent pretty much everything else (assuming you've been stranded at some point in the past when modern humans existed).

When you say pretty much everything else . . .

Well, more like, puts you on the path to inventing other things. Like, there are instructions for how to make charcoal and how you can use that to make pig iron which you can forge into useable steel. So, while it gives you the basics for starting out, the rest of it is on you (or the society you build). And it's like that for pretty much the entire human technological tree. The text provides the basic foundational knowledge you'll need for things as diverse as first aid, music theory, engineering, mathematics, and logic, without getting bogged down in technical jargon that would hinder the layman from understanding and enjoying the book.

Really? Enjoyment? From a technical manual?

Well, I would hope that I've made clear that this is not a technical manual, it's more of, let's be honest, a textbook with jokes. The point is to teach you something while making you laugh. And this book definitely made me LOL several times. Partly this is due to the style. North adopts a chummy, conversational tone throughout, and takes every opportunity to dunk on humanity for our seeming inability to make the simple cognitive leaps necessary to invention.

But isn't that just a modern bias against our ancestors? Ancient humans were actually pretty smart. F'r'instance, did you know that ancient Greeks invented a steam engine?

Yes, North mentions that when telling you how to invent it. Except the ancient Greeks did fuck all with their invention. They thought of it as a fun novelty when they could have been harnessing that power to do work. Besides, the tone is more joshing than serious (except when human stupidity was costing lives, like when doctors were actively spreading disease by not washing their hands). But humor is subjective, so I could forgive people for not being as into this as me.

So, would you care to give us an example of something that you found particularly educational or to give an example of the type of humor that you found so hilarious?

So, in the section about how to invent soap (you know, to address the common human complaint of wanting to make yourself more attractive to other humans), North says of the time before soap: "you could visit your grandparents and say whatever swears you wanted all day long and they couldn't wash your mouth out with anything."*

Hmm. I guess humor is subjective.

C'mon, that was gold!

Whatevs, anything you want to complain about?

Well, now that you ask, in the Periodic Table in the back matter, there isn't anything important listed, just the numbers and atomic symbols. And there were a few typos, but I didn't obsessively keep track of them so that I could report them to the author.

All right, but would it work?

Would what work?

The book? If I were stranded in the year 3428 BCE with nothing but my good health and this book, could I use it to successfully jump-start a civilization and set it on the way to the sci-fi future that we live in thousands of years early?

There isn't really a way to test for that, but it probably wouldn't hurt. Worst case scenario, you'd have something funny to read while slowly starving to death due to your inability to properly manage society.

Fair enough.

That's the spirit! So who's ready to kickstart their own civilization?

*North, Ryan. How to Invent Everything. Riverhead Books. New York. 2018. p 216.

How to Invent Everything: A Survival Guide for the Stranded Time Traveler by Ryan North, Riverhead Books hardcover edition, 424 pages, pairs well with beer you brewed yourself with yeast and grain that you cultivated yourself and the desire to learn

Links:

Here's Ryan North's profile on Penguin's website, if you're into that kinda thing.

Similar books (you know, the kind that try to trick you into learning with humor) include: Thing Explainer and What If?  both by Randall Munroe of xkcd fame.