Wednesday, April 21, 2021

Invented vs. discovered

There are often discussions on whether something was invented or discovered. The following is my opinion regarding all of them.

The only case where you can’t say “invented” is when you find physical objects. Clearly America was discovered, for instance. But it is not wrong to say that Newton invented gravity.

On the other hand, you can say “discovered” in every case where you can say “invented”. So, for example, you can say that Alexander Graham Bell discovered the telephone.

I prefer to use “invented” in all possible cases because it is a cooler word. We admire invention and inventors. It sounds more positive about their achievement; a discovery of a physical object is way more liable to be due to sheer dumb luck.

No comments:

Post a Comment