The Evolution of Useful Things: How Everyday Artifacts-From Forks and Pins to Paper Clips and Zippers-Came to Be as They Are.

by Henry Petroski

  The various manifestations of failure, as have been articulated in case studies throughout this book, provide the conceptual underpinning for understanding the evolving form of artifacts and the fabric of technology into which they are inextricably woven. It is clearly the perception of failure in existing technology that drives inventors, designers, and engineers to modify what others may find perfectly adequate, or at least usable. What constitutes failure and what improvement is not totally objective, for in the final analysis a considerable list of criteria, ranging from the functional to the aesthetic, from the economic to the moral, can come into play. Nevertheless, each criterion must be judged in a context of failure, which, though perhaps much easier than success to quantify, will always retain an aspect of subjectivity. The spectrum of subjectivity may appear to narrow to a band of objectivity within the confines of disciplinary discussion, but when a diversity of individuals and groups comes together to discuss criteria of success and failure, consensus can be an elusive state.

  Naturally, the simpler the artifact and the fewer criteria applied to judge it, the less unsettled and controversial may be its form. The paper clip, for example, so unthreatening and controllable, seems easily to attract the admiration rather than the ire of critics and columnists, and appears to be embraced by almost everyone as a little marvel. Who but inventors has thought otherwise? And yet to look closely at this technologically lowbrow artifact is to discover the essence of how even the most elaborate of things evolves. A complex system like a nuclear-power plant, on the other hand, which provides a surfeit of detail at every level and is judged by numerous criteria, including some rather final ones, is a most poor primer on technology. But who should not care about it? Something like a new telephone system is in the middle ground of complexity and consequentiality. Regardless of their level of technology, if the same evolutionary principles govern these artifacts and those in between, then understanding more about any one of them enables us better to understand (and control) them all.

  Is all technology for the better, at least in social intention? The simple answer appears to be no, for there seem always to have been among us those who would exploit technology as they would exploit people. Indeed, just as magicians have long employed gimmicks and gadgets to deceive their audiences, so unscrupulous merchants and worse have not infrequently abused technology or played on the trust of their victims in the objectivity of technology. The butcher with his thumb on the meat scale is perhaps among the crudest manifestations of such deception; more sophisticated versions of the same idea have existed since ancient times. Almost twenty-five centuries ago, the Peripatetic author of the Mechanica asked why larger balances were more accurate than smaller ones. After answering his own question with an elaborate geometrical explanation involving the properties of circular motion, he explained that dishonest dye merchants preferred small to larger balances because deception could better be practiced: “This is how sellers of purple arrange their weighing machines to deceive, by putting the cord out of true center, and pouring lead into one arm of the balance, or by employing [heavier] wood for the side to which they want it to incline.” A slight imbalance in favor of the merchant was magnified by a longer balance arm, and so a smaller device was preferred to escape detection.

  But such aberrations in the human use of technology are no more an indictment of technology than criminals should be of the whole human race. Not that designers and engineers, perhaps sometimes in the service of merchants of dyes and worse, do not make mistakes or commit errors in judgment; they do—just as we are all fallible in everything we do. We all make wrong turns confidently, and when this happens the best course of action is to recognize our mistake as soon as possible, pull over to the side of the road, and consult a map to set us right. However, we all know how much easier it can be, especially in the company of others, to continue in the wrong direction than to admit our error and get on with correcting it. Designers and engineers, who after all are people first, can be subject to the same fallibilities, especially when they also suffer from a technological myopia that makes it difficult, if not impossible, for them to focus on several levels of a design problem. A technologically savvy and understanding public is the best check on errant design.

  The adaptability of humans to the imperfections of artifacts is perhaps the final determinant in establishing the ultimate form of so many of the things we use, even if with a cursed affection. For all of Russell Baker’s griping about a new telephone system, he no doubt eventually adapted to it and perhaps even came to appreciate (without writing about) at least some of the features he once thought so awkward and inscrutable. It is not so much that technology marches inexorably forward and that we risk being left behind if we do not fall into step. Rather, the evolution of the overwhelming majority of artifacts, in both form and function, is fundamentally well intentioned and for the better.

  The very fact that we are so adaptable to our artifactual and technological environment is often what makes us resistant to changes in it, especially as we grow older and accumulate our own familiar things and ways with them. Since old telephones did not have features such as call forwarding or voice mail, for example, we could either accept that we would miss calls or take steps to not miss them. A reporter or someone else who depended heavily upon the telephone could be sure that the phone would be answered in his or her absence—by a colleague, a secretary, an assistant, or even an answering service or machine. We did not need anything different, but when newer things do become available, some of us can immediately see their benefits. The automatic features on newer telephones have enabled even the free-lance person who works alone at home to have in a single phone all the telephone conveniences of an office worker with a support staff and a network of phones. However, it is the generation that is young enough not to have become so familiar with the old, and yet not so young as to be without the financial resources to do so, that usually embraces the newest technology first.

  Whether our sensibilities are with the aging observers of the world or with the up-and-coming generation, the forms of the artifacts that will have an impact on and shape all of our lives are shaped by someone’s perception of failure in existing artifacts. That someone will most likely be an engineer, a designer, or an inventor who looks at things in the peculiar way of the technological critic. If the critic has the means to produce a prototype of an improved artifact, or if the critic has the talent of communication or the power of persuasion to involve a corporate sponsor or an entrepreneur to produce it, then the rest of us may be presented with a choice between old and new. In some cases the choice is usurped from us, for manufacturers can have their own criteria of what constitutes failure and improvement, and these criteria involve profit and loss. Thus, what might appear to consumers to be a needed improvement, might appear to manufacturers to be unprofitable. Decisions to make things lighter, thinner, and cheaper may be based no less on perceptions of failure than the decision to adjust a clock that fails to keep time.

  The evolution of form begins with the perception of failure, but it is propagated through the language of comparatives. “Lighter,” “thinner,” “cheaper” are comparative assertions of improvement, and the possibility of attaching such claims to a new product directly influences the evolution of its form. Competition is by its very nature a struggle for superiority, and thus superlative claims of “lightest,” “thinnest,” “cheapest” often become the ultimate goals. But, as with all design problems, when there is more than a single goal, the goals more often than not are incompatible. Thus, the lightest and thinnest crystal can be expected also to be the most expensive. But limits on the form of artifacts are also defined by failure, for too light and too thin a piece of crystal might hardly be usable.

  I once saw a fine Orrefors water goblet broken when a dinner guest offered her small child a drink from it. The child, perhaps used to teething on jelly jars or heavy plastic tumblers, had no respect for the delicacy of the goblet and shattered the
crystal into a shower of bite-sized pieces. The suddenness of the accident apparently so startled the child that the broken glass just fell from his gaping jaw. Neither his mouth nor his sensibilities were hurt, but his mother was mortified and my wife and I were left with an odd set of crystal.

  The child’s mother offered to replace the broken goblet, of course, and a new one was ordered. When the piece arrived, my wife noticed immediately that the new goblet was heavier than the one that had broken, and all subsequent replacements were just as expensive but not nearly so light and thin as those in the original wedding gift. This gift had come at the time when the Orrefors was made as thin as it would get; orders for replacements came in with complaints of excessive fragility. Certainly goblets even lighter and thinner might have been conceived, but then adults too might have had to drink from them with great care, and washing them might have been a rather anxiety-ridden task. The crystal was so light and thin that setting down a wineglass just a little off the vertical on an uncushioned table was sufficient to cause a stem to snap. To make the crystal thinner might have allowed light to play even more delicately upon a glass and its contents, but the usability of the stemware might have been so marginal that it would have been more often than not left in the china cabinet while more hearty water- and wineglasses allowed diners to enjoy their food and drink without risking the crystal or their nerves.

  If the world of design is understood to include not only things we can hold in our hands and operate but also the organizations and systems that produce and distribute those things, then we can explain virtually every generation and alteration of any artifact or technological system as being in response to the real or perceived failure of its antecedents to function as expected. But since even real failures, let alone perceived ones, are really matters of definition and degree, what constitutes a useful improvement to one person may represent a deterioration to another. There are countless patents for things that have been labeled new and useful by few others than an inventor and a patent examiner. These things have existed in unique examples in only a few minds, drawings, and perhaps prototypes, but they have been no less reactions to failure than the most successful consumer products.

  Jacob Rabinow has related the story of designing a pick-proof lock, certainly an invention that corrected a shortcoming of existing locks. His idea for a more secure lock revolved about a key that was formed from an extremely thin strip of sheet metal, bent into a shape that displaced the lock’s tumblers to just the right positions. Typical lock-picking devices, such as bobby pins, would not work, because their very thickness would displace the tumblers beyond the unlocking position. Rabinow was granted two patents for his lock and key, but could not sell the idea to any manufacturer, because the key looked “peculiar.” He echoed Raymond Loewy’s dictum about “most advanced yet acceptable” designs by attributing to manufacturers the motto “Make it better, but don’t change anything.”

  The inertia of commercial taste may indeed be capable of preventing the form of things from changing too much too quickly, but there are no unalterable forms and many undeniable failures. Whether detected by manufacturer, independent inventor, or consumer, the failure of something to be as light or heavy, thin or thick, or inexpensive or extravagant as a competing or imagined product will institute changes that will ultimately affect in whatever small way the shape of the made world about us. Thomas Edison, whose record 1,093 patents led to some of the most pervasive forms among the artifacts of modern life, was himself caught up in the cycle of technological change that is inescapable. Edison preferred the cylindrical form for sound recordings; indeed, it could be defended as following almost organically from the rotary device that was the first phonograph. When his competitors came out with the flat-disc record, which required a turntable and which would eventually prove to distort sound as the pickup arm progressed from the outer to the inner grooves of the record, Edison at first rejected its form. But when consumers came to prefer the disc because it could be stored more compactly, Edison, who was in the manufacturing business in no small way, did his competitors one better by developing the two-sided record, thus making storage even more efficient. He was not content with things when he saw their shortcomings. As he once wrote in his diary, “Restlessness is discontent—and discontent is the first necessity of progress. Show me a thoroughly satisfied man—and I will show you a failure.”

  The vast number of things that exist in the world today ensures that there will be ever more tomorrow, for virtually every existing thing is fair game to come under the scrutiny of someone restless and discontented who does not think “well enough” is sufficiently free of faults. The reactionary call to leave well enough alone is a futile one, for the advancement of civilization itself has been a history of the successive correction (and sometimes the overcorrection) of error and fault and failure.

  What is well enough for one person may not be so for another, of course. Left-handers have had to learn to live in a world in which door handles, school desks, books, corkscrews, and countless common objects are biased against them. Lefties have to wear borrowed baseball gloves on the wrong hand if their own gloves are at home. But besides fielder’s mitts, and the rare school desk, few alternatives to right-handed artifacts have been even remotely available to left-handers, who have simply learned how to live in a right-handed world. Nor do they seem as a rule to express any pressing need for special left-handed devices.

  But, as we have seen, specialized artifacts evolve not out of grassroots needs but out of the idiosyncratic observation of shortcomings in existing things. Thus, inventors and manufacturers have devised left-handed objects, and shops like Anything Left Handed Limited, in London’s Brewer Street, offer these in strikingly disorienting catalogues whose pages open from left to right and are numbered accordingly. Though some of the objects offered, like clocks that run counterclockwise, provide more fun than convenience, left-handed garden shears and ladles must seem a godsend. A similar shop exists in San Francisco, where an acquaintance’s wife found a left-handed Swiss army knife for him. Not knowing such a thing existed, he explained how he had long gotten by with a conventional model, but now he was anxious to demonstrate how the blades of his new knife could be opened with the fingers of his left hand, and how the corkscrew twisted in the opposite direction from the usual.

  Anything Left Handed’s kitchen knives have handles shaped to fit the left hand and blades serrated accordingly. Similarly serrated table knives are also available, as are matching pastry forks with the cutting tine on the side where a left-hander needs it. Each item in Anything Left Handed corrects a problem or annoyance that lefties have found in using something designed, whether deliberately or inadvertently, for right-handers. This is a model for the way all artifacts diversify and technology evolves, for as things are used, they reveal their shortcomings—at least to some of us. While inventors, designers, and engineers may not always be the first to see the problems with technology and its objects, they are the ones who do come up with solutions. In the meantime, we tend to accept that ours is a technologically imperfect world and live with its minor annoyances. We may even modify our behavior to accommodate the technology, as left-handers have in adapting to right-handed utensils—until we discover an altered artifact to marvel at and use.

  NOTES, BIBLIOGRRPHY,

  LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

  Notes

  Full references are given in the bibliography. Short quotations not specifically referenced are from the same sources as referenced quotes nearby in the text.

  1 HOW THE FORK GOT ITS TINES

  1 For general background on eating habits and utensils, see especially Bailey, Giblin, Himsworth, and Singleton.

  2 “all the tools”: Eco and Zorzoli, p. 11.

  3 “any new thing”: Basalla, Evolution, p. 45.

  4 “scramasax”: Himsworth, pp. 41–42.

  5 “flesh-fork”: Beckmann, vol. II, p. 408. “that they were only used”: Bailey, p. 5.

&nb
sp; 6 “I observed a custom”: quoted in Beckmann, vol. II, pp. 412–13n. “Furcifer”: ibid., p. 412.

  7 “an effeminate”: ibid., p. 413n.

  8 Ben Jonson: quoted in ibid., p. 413n.

  9 Erasmus’s 1530 book: quoted in Giblin, pp. 31–32.

  10 French book of advice: ibid., pp. 24–25. Cardinal Richelieu’s disgust: ibid., p. 52.

  11 The spoon: see Singleton, pp. 4–5; cf. Hume, pp. 180–84.

  12 “knives, spoons”: Dow, p. 34.

  13 “spike and spon”: a lunchtime conversation with I. B. Holley, Jr., introduced me to this connection and provided early encouragement for my pursuit of form in the knife and fork.

  14 According to Deetz: Deetz, p. 123. Cf. Furnas, p. 903; Williams, p. 40.

  15 “split spoon”: Hooker, p. 97.

  16 “zigzagging”: Post, 1945 edition, p. 483; see also illustrations between pp. 448 and 449.

  17 “etiquette manuals”: Kasson, p. 44.

  18 “many persons hold”: quoted in Williams, p. 40.