How does nature innovate? How does it create novel adaptations that help organisms survive and reproduce? What lessons can we learn from succesful innovations? Innovations in biological evolution and in human culture, from science to the arts, arise by similar processes. One of these similarities is that many innovations originate as ‘sleeping beauties’, creative products that are not successful when they first emerge. They become successful only after a long period of dormancy, and then often dramatically so.

Evolutionary biology professor Andreas Wagner will discuss diverse examples from biology that range from the evolution of grasses to the emergence of new antibiotic resistance and the origin of new genes. He will also discuss examples from science and technology, such as the invention of the cardiac pacemaker and the discovery of radar. These examples will illustrate that an innovation’s innate quality may not suffice to ensure success in the natural world or in a marketplace. Instead, the environment plays a crucial role for an innovation’s success. This includes other organisms for biological innovations, as well as social, political, and cultural factors for cultural innovations. Taken together, these examples also harbor lessons for human innovators whose own creative products are unsuccessful.

This event is an initiative by the Dutch Institute for Emergent Phenomena (DIEP) with the support of the University of Amsterdam. Science & Cocktails Amsterdam is presented in cooperation with Paradiso Amsterdam.