Engineering minds
Engineering and infrastructure with stimulating and significant ideas in the latest John Browne’s book with empathy for history and place including 15th century Venice highlighting in addition to its trade, ships , glass and architecture, printing centre pioneering the spread of ideas in a Renaissance version of today’s internet and iPhone. L Serenissima was a civilisation that created so much that makes us modern. Browne’s book inspires every society to think big and plan physical infrastructure for the future which few governments and leaders actually do it. In UK history, Harold Macmillan, Michael Heseltine and few other politicians have implemented a national plan to “build big”.
“The impact of engineered structures have on us is influenced by the aesthetic response they provoke; for any designed object, how you feel is part of its function”, Browne observes with reference to designer Thomas Heatherwick. A vision of design was at the heart of Victorian railway revolution and Browne calls for greater imagination in planning and design with better quality and greater boldness. A wizard once said “ To defend a nation you need fighter planes and battleships beautifully designed but to defend a civilisation you need schools, which also need to be beautifully designed requiring huge public resources.
Browne’s discussion of Renaissance “ O Florence, you will have innumerable riches, and God will multiply all things for you”, a preaching by the Dominican friar Savonarola with great imagination to the poor and the young, urging them to overthrow the Medici and all their work.
Savonarola produced a revolution and was sadly hanged and Florence is now like Venice – a vast museum.
“An ode to the ways in which engineering has improved civilisation” John Hennessy, Chairman, Alphabet and “a blue print for future global progress underpinned by the spirit of innovation” Lord Foster, Architect.
Has social media robbed us of our privacy and fed us with false news. The decisions about our health and security and finances made by computer programs inexplicable and biased? Are robots going to take over our jobs? Will we be terrorised by autonomous drones that can identify and kill us one by one? John Browne argues that we need not and must not put brakes on technological advances as innovation and all progress stems from the human urge to make things and to shape the world around us, resulting in greater freedom, health and wealth for all.
Browne who had been head of BP and his father an executive of Anglo-Iranian Oil Company in Iraq. The book is an engaging and stimulating trek through their thinking.
Make, Think, Imagine: Engineering the Future of Civilisation by John Browne, Bloomsbury £25/ $29.95, 432 pages