The Elixir of Innovation

摘要

In his famous diaries, Samuel Pepys, the 17th-century London author, described his daily repast: Each morning he would break his fast with a pint of beer or ale. At mid-day, he would lunch on meat, bread, and a pint of either beer or wine. On the way home in the evening, he would stop for ale or hard liquor. Dinner included at least another pint of beer. Pepys's menu was not unusual. Entire countries were awash in an alcoholic stupor. In the majority of the population, this continuous sotting of the brain engendered a lethargy of body and mind that suppressed productivity and dulled creativity. Even a hundred years later, the effects were evident; Benjamin Franklin describes the situation as he found it in the London printing house to which he was apprenticed in 1725.