Necessity is the mother of all inventions - Group discussion

There is a very thin line between requirement and necessity. The quote “Necessity is the mother of all inventions”, says that until something is not needed, we can’t work towards inventing or discovering it.

For:

- Let’s consider an example of business. A business environment goes through many changes. Unless, it’s not necessary, we don’t change, invent or discover.

- Whether it’s the invention of telephone or electricity, because people then realized the need of such things, did they manage to invent.

- Innovation helps you realize gaps between former and invented processes. This can’t happen unless necessary.

- There are places which are suffering from draught and other calamities. This shows that there is a necessity to invent something.

- Evolution brings invention. As and when we evolve, we realize the need to invent something.

Against:

- At times, we invent something and realize the need to do so. Newton’s law of gravity is the biggest example of this.

- Necessity may not be the mother of all invention when it comes to marketing. Demand for the product is what helps you innovate.

- It is all about what you want and not what you need. So many things are invented but, not all of us are interested in knowing or making use of it.

- Perhaps whatever has been discovered until today was not needed? May be we could have lived our lives had we not been used to TV, AC’s etc.

An invention or a discovery is not always a result of need. At times, people unknowingly discover something. The word invention differs in context for each industry. For e.g. there is a need to hire more employees so we need to discover a better on-boarding process. At the same time, we want to travel every month so we should discover a better plan.