Nathan Myhrvold, CEO And Founder, Intellectual Ventures

with Nathan Myhrvold
in Current Affairs
on Thursday, May 20, 2010 * * * * *

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Nathan Myhrvold, CEO And Founder, Intellectual Ventures

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  • Comments 15
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    1. mrsolik  01/27/2012 03:19 PM Report

      I was inspired by this guy until I discovered this is one of the most egregious companies in America. This man is a terrible person. Listen to the this American Life story about Innovative Ideas:

      http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/441/when-patents-attack

    2. SpeedSynch  01/26/2011 07:23 AM Report

      Invention Capital is a nice idea but it supports a broken IP model that restricts innovation.

      Accelerating learning or reducing patent life or open source innovation or putting a limit on Innovation to Market, say 3 years, or the Innovation Capital shifts to Open Source may be helpful.

      Cheers,

      Nick @SpeedSynch

    3. GullLars  07/13/2010 06:02 PM Report

      A great video, and a great man. I have little to critique about it other than Charlie interrupting a couple of elaborations i would have liked to hear the continuation of.

      If given the opportunity, i would love to work for intellectual ventures.

      @DavLev: Your arguments contain obvious logic flaws. Requiring proof is not disregard, it's common practice for anyone (except small children) for any serious subject.

      "It looks designed, therefore it must be" is not valid.

      You have also not understood evolution, since you keep emphasizing "CHANCE". "Evolution through natural selection" is mainly selection mechanisms (you can view it as a filter) combined with the random mutation of genes. There is also some chance in the picture, but it is not in any way the driving force in evolution.

      "To put it bluntly, I won't ever believe we might have come from a snail, ape, jellyfish, or pigeon." Neither will any scientist. We do however have common ancestors with all of them, some more distant than others. See the genetic tree of life.

    4. mfatah281  06/02/2010 04:10 AM Report

      Excellent. This is the kind of stuff that keeps me hopeful about our future!

    5. winter  05/31/2010 01:43 PM Report

      Wrote to Intellectual Ventures about a professor Kalafatis from Cleveland State University who's working in collaboration with the Cleveland Clinic. Seems from the CNN article that the professor has discovered a compound that has successfully destroyed 14 varied cancer tumors in mice w/o affecting the surrounding tissue. I cannot understand why the venture capital world isn't beating a path to his door and his work has seemed to be buried relative to its importance.

      I could be wrong. It could be that accounts I've read of his work are exaggerated but if they're not then what is the problem. ITS A CURE FOR CANCER. I'm feeling like Yossarian in Catch 22- absurdity vertigo. Theres more interest in Britney Spears latest album than this. Is everyone insane?

    6. robdverity  05/27/2010 09:45 PM Report

      Consigning the marvels of life to a master designer to date seems merely to lead to dogma disputes on the mechanics of paying homage to her. Which could ultimately lead to its extinction. Which ipso facto says it was not smart (fittest?) enough to survive. A conceit without merit.

      P.S.: G-d is spelled J-e-h-o-v-a-h.

    7. DavLev  05/25/2010 12:30 AM Report

      It's obvious that he is a genius. He has one flaw however,

      his disregard for G-d. He requires proof, and seems not

      to have noticed the design ( intelligent ) in everything

      he has researched. What more proof does he need than looking at nature, seeing the stars, enjoying the sunshine?

      Yes, the brain is complex and has evolved over billions of years. But is it's complexity due to sheer chance? Like too many of my fellow university graduates, he dismisses G-ds work as simply chance, over millions/billions of years. What he doesn't understand, ( Charlie's loaded question about religion being the "opiate of the people". is simply

      answered by reading the bible. The bible is NOT about science. Science and religion are separate. The bible is

      about man's relation to man, and to his (her) G-d. Yes, religion does have as a sub-text, morality, but this is not

      it's reason for existence. No one can really describe G-d, just as no one can really understand science and (in my opinion) never will. Each year, scientific research reveals more to us. Just looking into the heavens and back at the Earth, suffices to prove the existence of a divine power.

      Nothing more is needed. To put it bluntly, I won't ever believe we might have come from a snail, ape, jellyfish

      or pigeon.

    8. esantoro  05/23/2010 11:13 AM Report

      It is much more interesting to listen to Charlie interview an entrepreneur who likes thinking about intellectual questions rather than hucksters selling wares such as Twitter, Ipads, Ning, and the rest of the pablum.

      I especially enjoyed Nathan's view of an eclectic education, which I fear is growing increasingly reserved for a small minority in this country. While watching this interview, I imagined how nice it would be to bring in Michael Bloomberg and Diane Ravitch to discuss how the current state of U.S. education is addressing some of the issues Nathan raises.

      Here's what Ravitch would add to such a conversation:

      http://www.slate.com/blogs/blogs/thewrongstuff/archive/2010/05/17/diane-ravitch-on-being-wrong.aspx

    9. BenCahn  05/22/2010 09:45 AM Report

      It is wonderful and refreshing to hear that someone who has so diverse a interest has found a niche to enjoy life and accomplish so much without having to bore deep into just one thing. Nathan, now that can fund a research team your own to crack the spacetime and matter origin, you may have the answer within your reach. Good luck. Great interview, thank you Charlie Rose.

    10. gotjupiter  05/22/2010 07:29 AM Report

      Thank you Mr Myhrvold for creating a support group for inventors. Maybe one of the best inventions so far.

    11. SkyTopBuilders  05/22/2010 07:26 AM Report

      Stunned…. that’s my reaction every time. It shouldn’t because I see it routinely where these giants of intellect are consumed by their pride; so much so that when they need to defer to an intelligent designer, their powerhouse logic goes out the window. It is sophistry…. Commit it to the flames [Hume]. As a builder, when walking through the woods and coming upon a custom home, would NEVER say: hmmmm…. I bet a random sequence of events over time caused this…. notwithstanding that this analogy greatly diminishes how AWESOME the brain is. Come on Nathan.

    12. SkyTopBuilders  05/22/2010 07:17 AM Report

      Stunned... that's my reaction every time.

      It shouldn't surprise me but it always does when these brilliant men get to a point where they have to defer to the notion of an intelligent design... but come up with the most illogical explanations for one of life's hugest questions: origin. Logic, at that point, is sophistry... commit it to the flames.

      As a builder, if I am walking through the woods and I saw a home, finely crafted by the worlds best artisans, I don't EVER think: hummm... I think a random set of events over time constructed this thing... notwithstanding that this pales in comparison as an analogy for the unbelievable awesomeness of my BRAIN! Come on Nathan.

    13. robdverity  05/21/2010 04:41 PM Report

      Faux wisdom notwithstanding, this kind of stuff (accidentally or no) provides potential at least of providing the wherewithal for (exotic?) breakthroughs that may be needed for survival itself. The energy consuming tools we have to date have peaked with diminishing returns ahead.

    14. charlizecourriers  05/21/2010 03:05 PM Report

      Nathan is only saying the things he wants to hear(aural narcissism). I would like to "hear" exactly how big the piece of change is that he extracts from real inventors. If the fool would persist in his folly would become wise, said Blake. If you minimize the screen and just listen, you may find as I did, that Nathan is completely unconvincing. Blake may be wrong in Nathan's case.

    15. REMant  05/21/2010 01:46 PM Report

      No quarrel with the policy prescriptions here, but inventive and useful as those projects are, they are hardly a solution to the underlying and urgent problems of our time, which involve developing ppl and stabilizing population growth, the overhaul of trade and monetary policies, and our politics. Nor is religion necessarily a matter of icons and rituals, or, for that matter, need science or even technology be. I would think, BTW, those dinosaur tails are vestigial, left over from when they were fish.