How does Diamond's theory of invention in Chapter 13 contrast with the traditional "heroic" model?

Jared Diamond attempts to overturn the "heroic" model of the lone genius inventor by arguing that many of the most important inventions are the result of marginal and incremental improvements by many individuals over time and across cultures.

Diamond's example of printing is well suited to his thesis. He points out the Chinese were printing inscriptions from stone columns onto paper with ink in the second century and were printing books by the ninth century.

Although Gutenberg is often credited with the revolutionary invention of moveable type, Diamond points out that Chinese inventor Pi Sheng had made a moveable type of Chinese characters from fired clay and glue in the eleventh century, that Korea's King Tjong invented cast-bronze type in the early fifteenth century, and that the Dutch printer Janszoon was using a moveable wooden type with letters as early as 1430.

Diamond effectively makes his point by putting Gutenberg into a much broader technological and cultural context. Gutenberg's advances of using a press, inventing mass production of long-lasting metal letters with a new alloy, and the use of an oil-based ink are all significant, but we can see that he is no longer an isolated genius, but an innovator in a long chain of innovators. As it turns out, a clay disk unearthed in a Minoan palace from 1700 BCE shows that moveable type had been used in the Mediterranean over 3,700 years ago by the ancestors of the ancient Greeks.

How does Diamond's theory of invention in Chapter 13 contrast with the traditional "heroic" model?

The "heroic theory of invention" stresses the role of individual geniuses in developing inventions. So we remember Alexander Graham Bell, Thomas Edison, James Watt and others as pioneers who brought forth their inventions from nothing. Diamond argues instead that inventors usually develop, adapt, or repurpose their inventions from previously existing technology. James Watt, for example, is remembered for inventing the steam engine, the inspiration for which he allegedly got by watching a teakettle boil. In reality, Watt developed his steam engine from a previously invented model by Thomas Newcomen, which was an adaptation of an engine developed by Thomas Savery, which had been inspired by earlier, European models. The point is that technology seldom develops in isolation, but rather by a process of adaptation and improvement. 

How does Diamond's theory challenge the traditional "heroic" model of invention?

According to Diamond, many of the inventions that have most shaped modern society were not invented to fill a demand. Many, in fact, were put to uses far different than what their inventors envisioned. This is true, he says, of "most of the major technological breakthroughs of modern times . . . ranging from the airplane and automobile, through the internal combustion engine and electric light bulb, to the phonograph and transistor."

When the automobile was invented, people got around quite well in the same way they had for many thousands of years—on foot or horseback. In addition, the invention of locomotives, electric streetcars, and other vehicles seemed more than satisfactory for getting people around. The automobile changed people's lives in ways nobody could have predicted when it was first developed. And after it was invented, people wanted one, to the point that it became a necessity then and now in modern life. Diamond argues that "many or most inventions were developed by curiosity or a love of tinkering" rather than by heroic geniuses (like Thomas Edison, James Watt, Alexander Graham Bell, etc.) who set out to better society. They also tend to be improvements on already existing inventions rather than the products of one person's brain. This discussion of invention is part of a broader explanation for why technologies proceeded and developed differently in some societies and geographical locations than others.

How does Diamond's theory challenge the traditional "heroic" model of invention?

What Diamond says that really goes against the "heroic" model of invention is that individual inventors are not really all that important.  He argues two things.  First, he says that by far most famous inventors did not actually invent something completely new.  Instead, they tinkered with something old and improved it.  Second, he argues that if the famous inventors hadn't come around, someone else would have made the same breakthrough.  So he's saying that invention is a process that is done by building in small steps, not by some genius having an inspiration and creating some finished product right on the spot.

Diamond's argument about the "mother of necessity" also takes some of the shine off of individual inventors.  He is saying that these are not people who invent something because they see a need.  They are not out to help humanity by solving some problem.  Instead, they are just playing around with technology, trying to devise something new just for fun, almost.  That takes away from their heroic image because it means that their discoveries are way more random and way less heroic.

How does Diamond's theory challenge the traditional "heroic" model of invention?

This is an interesting concept.

The heroic model supposes that any invention is a product created by creative and unique individuals.  Sometimes this will be known as the 'great man' hypothesis.

Diamond's theory challenges this by showing that different civilizations and societies throughout history have made similar discoveries - simultaneously without any contact with the other groups.  Good examples might include the cultivation of crops and animal husbandry.  Going further, we have pottery, architecture and later writing.

Does this mean every civilization would have come up with the lightbulb eventually?  Good question.  The modern inventions as we know them were all products of a particular civilization.  Diamond would argue that steel, guns etc. were creations from Western civilization thanks to its fortunate advantages in the past.  There is therefore no way of scientifically proving this theory.

I will let you come up with your own ideas and conclusions from these initial ideas.  Hope that helps