The Next 50 Things That Made the Modern Economy

In our modern hectic age, we’re always being urged to slow down, stop and smell the flowers. Or watch the birds. Or stand and consider the trees. To take in the slow natural rhythms of nature.

And I do. I think it’s good advice. But I also sometimes stop and consider the human-made world around me. I wonder who thought up the skyscraper. Or locks on waterways. Or suspension bridges. Who came up with these concepts that so often form an un-noticed background to our daily lives?

Which is why this book by Tim Harford is a fascinating, eye-opening delight. In short, easy-to-read chapters, it describes how and why such concepts as the SWIFT financial system, canned food, cellophane and the QWERTY keyboard have become such an integral part of our modern world.

In fact, just flicking through the Table of Contents is enough to make you sit up and take notice of a whole range of ideas and objects most of us take so easily for granted: bicycles and blockchains, slot machines and GPS, dams, spreadsheets and mail-order catalogues.

It makes you realise how far our human society has come - for better (spectacles) or worse (fast food franchises?) and just by virtue of describing the things it does describe, makes you wonder what wonders we might come up with next.

I can’t recommend it enough.