(via Tripping into Terra Incognita: How Mistakes Take Us To New Places :: Tips :: The 99 Percent) “In fact, the history of invention is full of significant leaps that resulted from mistakes or happy accidents. Charles Goodyear, while demonstrating a sample of his rubber mixture, accidentally dropped the sample on a hot stove and noticed that the parts that hadn’t charred were strong and flexible, at that moment inventing the process for vulcanizing rubber. And in 1879 Constantin Fahlberg, while investigating the properties of coal tar, forgot to wash his hands after work and then ate a piece of bread, finding it unaccountably sweet. When he realized the sweetness had come from the dust on his hands, he discovered the first artificial sweetener, saccharin.”

(via Tripping into Terra Incognita: How Mistakes Take Us To New Places :: Tips :: The 99 Percent)

“In fact, the history of invention is full of significant leaps that resulted from mistakes or happy accidents. Charles Goodyear, while demonstrating a sample of his rubber mixture, accidentally dropped the sample on a hot stove and noticed that the parts that hadn’t charred were strong and flexible, at that moment inventing the process for vulcanizing rubber. And in 1879 Constantin Fahlberg, while investigating the properties of coal tar, forgot to wash his hands after work and then ate a piece of bread, finding it unaccountably sweet. When he realized the sweetness had come from the dust on his hands, he discovered the first artificial sweetener, saccharin.”