[cheese1756]

It is this experimentation, however, that creates large improvements in the world. Creating a hobby operating system, for example, may seem like a waste of time. Why would CS students spend time creating something only for themselves, when they could be creating software to change the world? Aren't they wasting their talents by building something that they don't intend for anyone to use?

Of course, one of those hobby operating system grows into Linux, and suddenly that experimentation doesn't seem pointless anymore.

A contractor at CERN wants a faster way to share research papers. Isn't this outside the scope of his work, though? Isn't he wasting CERN's money with this project? People can just share papers via Usenet anyway. Who even needs the World Wide Web?

Most people don't set out to "bring benefit to your fellow man." Most people fool around with side projects or new ideas. These projects, which seemingly offer "trivial benefit to humanity," are the ones which make a difference in the world.

Experimentation or invention for any reason (including profit) is valuable, precisely because we don't know where this experimentation will go.

[maj0rhn]

The reasonable upper bound of benefit when designing a new OS or a new information-sharing medium is, a priori, much higher than the upper bound of a new measuring cup or a new dessert. So, this means someone entering those quests can reasonably state that they are tackling something big, i.e. worthwhile.

[cheese1756]

I see your point. While breakthroughs (such as Penicillin) can still be a result of unrelated research, it is true that focused experimentation is more likely to make an impact.

[maj0rhn]

The penicillin story is not what most people think.

Fleming discovered the mold and its anti-bacterial effect in 1928 by happenstance, but this knowledge languished until the outbreak of WW2 in Europe in 1939. At that point, the Oxford group realized the war was going to cause enormous numbers of gas gangrene cases (truly a terrible affliction), and they very deliberately set out to find a treatment. Their research was, therefore, incredibly directed, and, indeed, most of their work centered on culture and chemical preparation.

Fire, wheels, writing, and industrial production of penicillin -- greatest inventions ever.