an aspect of entrepreneurship within They Say It Cannot Be Done is creative destruction. Throughout this documentary creative destruction is mentioned in several ways, both good and bad. Starting out with the possibility of making organs cheaper, then making meat cheaper, then it being prevented in its entirety.
The documentary starts out by describing the challenges in organ replacement and how innovation is beginning to solve these problems. It was very interesting to understand how organs can be 3D printed and all from a small grouping of cells taken from the host. How this innovation is creative destruction is it is allowing for new methods of organ transplants to supersede the old method of having to find a donor. This idea of taking cells from the host to create and grow new organs can also be innovated on.
The use of cells from a host can also be used to cultivate meat. In the same process to grow the cell prior to the printing process can be used to grow parts of animals humans use farms just for consumption. These animals take up an abundance of resources to grow and mature from land usage to crops and materials used to grow them. The creative destruction in this would allow for the crop and materials used to grow and mature these animals can be utilized elsewhere as well as the land. However, there are forces in our society that prevent these measures from being implemented and used on a large scale to assist world issues. These measures are regulations.
These regulations have been put in place by the government to “help keep people safe” are put in place by organizations like the FDA and the Department of Agriculture. While yes, some regulations are needed in this market, the current ones prohibit innovation and therefore creative destruction. This is part of the interaction between entrepreneurs and society since the other part of the interaction has yet to be seen. What I mean by that is that society can't see the value that this new technology can bring to the table in terms of cheaper products and assistance in lowering climate change measures.
This aspect of entrepreneurship affects society since it allows for unused precious resources to be utilized in the best way to provide the most value. The example of meat cultivation shows how we can minimize the number of animals and utilize the land and resources for future innovations that cause creative destruction. Society doesn’t fully realize creative destruction in its entirety, but it benefits them in the long run since the reason for the destruction is that they benefit and value it more than what is being destroyed. In the case of meat cultivation, people still value traditional meats over lab-grown meats due to traditions. The interaction between this aspect of entrepreneurship and society is always a positive one. The reason it is always positive is because creative destruction will only happen when innovation is more valuable than a process, method, or product already in the market.