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• Necessity is the mother of invention
  Necessity is the mother of invention

  A need or problem encourages creative efforts to meet the need or solve the problem. This saying appears in the dialogue Republic, by the ancient Greek philosopher Plato.
• necessity is the mother of invention
  necessity is the mother of invention

  Inventiveness and ingenuity are stimulated by difficulty. For example, The first prisoner to tie together bedsheets to escape knew that necessity was the mother of invention. This proverb first appeared in English in 1519 in slightly different form, “Need taught him wit,” and exists in many other languages as well.

Necessity is the mother of invention

Cultural  

1. A need or problem encourages creative efforts to meet the need or solve the problem. This saying appears in the dialogue Republic, by the ancient Greek philosopher Plato.

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necessity is the mother of invention Idioms  

1. Inventiveness and ingenuity are stimulated by difficulty. For example, The first prisoner to tie together bedsheets to escape knew that necessity was the mother of invention. This proverb first appeared in English in 1519 in slightly different form, “Need taught him wit,” and exists in many other languages as well.

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Example Sentences

But necessity is the mother of invention or, in this case, reinvention.

From BBC • Jun. 4, 2026

The proverb "necessity is the mother of invention" has been used to describe the source from which our cultural evolution springs.

From Science Daily • Feb. 5, 2024

“Right now it’s number one on the list of issues that are concerning school districts ... necessity is the mother of invention, and hard-pressed districts are going to have to come up with some solutions.”

From Washington Post • Aug. 3, 2022

If necessity is the mother of invention, then perhaps this horrible pandemic can provide autistic individuals like myself with an opportunity to undergo some forced therapy when it comes to our executive functioning skills.

From Salon • Apr. 11, 2020

Mr. Fazio once told me that necessity is the mother of invention.

From "The Sky at Our Feet" by Nadia Hashimi