Albert Einstein is credited with observing that invention is 2 percent inspiration and 98 percent perspiration. To this can be added the old maxim that necessity is the mother of invention. Most new products, which stimulate advances within a civilization, are the result of invention, followed by repeated innovations to improve on performance or to permit market adaptation. The invention of pockets, added to the clothing of hunter-gatherers, permitted carrying larger numbers of nuts and roots back to the prehistoric campsite. The creation of the DOS system assisted in the advance of PCs to home use. Should cold fusion become an invented reality, it will revolutionize all of civilization with less expensive energy.