That doesn’t take into account emergent properties, though.
I don’t see how “general purpose computers” have always been here before us — many things can compute (one proper, but not too useful definition of a computer is something that represents a computable function by upon giving it an input in a specific format, it will give an output that can be interpreted as a result. E.g. a sundial is a computer), and none of the primitives are unique (logical gates can be made from many things), but their unique composition into a programmable computer is a novel invention.
I don’t see how “general purpose computers” have always been here before us — many things can compute (one proper, but not too useful definition of a computer is something that represents a computable function by upon giving it an input in a specific format, it will give an output that can be interpreted as a result. E.g. a sundial is a computer), and none of the primitives are unique (logical gates can be made from many things), but their unique composition into a programmable computer is a novel invention.