How would you summarize the work that went into making Edison's discoveries possible? Can it be summarized in the same breath while praising his own achievemen

How would you summarize the work that went into making Edison's discoveries possible? Can it be summarized in the same breath while praising his own achievement? Is it possible that some people use the word "luck" here, not as a mechanism to dilute his achievements, but just as a way to simplify what had been done before he started tinkering? Could you be misinterpreting peoples' speech here? Is it reasonable to ask you to attempt to find more than one meaning to peoples' words even if the alternate meanings do not match the exact definition of their words? Would "fortunate" be an acceptable substitute? Could it be that his success was a combination of his own ingenuity and perseverance alongside the work of others?