The greatest ever achievement of mankind?

harry Bailey esq · 15-07-2019 8:27pm

Has anyone mentioned sliced bread?

stimpson · 15-07-2019 8:37pm

Your Face wrote: »

The Transistor

I can’t believe I was the only person to thank this post. I guess it just shows us how ubiquitous they have become.

I say that the transistor is the most important invention ever. More important than the printing press. Landing on the moon is great, but they couldn’t have done it without transistors. The ability to manufacturer chips with billions of transistors at a vanishingly small cost per transistor gives us the tools to research and model almost anything you can think of. If anything saves us from any of the myriad of impending dooms we face as a species, it will be done with transistors..

scamalert · 15-07-2019 8:40pm

the man who ate some cheese covered in mold just to find out penicillin :pac:

imme · 15-07-2019 8:42pm

Surviving

JupiterKid · 15-07-2019 8:47pm

Humankind has made so many achievements and advances over the past 10 millenia it is very difficult to pick one out as the greatest one of all.

However the top five in my book would be:

Writing
Agriculture
Fire
Computing
Space Travel

JupiterKid · 15-07-2019 8:50pm

nuyil simp wrote: »

we have a planet in our solar system entirely inhabited by machines, how cool is that?

Yes, it's cool but it will be much more cool when those machines on Mars are joined by the first human explorers.

Wibbs · 15-07-2019 9:30pm

stimpson wrote: »

I say that the transistor is the most important invention ever. More important than the printing press.

While the transister is an amazing invention S, without the printing press the modern world including the transistor would simply not have happened until it was invented. Without the printing press it's unlikely the Reformation would have happened, nor the Enlightenment. Printing gives you concepts like indexing(the interwebs wouldn't work without that), jargon, a massive increase in specialisation which gave rise to more research and more thorough research. Look at how Europe rapidly advanced compared to cultures that didn't use it, including China who largely came up with the concept. They stagnated.

odyssey06 · 15-07-2019 9:35pm

As an achievement... the original population of North America... all the logistical challenges of a new continent AND the threat of mega predators such as the giant running bear.

Printing press is a good shout too but I would class it as an invention. I think an achievement should battle adversity.

Roger Hassenforder · 15-07-2019 9:38pm

Language
Fire
Wheel
Domestication of animals

4068ac1elhodqr · 15-07-2019 9:40pm

Someone from 2030 said it was time-travel, also added as a word of caution, to be beware of Skynet.

RMAOK · 15-07-2019 9:41pm

Anya Attractive Vein wrote: »

Someone from 2030 said it was time-travel, also added as a word of caution, to be beware of Skynet.

He name wasn't Kyle Reese by any chance?

stimpson · 15-07-2019 10:41pm

Wibbs wrote: »

While the transister is an amazing invention S, without the printing press the modern world including the transistor would simply not have happened until it was invented. Without the printing press it's unlikely the Reformation would have happened, nor the Enlightenment. Printing gives you concepts like indexing(the interwebs wouldn't work without that), jargon, a massive increase in specialisation which gave rise to more research and more thorough research. Look at how Europe rapidly advanced compared to cultures that didn't use it, including China who largely came up with the concept. They stagnated.

I thought about the printing press and I guess it’s the printing press of our time.

I agree the transistor would not have existed but for the press, but the press was an evolution from paper and pen, which itself was an exclusion of chalk and slate.

I would argue that the transistor has had a bigger impact on our daily lives and likely will have going forward. AI may well be the next quantum leap.

filbert the fox · 15-07-2019 10:42pm

Pain Relief, anaesthetics,
Just imagine the complex nature of surgery today without anaesthetics

Radio.

A much underrated achievement we all listen to daily.

mr_edge_to_you · 15-07-2019 10:43pm

Chocolate Kimberly

jaxxx · 15-07-2019 10:43pm

Our failures far outweigh our achievements.

Pessimistic? Yes. True? Yes. Hotel? Trivago.

AMKC · 15-07-2019 10:53pm

The ISS is also a great human achievement. Because of it we have been able to do thousands of experiments that simply can not be done on Earth and from this advance technology and science. It is also a great way of showing what can be achieved when humans work together,

Franz Von Peppercorn II · 15-07-2019 10:58pm

JupiterKid wrote: »

Humankind has made so many achievements and advances over the past 10 millenia it is very difficult to pick one out as the greatest one of all.

However the top five in my book would be:

Writing
Agriculture
Fire
Computing
Space Travel

This is similar to a list I had (except space travel is a gimmick).

But how can people forget electricity? Nothing that people like in the modern world (transistors, computers, space travel, phones, the internet etc etc etc) can exist without it.

sabat · 15-07-2019 11:04pm

Landing a probe on a comet (or maybe that was just a lucky shot.)

d8491prj5boyvg · 15-07-2019 11:09pm

alchemist33 wrote: »

Making stars out of Jedward?

Or what happened 50 years ago, when three brave men took off on a giant explosive device and spent three days in the vacuum of space, landed on a rock, and got back safely again? All planned by hundreds of very smart people with computing power a fraction of your smartphone's. There have been probably advancements in medicine and society that have saved hundreds of thousands of lives and made everyone's lives better, but for the sheer audacity, teamwork and organisation, the moon landing must be our greatest achievement so far.

What about the single Russian lad or the Russian dog that did it before them? That was the real competition. The Americans made up the race to the moon when they lost the first one

Force Carrier · 15-07-2019 11:31pm

sabat wrote: »

Landing a probe on a comet (or maybe that was just a lucky shot.)

The rendezvous was complicated(no luck involved) but the landing equally as much. You have to kind of fall on to it and the the gravity of a comet is weak. Also they didn't know exactly what the surface of the nucleus of a comet was like when they designed and launched Rosetta. The first good look came from the probe itself as it got close.

Junkyard Tom · 15-07-2019 11:52pm

Stuff like electricity and grain were always there, waiting to be discovered and harnessed. The cat-flap though? The cat-flap is Isaac Newton's greatest ever invention, surely. A door within a door? Genius.