Man's Greatest Invention

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Tucher

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Well, what do you think it is?

I would of course first say alcohol, but that is something that can occur naturally, indeed that is probably how it was first discovered. :mug:
 
Principles of mathematics, if that is not stretching the definition too much. When I am coming home Wednesday the invention of the airplane will be much appreciated.
 
discovery

nature

discovered nature


sanitation/antiseptics is my vote.

The wheel I would argue as observation leading to invention. Wheels did not exist, rolling objects did.

Bacon, I would give that yes it "existed" in nature, but I would also argue it as a manly invention. Domestication of hogs into a breed-able food source (pigs), and then the creation of certain meat cuts leading to bacon.

Fire, yes observation of nature, but the ability to create fire was an invention.
 
I will argue that fire, bacon, and even alcohol already existed in nature. It was more a matter of taming them. I will grant that things did roll occasionally in nature, but there were no wheels. How many animals have wheels? There are protozoa with spinny things that might qualify as a propeller, but no wheels. That was an invention that not even some advanced ancient civilizations came up with. And if you're old enough to remember luggage without wheels you know how important wheels are.

The C programming language was a biggie. It beat the crap out of assembly, Basic, Fortran and Cobal. Love it or hate it, it's what drove modern technology. You might also add working metal, mathematics, physics, and mechanical refrigeration. Oh, and medicine.
 
I will argue that fire, bacon, and even alcohol already existed in nature. It was more a matter of taming them. I will grant that things did roll occasionally in nature, but there were no wheels. How many animals have wheels? There are protozoa with spinny things that might qualify as a propeller, but no wheels. That was an invention that not even some advanced ancient civilizations came up with. And if you're old enough to remember luggage without wheels you know how important wheels are.

On an interesting side note, it is interesting that Native American Indians never realized the wheel until Europeans came to America.
 
Agriculture. This includes the eventual domestication of both plants & animals. Without it we would still be small tribes of hunter/gatherers, roaming the land, occasionally fighting with other tribes; not unlike the plains indians (native Americans) of the 19th century & earlier. I specify the plains tribes, as many other tribes from the eastern & southern areas of north America had developed agriculture, while most of the plains tribes did not.

On a side note, the crowning achievement of 2 million years of human evolution came in 1969 when Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon. While one could argue that things like pasteurization or firearms, or even the computer have benefited mankind more than the moon landing(s), there is nothing more significant, daring & spectacular that any known species has done. Now if we can just avoid destroying ourselves or succumbing to a virus, maybe we'll be able to top the moon landing one day.
Regards, GF.
 
"Compound interest is the Eighth Wonder of the World. He who understands it, earns it; he who doesn't, pays it." ~ Albert Einstein
 
Bacon may not be an invention per se, but the curing process certainly was.


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The telephone.

Not only for the invention itself, which is astonishing, but for the technological path it forged that led directly to the internet.
 
Beer!

Yes, we invented it. By accident, maybe, but still, we did it!
 
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