Posted on 05/15/2016 9:02:59 AM PDT by PROCON
Which was a more important innovation: indoor plumbing, jet air travel or mobile phones?
We’re in the golden age of innovation, an era in which digital technology is transforming the underpinnings of human existence. Or so a techno-optimist might argue.
We’re in a depressing era in which innovation has slowed and living standards are barely rising. That’s what some skeptical economists believe.
The truth is, this isn’t a debate that can be settled objectively. Which was a more important innovation: indoor plumbing, jet air travel or mobile phones? You could argue for any of them, and data can tell plenty of different stories depending on how you look at it. Productivity statistics or information on inflation-adjusted incomes is helpful, but can’t really tell you whether the advent of air-conditioning or the Internet did more to improve humanity’s quality of life.
(Excerpt) Read more at mobile.nytimes.com ...
> Which was a more important innovation: indoor plumbing, jet air travel or mobile phones?
None of the above. It’s eyeglasses.
Without them, life after 45 is all blur.
My dad said when he left Oklahoma they ate in the house and crapped outside. Came to California where they crap in the house and eat outside.
Perhaps of interest?
And any country or ethnic group that did not invent, but uses those inventions are guilty of cultural appropriation
There’s plenty of innovation going on all the time.
There are periods during which it is appreciated, and periods during which it isn’t.
That one is easy to answer. You can survive a summer without the internet far better than you can survive a summer without air conditioning.
For the most part, the internet is about entertainment available at our convenience. We did fine without it. However, people die without air conditioning.
Going down memory lane; I can remember a telephone call to relatives in Iowa took several hours to complete circa 1948.
Yes, and now the residential land line is becoming obsolete.
I always think the electric light is the most important, but the dishwasher is my personal fave.
And in 2016, Gov’t created the unisex bathrooms just for preverts.
That and hot and cold running water and soaps
Well, we're heading for the Dark Ages if Hitlery or Bernie wins, so we'd better get used to zero-info clickbait like this. :')
Thanks PROCON -- there is no one right answer, IMHO. The earliest innovations have had the most impact, direct and indirect, on our present world -- fire, stone tools, hunting and cooking meat, eating off baked clay dishes, brickmaking, agriculture, irrigation -- but in terms of what most of us would call technology (knapping flint results in stone tool technology, but most of us don't consider that technological), we generally see the most innovation during brief periods, during wartime.
Henry VIII of England laid the groundwork for the modern British Navy (what's left of it) by expensively building an ironmaking industry to produce iron cannon for the ships (ship construction changed to reduce the topheavy-ness that tipped over his Mary Rose flagship), and iron cannon also took over in land warfare.
The US Civil War was transformative in the US itself, but before 1870 the Monitor-style ironclad was part of the fleets of Brazil and Russia, among probably others.
WWII saw so much innovation -- leading to nuclear energy, rockets, satellites, jet aircraft, radar, computers, what else ya got? -- that it could be said that the former world entered WWII and a new world made egress from it.
/d***edright
Just to second something you said, people have to go without beer unless there is refrigeration.
It was the U.S. Constitution, which created the FREEDOM to allow innovations to thrive.
Heh-heh.... that could have been and might have been
said by my own dad whose family left Hardtner, Kansas
in the 30s to work in the orchards and fields of NorCal.
I sure remember party lines,luckily our party line
was with grand-dad and grand-ma.
Anyone remember calling the USA from VN going through
MARS stations?
I have to vote for the hand axe, about 1.75 million years ago, as the foundation stone for all future innovation.
Mobile phone have bigger downsides than that for plumbing or jet travel. Mobile phone produce radiation, facilitate government and corporate spying, and reliance on mobile phone devices has resulted in a reduction in conversation skills and car accidents (texting), and the convenience of a mobile phone with many apps has lead to anti-social and addictive type behaviors.
In the old days when you saw a family at restaurant bowing their heads before a meal, you knew they were praying before their meal. Today, when you see them bowing their heads, they’re texting or gaming on their phones.
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