Inventions that Changed the World

If one imagines a world of today, without the thousands of years of human invention and ideas, we would have very little to show of generations of human existance.

The world we know is merely the cumulative results of at least eight millenia of human activity and invention.

This is a list of the five most important inventions of humans over the past eight thousand years.

1. Architecture Look around you, you are probably in a building or at least outside a building of some kind. The art of architecture made that possible. It is the art of the enclosed space, and although man and many animals create shelter, complex structures to help them survive. Man alone has created space in monumental, massive structures. The earliest known stone structures were the pyramids of ancient Egypt, the first built by the great architect Imhotep at Saqqarra. From this first great building almost all other architecture in the Western world can claim descent.

2. Weiting Creating a written language was a means of immortalizing man’s ideas. Prior to writing man had to share ideas directly with another. Writing and the ability to read any written information meant ideas could be passed across vast distances or down the generations. There are many written languages of the past which remain mysterious and wanting a scholar to crack their code. But many ancient written languages are today read and inderstood by sprcialists, unlocking the world of their creators and giving us insight into the past.

3. The Incandescent Lamp The invention of the incandescent lamp or light bulb at the end of the 19th Century transformed the world. Humans had more or less lived in a world ruled by the power of the sun. People we forced to use all the daylight hours for activities and rest after sunset. The light bulb meant the twenty-four hour world became a reality, we could work or play throughout the night as well as all through the day.

4. The Wheel. The invention of the wheel gave man the power to move objects more easily. It allowed improved capacity to move trade goods or armies. The wheel gave us power through windmills and the waterwheel.

5. Domestication of Animals. When early man domesticated animals, they createdd a means for harnessing power. Oxen could pull heavier loads in mens carts, dogs could chase down faster prey than a man, horses could carry people across the Eurasian and African continents.

This is just a shortlist of a few ideas and inventions. Please feel free to comment and leave suggestions as to your top five.


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