Assignment 2B: Top 10 Technological Innovations

Hi everyone!

This is my official first post in response to Dr. Lavian's first assignment. I will be listing and briefly discussing my list of the top 10 innovation in human history.

1. Money - Destroying the barter system and allowing efficient conversion of labor into necessary goods, this is arguably the most important driver of inventions—the inventor of all inventions—as it provided easy, quick incentivisation. Notable applications include everything.
2. Vaccination - This provided a means of combatting diseases that otherwise would have went untreated. Without this, the world’s population would have been decimated by disease. Notable applications include influenza, AIDS, polio, measles.
3. Refrigeration - This allowed for safe storage of food over a dramatically longer period of time. Additionally, this allowed for transportation of food and other goods over a much greater distance. Without this, the shelf-life of cold food would be no more than a few hours. Notable applications include food, drugs, human organs, import & export, biological experiments.
4. Electricity - This is the creator of light and thus “extended” the hours by which humans could do productive work. This also provided the power necessary to drive almost every invention in the modern world. Notable applications include refrigerators, motors, radios, telephones, computers, generators
5. Semiconductor - This is essential to the construction of electrical equipment. Without it, there would be no means of long-range communication or modern day technology. Notable applications include computers, radios, telephones.
6. Internal Combustion Engine - This revolutionized the way energy was created and utilized. This increased work efficiency exponentially, cutting process time drastically across all industries (e.g. farming, manufacturing). Without this, work would at best be conducted using steam or water power. Notable applications include automobiles, airplanes, construction.
7. Personal Computing - This propelled mankind into a new era of thinking, computation, and knowledge. This allowed for computations and simulations much beyond the capability of manual labor. Without this, all forms of computation would need to have been done by hand. Notable applications include mathematical calculations, word processing, gaming.
8. Internet - This allowed for an unparalleled, quick method of communication of ideas and goods. Without this, information relay would be limited to telephone, radio, and physical mail. Notable applications include messaging communications, item orders, information transmission, entertainment, search.
9. Cloud - This ushered in a new era of information storage, transitioning from the physical to the intangible. No piece of information is really lost if it is not confined to a physical body. Without this, the sharing and transmission of data would be much more expensive. Notable applications include information storage, information transmission, email.
10. Cement - This is literally the foundation of civilization. This provided a quick means of building structures in locations lacking natural resources (e.g. stone, wood, mud). Without this, construction projects would be much more labor-intensive and lengthy. Notable applications include skyscrapers, commercial structures.