What is the most important invention of the past 500 years?
That’s a tough one. Most important inventions are important refinements of earlier inventions. Take the printing press: an important invention in itself, vastly improved by the invention of the rotary press. Which one is more important, the founding concept or the tool enabling it useful on a large scale? Also, there are so many inventions that radically changed life, each in their own unique way, that it’s hard to pick just one. I won’t try to get out of an answer though. I’m going to be a librarian, so I figure I might as well follow my biases for the reasons stated above. To answer your question, I will say cross-indexing; it can connect anybody to anything and lead to new discoveries. Being that this is how our brains work, cross-indexing has led to the creation of an interactive global brain that we need but learn to use.
That’s a tough one. Most important inventions are important refinements of earlier inventions. Take the printing press: an important invention in itself, vastly improved by the invention of the rotary press. Which one is more important, the founding concept or the tool enabling it useful on a large scale? Also, there are so many inventions that radically changed life, each in their own unique way, that it’s hard to pick just one. I won’t try to get out of an answer though. I’m going to be a librarian, so I figure I might as well follow my biases for the reasons stated above. To answer your question, I will say cross-indexing; it can connect anybody to anything and lead to new discoveries. Being that this is how our brains work, cross-indexing has led to the creation of an interactive global brain that we need but learn to use. Sources: The Day the Universe C
