Viewing 40 posts - 41 through 80 (of 126 total)
  • What's mankind's greatest achievement?
  • Drac
    Full Member

    Silicon chip.

    slackalice
    Free Member

    Stepping away from the contemporary, the Aztec’s and Egyptian’s did some amazing things in construction. As did the Chinese. Stonehenge was also remarkable, not least in a logistical sense. Nowadays we have become very good at moving stuff from one part of the globe to another… And back again.

    Whilst good, I would consider things like speech, abstract thought, compassion, empathy etc to be evolutionary achievements, rather than those of mankind’s doing/making.

    TooTall
    Free Member

    Me

    It was all building up to me. The rest of you were failed experiments.

    Now it is downhill for the entire human race.

    Sorry. I had to tell someone eventually.

    Fresh Goods Friday 696: The Middling Edition

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    slackalice
    Free Member

    ^ 😀

    Ming the Merciless
    Free Member

    GTA V

    Whassup Dog….

    athgray
    Free Member

    Some modern acheivements that affect day to day life in a big way
    creation of Windows OS and invention of mouse in computers
    internet
    powered flight
    standardized machine parts

    A bit older
    Repeating revolver
    Steam engine
    Knowledge of the chemical processes involved in cereal fermentation
    First telescopes and the discovery of the 4 main Jovian moons by Galileo

    Really old
    Most of what the Romans did (excluding unfeasibly short tunics)
    The Pyramids at Giza

    chvck
    Free Member

    I think that you’re probably older than me. That makes me a little pointless 🙁

    crikey
    Free Member

    I think some folk are just listing inventions, which are really only a better kind of stick to hit things with.

    The greatest achievement is the NHS.

    The vision required to see a society that would contribute as they were able to develop and maintain a healthcare system that would last so long, treat so many in such a non-judgemental, we-don’t-care-who-you-are-or-how-much-you-earn fashion is one of the greatest, most civilised concepts seen on the planet so far.

    “We are not here in this world to find elegant solutions, pregnant with initiative, or to serve the ways and modes of profitable progress. No, we are here to provide for all those who are weaker and hungrier, more battered and crippled than ourselves. That is our only certain good and great purpose on earth, and if you ask me about those insoluble economic problems that may arise if the top is deprived of their initiative, I would answer ‘To hell with them.’ The top is greedy and mean and will always find a way to take care of themselves. They always do”

    A Michael Foot quote, btw.

    yossarian
    Free Member

    Beer

    PJM1974
    Free Member

    The greatest achievement is the NHS.

    Fair point. Not as glamorous as a moon landing, but socially a watershed moment.

    Northwind
    Full Member

    Fire on demand.

    Or, porn on demand. Can’t decide.

    samuri
    Free Member

    Thank you crikey. That sums up everything that is so wonderfully right about humans.

    But beer comes next.

    lemonysam
    Free Member

    The elimination of smallpox?

    Torminalis
    Free Member

    I reckon it goes in leaps and there are a few contenders that have really changed everything socially, economically and politically.

    Language
    Fire
    Farming
    Mass production
    The Internet

    mcmoonter
    Free Member

    Laughter – we are the only things on the planet that can do it. Lets not forget it.

    athgray
    Free Member

    The NHS is a great achievement, however only to countries with that sort of health care model.
    The invention of the telescope to see Jupiters moons changed our perception of the order of the universe and mankinds place within it.

    benji
    Free Member

    TooTall – Member
    Me

    It was all building up to me. The rest of you were failed experiments.

    Now it is downhill for the entire human race.

    Sorry. I had to tell someone eventually.

    But by your own admission, they didn’t even get you perfect as you are TooTall 😉

    As for greatest acheivement, got to be surgery/medicine without many of us wouldn’t be here.

    rogerthecat
    Free Member

    IMO disease control & modern medicine – penicillin, vaccines, antibiotics, anaesthetics.

    Or, Marmite.

    ernie_lynch
    Free Member

    Laughter – we are the only things on the planet that can do it.

    Laughing is just an evolved form of panting, other species laugh/pant when they are playing, chimps certainly do, and they also screech when playing.

    I don’t think language is unique to our species either, we’ve just taken it further.

    Fire is a good one imo.

    bearnecessities
    Full Member

    Seriously, no-one has mentioned chips? Ok, I will.

    Chips.

    Torminalis
    Free Member

    Furthermore…

    Numerous species demonstrate vocalizations similar to human laughter. A significant proportion of these are mammals, including non-human primates, which suggests that the neurological functions involved in expressing cheer occurred early in the process of mammalian evolution

    Radio 4 reported only the other morning that rats can laugh.

    torsoinalake
    Free Member

    Edit – beaten to it, so I’ll go with:

    Geordie Shore

    Tiger6791
    Full Member

    RustySpanner
    Full Member

    [video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X-84jOEmCf4[/video]

    scuzz
    Free Member

    Moon landing was basic physics

    lol
    Personally I think it’s civilization as a whole.
    The fact that we have this amazing system where we do sustained activities knowing the place you do it will still be there tomorrow. You can dig stuff up, work it and we have these systems in place to produce all this fanciful tat, complete with the logistics and fuel to ship stuff across the planet all so that Matey down the road, who is concerned with nothing but his own skin, self worth, appearance and shallow guff can swan around in something like this:

    What the hell, mankind? What the hell?!

    athgray
    Free Member

    It is believed that homo erectus and neanderthalis were capable of some form of speech. Certainly different species from what we would call mankind.

    mcmoonter
    Free Member

    Laughing is just an evolved form of panting, other species laugh/pant when they are playing, chimps certainly do, and they also screech when playing.

    When you get a minute check this out, it was on the wireless the other week.

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03bdpl5

    EDIT, I stand corrected – even rats laugh.

    twohats
    Free Member

    The ability to surf the net whilst on the bog.

    Garry_Lager
    Full Member

    Tom_W1987 – Member

    Our greatest achievement judging by future consequences then, has to be the enlightenment surely? Is right lar. Francis Bacon’s ideas on the nature of scientific enquiry, which would form the scientific method, Newton’s principia, Kepler and Gallileo’s astronomy, Liebniz’s calculus etc etc. Impact of this birth of science turned society upside down, reaching way past the immediate concerns of studying the natural world. Democracy, literacy, education and what we might think of as citizenship all stem from this time and the achievements of the enlightenment.

    butcher
    Full Member

    It’s difficult to quantify great achievements because they all mean different things to different people. But the moon landings highlight the human desire for exploration and progression in the face of grave danger. It goes on here on earth all the time too. I look at buildings and bridges and stuff like that, and to think some lunatic would happily swing about on a cable 400ft in the air to build that. Our whole infrastructure relies on these brave people, to come up with new innovative ideas, and to put their lives at risk making them work. It amazes me. So many great achievements in our everyday lives. The moon landings came about through a normal bunch of people doing normal things…just with the volume turned up to 11. It is the perfect example of how we’ve come so far as human beings.

    edlong
    Free Member

    When you think about what it allows you to do, and how efficiently, the bicycle’s a pretty bloody amazing thing.

    JoeG
    Free Member

    Written language.

    Only humans can do it. Being able to accurately record information for reference at a later time made most of the things mentioned above possible. Societies without writing didn’t advance very far.

    Or bacon! :mrgreen:

    epicyclo
    Full Member

    We’re nearly there.

    Crikey +1 with the NHS. Having a society that cares for its infirm is a high point. Privatised care sees its clientele as cash cows to be bled for every test possible and discarded when dry of money.

    Edlong +1 for the bicycle. Once we optimise our transport infrastructure for bicycles and make cars unnecessary we’ll have made a major advance in looking after our planet and our health. Cars are chewing up the Earth’s resources.

    Now all we need is proper democracy…

    But mankind’s greatest achievement is we keep striving even though we get it wrong from time to time.

    ninfan
    Free Member

    Agriculture

    Prior to that, the human species was limited to that which was supplied by nature – reliant upon the wild plants and animals we could find – at that one point, when we began to cultivate the resources to secure our food supply, man truly became the master of his own destiny (for better or worse) and that makes it the most crucial event and achievement in the history of mankind.

    binners
    Full Member

    Greggs cheese and onion pasties

    First thought was farming.

    Second thought was storytelling – ie the ability to think about things that are not literally true, may not happen and may have never happend. Though this may be more biological accident than an achievement.

    bencooper
    Free Member

    It all hinges on your definition of “great” – I’m tempted to say the Welfare State.

    However, I’m reminded of a quote from Freeman Dyson about what should be included on the Voyager discs – “We should just send Bach, but that would be showing off”

    ahwiles
    Free Member

    the toilet.

    landing on the moon was impressive, chips are nice, but without toilets most of us would be dead, and those left would be stinking of shit – and destined for an early grave.

    toilets allow humans to gather / live in large groups, without the inevitable outbreaks of cholera.

    yay for toilets!

    anono
    Full Member

    Surely its sliced bread, unless there was something better before that?

    bikebouy
    Free Member

    I’m late to the Paaaarrtaaayy…

    I’d say it was Adam’s intuition. If he hadn’t looked around at Eve and thought “whats that stiring under my Fig leaf” we’d not be here to type on the Interbebz would we. 😉

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