Game changing technologies.

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telsor

telsor

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As the title suggests, what technologies do you think led to the biggest shifts in history?

Obviously there are some ancient options, such as fire, the wheel, crop cultivation, domestating animals and the like, but I'm thinking more over the past 1000 or so years where the pace of change increased.

Personal 'favorites' would be things like:

The crossbow, which marked the demise of knights as the dominant military force and as a result let to the decline in relative importance/power of the aristocracy in Europe. (yes, longbow moreso perhaps, but crossbow was more widespread).

Steam power. Led to the industrial revolution, and the world hasn't been the same since.

Thoughts, additions?
 
The tank. Developed initially in WW1 with varied and mixed results as they were of dubious reliability and nobody had figured out how to properly work your troops with them.

By WW2 however they became the absolute centrepiece of any land battle, obviously initially with the German blitzkrieg but also in later, more static situations which otherwise could well have gone back into the trench stalemate of the first war.

Ironically, as I recall it was actually a French military strategist who wrote a book after WW1 detailing how best to combine your tank and other forces. This book was completely ignored by the French army, who continued to rely on cavalry. The German generals, on the other hand, read it with great interest.
 

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The Speaker said:
This answer is almost cheating.

But very much true. Difficult to argue that anything has changed warfare in a greater way. Pretty much every advance in the past century at least has been enabled through oil production.
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IMO why the planet is where it is today. Not only warfare but everything from transport to drugs has been revolutionised.
 
Illinois Nazi said:
The tank. Developed initially in WW1 with varied and mixed results as they were of dubious reliability and nobody had figured out how to properly work your troops with them.

By WW2 however they became the absolute centrepiece of any land battle, obviously initially with the German blitzkrieg but also in later, more static situations which otherwise could well have gone back into the trench stalemate of the first war.

Ironically, as I recall it was actually a French military strategist who wrote a book after WW1 detailing how best to combine your tank and other forces. This book was completely ignored by the French army, who continued to rely on cavalry. The German generals, on the other hand, read it with great interest.
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Pretty sure it was a Brit (Liddell Hart) and his theories were taken up and made practical by Guderian (who paid to have Liddell Hart's books/papers translated into German).

De Gaulle also did some work/development of these theories, although it's debatable how much he really achieved (not least because he was prone to claiming credit for the work of others).

It is notable however that the French had more (and arguably, better) tanks than the Germans when the Germans Blitzed them. The Germans had better tactics, helped massively by the fact that unlike everyone else until ~1942, they had radios in all their tanks.
 
telsor said:
Pretty sure it was a Brit (Liddell Hart) and his theories were taken up and made practical by Guderian (who paid to have Liddell Hart's books/papers translated into German).

De Gaulle also did some work/development of these theories, although it's debatable how much he really achieved (not least because he was prone to claiming credit for the work of others).

It is notable however that the French had more (and arguably, better) tanks than the Germans when the Germans Blitzed them. The Germans had better tactics, helped massively by the fact that unlike everyone else until ~1942, they had radios in all their tanks.
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You may be right there. I think I've actually read one of Liddell Hart's books, can't remember exactly which one now.
 
Hank Scorpion said:
Alternating current, radio... just about anything of Tesla's.

Of those mentioned so far, hard to go past oil production.
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good one. who invented the technology?
 

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The printing press, aerofoil, antiseptics, fiat currency, antibiotics, vaccines and sanger sequencing.

The printing press was the catalyst for the modern age. It led to the decentralization of knowledge, which preceded the decentralization of wealth and power. Facilitated the rise of rationalism, broke the transcontinental power of the catholic church as the dominant cultural, political and spiritual paradigm.

The twisted aerofoil was the basis for modern flight. It preceded the jet engine, which has allowed for rapid transcontinental flight. Rapid mass transit and freight, along with wireless communication and fiat currency are the backbone of globalization and the modern market economy.

Sanger sequencing was the technology that drove early genetic sequencing and was a catalyst for the biotech revolution.

Antiseptics along with improved sanitation helped rapidly increase mean human life expectancy, which has completely changed the shape modern human civilization.
 
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Two chemical ones:

The Hall-Heroult process: Significantly increased efficiency of aluminium production. Made everyday use aluminium products possible.

The Haber process: Allowed for production of ammonia from atmospheric nitrogen. Germany used this to great effect in WWI. Naval blockades prevented imports from traditional sources. A new source of ammonia provided fertilisers and explosives crucial to the war effort. The process is still used extensively today.
 
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Hank Scorpion said:
Two chemical ones:

The Hall-Heroult process: Significantly increased efficiency of aluminium production. Made everyday use aluminium products possible.

The Haber process: Allowed for production of ammonia from atmospheric nitrogen. Germany used this to great effect in WWI. Naval blockades prevented the import from traditional sources. A new source of ammonia provided fertilisers and explosives crucial to the war effort.
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I was toying with mentioning the Haber process.

Other biggies from the 20th century are NMR, the web search engine, PCR and though not a single invention, Woodwards collective methods for organic synthesis.

PCR underpins most technologies in genetics, be that standard methods of sequencing, DNA amplification for therapeutic uses, manufacture of probes, DNA cloning, gene mapping, identification, gene fingerprinting and on it goes. It allowed an area of academic research (genetics), to transition to one of practical significance and real world application

NMR spectroscopy allows us to elucidate the properties of compounds and atoms. No modern chem lab can do without it. Cannot overstate it's impact on applied chemistry and biotechnology.

Woodwardsn work on organic synthesis changed medicine, nutrition and chemistry. For the first time he demonstrated the full potential for organic molecular synthesis.
 
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Shannon's information theory. More important and ground breaking than special and general relativity.
 
About 5000 years ago there was a game changing event. No one is quite sure what it was, but it happened. An unrelated breed of humans brought with them food and technology. Or perhaps they just turned up in thin air after an axis shift or something.

What ever it was, agriculture was born, allowed populations to be centralized, networked.
 
little graham said:
About 5000 years ago there was a game changing event. No one is quite sure what it was, but it happened. An unrelated breed of humans brought with them food and technology. Or perhaps they just turned up in thin air after an axis shift or something.

What ever it was, agriculture was born, allowed populations to be centralised, networked.
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I am about to begin Guns Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond. I presume it attempts to discuss this.
 
Radio Telegraph System. Instead of waiting for information to be delivered by ship or horse, people could send important information through Morse Code in a matter of seconds depending on how close the destination was.
 
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