Why did all the technological advances have to happen in the last 100 years or so?

Question

Civilization has been existent for several thousands of years and there is a sudden surge in technology in the last 100 years. Is it indicative of something? Perhaps the end of the world?

Answer 1

Communications. People were able to communicate their successes and failures for others to learn about. The second answer would be the development of uses for electricity and oil. You can't do ANYTHING today without either of those two.

Answer 2

With each new invention, another one was made. There have been other major advancements, but todays refinements to technology simply outshadow everything.

Cultures have developed better for warfare and weapons, better transportation, and food preparation, and many other things, but they've happened slowly because the word on how to change things didn't travel as quickly as it does now. You can access the internet from almost anywhere in the world with the right technology and you can recieve the latest and greatest information on practically anything.

Answer 3

I hate to burst your bubble, Krishna, but people didn't live in caves and cook mastodon meat over a fire in 1905, then get running water, electricity, jet airplanes and heated hair curlers in 1906. Trains in the US were routinely doing 60 mph in the 1880's, and 120 when they wanted to set a record. The Victorians had indoor plumbing.

Technology builds. Once you harness steam power for pumping water out of mines, you can tinker with the steam engine until you get a railroad. Once you have an internal combustion engine for an automobile, you can make a lighter, more powerful one for an airplane. Once you invent the printed circut, you can put computer chips in all manner of gadgets.

It was a long, slow climb out of the dark ages, but there was lots of technology in the 1800's; more of it towards the end than the beginning, as people invented things.

Answer 4

The turning of inwards took a back seat for a while, and man got caught up in material aspects of life, the latent potential broke loose, and then there was no going back.
Proof of this, look at the very personal lives of great among living men/women/people, you will find them keeping a safe distance from gadgets consciously, though not negating its use or utility !

Answer 5

Technology tends to feed on itself and exhibit exponential growth, so once it really got started (with steam engines in the 19th century), it took off. However, exponential growth tends to start small and then "explode", so it's only fairly recently (since 1950?) that we've really noticed it. Also, you have to ask how many of these advances are really "new", and how many are just adaptations of previous technology. For example, the concept of the laser was truly new, but are all of its offshoots really novel, or just clever ways of using something previously discovered?

Answer 6

well if you have a look a lot of technology has happened in the past around wars and the need for greater offense/defense. however i think you mean just normal stuff like gene-mapping?

i'd say it's because of the amount of people in the world. more scientists = more science!

Answer 7

Technology in my present opinion has come about because we see ourselves as disabled and we no longer view the earth as our source for existing. The common seance to stay on land has been glazed over.

Answer 8

civilization has been around much longer than this and so has technology . you must not know very much about history .

Answer 9

One word, electricity.