What is the most important invention that has made mankind, Mankind!?

Answer 1

OK, I gave this some thought. First of all, I'm going to eliminate a few. Since you specified "mankind" then that automatically eliminates stone tools and fire, as these preceded mankind and was invented or harnessed respectively by hominids. Yes harnessed, fire was originally created by non-hominid means and therefore was not even "invented". Now, I'm also going to exclude modern conveniences that are considered "luxuries". These items may seem great, but in reality they are just novelties. For example, one poster mentioned the toothbrush, but in fact in Africa the tree commonly called the east African green heart has a spicy flavour and is abundant in natural antifungals and antibiotics which have been used to clean the teeth and gums there long before anyone invented a toothbrush and toothpaste. And something like the internet is no more spectacular in it's distribution of knowledge then was the printing press for it's time, both of these did create a ripple and deserve honourable mention, but I'm searching for a Tsunami. So, with that covered, I wanted to really narrow this down to inventions that drastically altered our lifestyle and open up entirely new resources and reproductive opportunities to mankind. With this in mind I want an invention that could be considered revolutionary regarding all it's effects on mankind. To answer this I came up with a few, but the single most useful invention made by mankind (125,000ya - present) was agriculture. This single invention allowed mankind to become sedentary and produce surpluses. In doing this it allowed a division of labour so that food acquisition was no longer the fundamental priority thus allowing people to explore other avenues. Agriculture is the foundation for the development of art, science, politics and religion as careers rather then just as part time habits. Having a constant food supply also allowed for a more constant food intake, and although this did lead to diabetes, in these early populations those most prone to diabetes were selected against via natural selection, and the resulting population began a population boom that far exceeded the carrying capacity of the land when used for hunting and gathering. As of such agriculture was also the foundation needed for cities, civic organization, and infrastructure. The increased food intake also allowed more reproductive success, despite the fact that at the same time these populous areas were the cause of new diseases from overpopulation, keeping farm animals in close proximity and also from more exposure to disturbed/tilled land. The overwhelming effect, however, was truly revolutionary. Of honourable mention in my thinking for most useful inventions include clothing, because this opened up the full extent of the northern Hemisphere to mankind, money, because it allowed a move from the barter system to a new financial system that had numerous effect and I'm also tempted to say medicine, but it is actually too general and can't be pegged to a distinct moment in time, so scratch medicine altogether. I could also throw in the industrial revolution, and some may argue for it, but I think that the before and after comparison of the invention of agriculture still holds the revolutionary edge for the full extent of its change.

The wheel is no more impressive in it's ability to move people and goods over space then money was as an enabler of such transactions. If you think of a nomadic tribe, and what would change their life the most.... definitely agriculture. The wheel might be able to provide nominally more carrying capacity out of their work animals, but given the lack of roads it probably would have actually decreased the distances that could be travelled. In fact, as far as goods are concerned, the wheel was not as important as simple rafts on watersystems provided for this purpose at this time, followed by sailing ships. The wheel didn't take over as far as mass transportation is concerned until the british added pully systems for the ropes on their navy and merchant marine fleet (which still would have operated without), followed by steam ships and railroads, which were more importantly mobilized because of the industrial revoultion. Since the wheel had been around for millenia with little overall effect, I'm sorry to say it but that isn't a revolutionary invention at all. The wheel doesn't even come close to agriculture. It gets honourable mention alongside money.

All right, it looks like another idea has permeated this column which needs my attention. Symbolism, language and the writen word. First I would like to point to the Yerkes primate research centre where bonobos and chimpanzees have been taught to use "symbolic" character boards and through using these boards have demonstrated that they understand the gramatical rules (especially the bonobos) of language and concepualize time and space and will even gossip about the past and plan what they would like to do in the future. So language (in the brain) is not a special characteristic that only applies to humans and being that it exists in our closest relatives (and further: Gorillas) it certainly was not invented and that this ability by far preceeded the arrival of Mankind. Even Koko the gorilla who is even further seperated from humans was able to learn sign language relatively well and showed an ability to combign sign to make up new ideas, thus adapting symbolism. Our actual complex vocalization was no more an invention of ours then walking bipedaly was. Our complex vocalizations are just another physiological adaptation that we have, this physiological adaption being the ability to control our breath so that we can create our full repetoire of constonant sounds. Evolution does not work such that we would have developed breath control to talk but it would have had to have developed for a reason that proved reproductively successful and then was later adapted towards the spoken language. With all this covered, all that is left that is unique to Mankind is the written word. A history of the earliest use of writing show that it was primarily used to record transactions. So writing was more like an aid to the barter system which preceeded money so that someone could collect the value of what he gave at a later date or else write down an IOU of sorts. So money came about to replace this system of writing down trade items by assigning a value on the spot and writing eventually was adapted to be used to record other stories, facts and histories, but lets first understand the route to the adoption of the written word. The reason why it became necessary to record trades was because of surpluses, and the reason why Mankind suddenly had surpluses and was able to hoard was because of the revolutionary changes that occured because of... that's correct, agriculture. Like so many other advances in mankind I would give the written word honourable mention as a sidenote to the agricultural revolution.

Answer 2

The invention of language,symbolism and abstract reasoning has, more than any other invention, made mankind what it is today.

As a college student I just took two great classes; an in depth Anthropology class as well as an upper level Theory of Criticism and Literature class, both of which claimed the higher cognitive ability of creating and understanding symbols to be our single greatest accomplishment as a species. Literally, we have the ability to think and talk about things without actually being anywhere near the thing of which we are speaking.

Some who have answered your question before me have said writing. Written words are symbols scratched down onpaper (or clay or stone) that represent sounds. Thus they are only symbols. Also, the sounds themselves are only symbols of concepts. For Example, The word for "wall" in Tagalog (language of the Philippines) is "ding-ding." Both of these words mean the concept of wall, however, the sounds (symbols) are different. The concept is universal, the symbol is not, but the symbol allows us to communicate about the universal concept. Thus, lanugage, and more importantly, the ability to undersand symbols let us understand concepts.

Animals do not invent symbols, but humans do. Think about what this means. If humans were incapable of creating language and symbolism there would be no speaking, no writing, no music, no television, no radio, no architecture, no computers, no internet, no mass production, no government, no religion, and lastly no art (art is completely symbolic in nature, a painting of a bed is not an actual bed). Symbolism is everything we do! Everytime you open your mouth you make sounds that represent concepts. Every time you write a letter you make symbols for sounds that are symbols for concepts.

Every time an artist creates a film, book, or painting they use symbols. When an architect goes over the plans of a building he knows how to interpret the signs on the blueprint in a way that allows him to build a magnificent building.

Someone said the wheel is the greatest invention. What is the wheel if you cannot TEACH what the wheel is to others because you have no language and no symbolism?

Language and smbolism have made us what we are today.

Answer 3

What is the most important invention that has made mankind, Mankind!? first let me say u didnt clarify yr question good enuff is thats the mostimportant invention that MAN made that made mankind or or by some other source . But if u want that man i feel the most imp invention that was made that has made man kind was God creating Man, but God isnt manmade so clarify your question more specifically

Answer 4

The most important invention for mankind was the wheel.

Answer 5

The printing press. Before the ability to share knowledge and ideas through the written word mankind lived more or less as it had for thousands of years. Every century after it has seen milestone achievements which have affected every person, every where, in ways that couldn't have been imagined before.

Answer 6

Simple. Language. The capability of exchanging thoughts with other humans. No technological or cultural advance would be possible without a system to communicate.

Answer 7

the most important invention is the logical system that takes all the activities of all the inventions and makes then into a general unit where man has benefited from in that it takes into account the many multi beneficial inventions without classifying any one of them better or more important. Since none of them could be on their own anything more than an invention with no where to go or get there.

Answer 8

The wheel and its amazing capabilities. It was used to invent time, transportation and management systems. One of your earlier your posters said agriculture, but that only affected localities until there was a way to move the excess goods, which the wheel does.

Answer 9

Fire has given the edge of humans over all the animal kingdom. As all animals have an inner fear of fire, but human intelligence prevent them from being afraid by domesticating the fire making technique. Without this, I am pretty sure that our race would have not being capable to survived in such a dangerous world and become what he is today.

Answer 10

Plastic

Answer 11

So far it was considered that the invention of weapons was the sine qua non of the anthropides. But recent observations have shown that weapons,however rudimentary but still artificial weapons, are used by our illustrious predecessors.But fire ignition and control is the identifying mark of the humans.A Charles Lamp story traces the linvention of fire to the accidental destruction by fire of a piggery of Chinese pigherd. When he ate the meat of the burnt pigs he found it quite tasty. Thereafter he went on burning down one piggery after the other with fire from theburning woods till at last he saw theconnection between the burnt and raw meat and studies how forests catch fire and duplicated the process ,becoming the first earhly Promesthus.The Greeks stole it from the gods. The practical Chinese developed it locally.