What held us back, technologically, for so long??

Originally posted by jude11
When we started reverse engineering UFO crashes it was all forward from there I believe.

Peace

My thoughts exactly.. Our technology started skyrocketing around the 50's, maybe even 60's... Hmm, what else happened around that time period that could be fueling this sudden advancement in tech..

reply to post by Opraks


I completely disagree with your stance on religion and it holding back human progression.

I assume you have heard of this man

The trial of Galileo Galilei


Everyone who seeks to stand in defense of religion as a blockade on our collective human evolution
need to seriously come up with a better arguement .
When I say religion I mean religion , not spirituality , hinduism or buddhism.
Humans have been duped by religion to forget our spirituality and in doing so have halted mans
evolution and our embrace of our collective consciousness , the next step in our evolution
through technology and science as our one true religion

reply to post by 0R10N


I was born.

reply to post by LastProphet527


Ha ha ha ha ha, I see you must be of German descent. I have many German descent friends,Ha ha ha ha ha.........Recently Europe gave more control of the food chemistry to the Finns, They saw truth in tradition "You can't eat that crap" "It'll make you Kranky"

Originally posted by nake13

Originally posted by MRuss
Are you sure it was Europe that advanced the world technologically?

The phone, the PC, the micro-chip...

The television...

The car...

I'm pretty sure these were all American inventions....

Alexander Graham Bell is credited with the invention of the telephone-Scottish

John Logie Baird invented the television-Scottish

Generally Britain was regarded as the father of invention(in reality most of the innovations were invented by Scots!)

Further examples include:

The Steam engine invented by James Watt-Scottish

The inventor of the first practical form of radar was Robert Watson-Watt-Scottish

The inventor of the pneumatic tyre is generally listed as John Dunlop-Scottish

the discoverer of penicillin was Alexander Graham Fleming-Scottish

The inventor of the first DEMONSTRABLE jet engine was Frank Whittle-Scottish

Gottlieb Daimler is generally credited with the invention of the car-German

The first practical computer was invented by Charles Babbidge-English

edit on 15-3-2012 by nake13 because: .

That's pretty interesting. I did not know some of those. Where were they when these things were invented? I know where Alexander bell was...but not most of the others.

If you want to contribute lineage over residence, that's fine...only native American Indians can claim to be "American" then...most all of us are immigrants or descendents of immigrants. My family roots are Scottish on my mom's side and Irish on my dad's...but the families have been here since the early 1800's...

So if I invented something profound...who get's the claim?...Scottish, Irish or American?

I still think fear held us back technologically...and yes...most of it was religion based fear. Either afraid of excommunication or fear of death as a Heretic or a "devil worshipper"....those that have said religion is at the root are not wrong...how you interpret it or apply it is up to you...but it is the reason years of research were done in secret and could not come forward for centuries.

reply to post by zerotime


IMO I think the human race have been "restarted" many times, ofc that means someone are in control of this planet, so yes religion have blinded us from real achievements.

nanu nanu

If you want to contribute lineage over residence, that's fine...only native American Indians can claim to be "American" then...most all of us are immigrants or descendents of immigrants. My family roots are Scottish on my mom's side and Irish on my dad's...but the families have been here since the early 1800's...

So if I invented something profound...who get's the claim?...Scottish, Irish or American?

I apologise if that came across as being a touch Jingoistic,personally I am more interested in the Invention and the inventor rather than the inventors country of origin or lineage,although I did find it astounding that a nation of less than 5 million inhabitants contributed so many firsts

On a personal level,if you were lucky,your Scottish lineage would get the credit !

In answer to your thread title. Do you really believe that we havent already been at this point technologically? Do you think that maybe we had the technology and failed through lack of understanding and more of what we see today? Today we have one nation capable of reaching the stars yet in the very same time frame we have nations where their people are simply struggling to survive due to famine poverty and illness.

I believe that the evidence lies on Saint Helena and what i believe to be solid evidence of a lost civilization. I am not allowed to paste the link to my blog but its there if you google. Saint Helena Hidden artifacts. You will be amazed also the USB symbol upon the forehead of one of the images, neptunes trident? evidence? I believe so.

reply to post by chr0naut

However, if everyone fails to find that 'more mechanistic' reason, this will come to the forefront as an answer.

Glad to have been of help to you in a scriptural answer at least, the Holy Bible usually has all the answers to life. It runs 4000 to 100 years ahead of science every time.. You will have to search for the mechanical answer on your own as I am not well versed in that field.

But the reason WHY is definitely God held tech back....the reason HOW is what you are searching for now. Good luck, I'll keep looking in this thread as I am curious too.

reply to post by Patrol

You answer is absolutely correct, and I am not even a religious man.
I don't think that many people here understood how BIG this is. You have put it so well in only two short sentences.

Why thank you sir, glad to help. But remember, it wasn't me, I simply quoted a single verse of scriptures from the divine and perfectly inspired King James Bible.......you guys would be astonished to find some other things that that Bible teaches......I can show you where modern scientists will claim global warming is the cause of the Tribulation and even comet Niburi..... well maybe it is

reply to post by Damrod


It's actually incredible the amount of wonderful things scotland has invented and the sheer number
of brilliant minds that have come from our tiny wee island !

The funny thing was I watched a tv show recently the 100 greatest brittish inventors , there was no mention of any scottish men in that list I found that a bit odd !

We also invented the Hypodermic syringe, tubular steel , tarmac to name a few things

check wikipedia most of them are on there !

all though my favourites are Irn Bru , and whiskey !
Awesome scottish inventiosn

Originally posted by chr0naut
Humans have been around for ages (3 million or more years according to current Science) and yet it is only in the last 100 or so years that we have progressed from horse & cart to the Internet & Space.

The start of the upward spike of the application of knowledge could have occurred anywhere, (ancient India, China, the Middle East or Greece), at any time but it seemed to come mainly from Europe and only a few decades ago.

So, what was it? Or conversely, what propelled us forward?

Lack of communication and isolation slowed us down, but as both got better we moved faster. BTW who says we were slow at all? I also think throughout history we had at times super geniuses that have push us quickly in areas during their lives. Just think of how many are out there today with 7 billion of us.

Originally posted by stAtrill

Originally posted by chr0naut

Originally posted by CaptChaos

I defy anyone to think of something truly new that has been invented since WW2. Even ONE thing, that is not just a refinement of existing tech.

The overwhelming majority of that list are not inventions, just about every single one is either a discovery or an innovation. Some of them haven't even been observed, and some of them are now being shown to be erroneous. In the interest of being thorough, I will demonstrate this for you:

The science of genetics and recombinant DNA. - Discovery.
Spintronics, -Discovery. Nothing useful has come from this yet.
Graphene, Fullerines and other allotropes of Carbon. -Discovery, by definition.
Magnetic monopoles, -Again, discovery. Existed in nature beforehand (if this is shown to be true)
Superconductivity, and its associated discoveries. -You said it yourself.
String theory, M theory and Brane theories, -these are theories, not inventions. Nothing useful has been produced from them yet.
Theoretical dark energy, -Again, not an invention, and useless.
Hawking Radiation, -theory, useless
Memory Alloys, -innovation, they have been refining this one for the last 4 decades at least
Metamaterials and negative refractive index, -discovery. Existed in nature.
Space Travel, -Not an invention theory, or discovery. Shouldn't be on this list at all
Kevlar, -innovation. They had been iteratively improving plastic strength
Graphite Polymers, -Again, an innovation.
Lasers and Masers, -This may be the only invention on this whole list.
Nanotechnology, -Another discovery. Nothing useful has come of this yet
Neuro-chemistry, -This is still in the theoretical stages. Nothing useful blah blah blah....

Out of that whole list, Lasers may be the only real discovery. So no, you couldn't go on for ages. Lasers are quite possibly the only true invention that we have had. There may be a few more, but they have likely been lost to time.

Those don't qualify as "inventions", huh? Well...by that definition a spear was simply an "improvement" upon the knife. Is an aluminum can only a "tweak" of a clay pot? They both hold things.
LOL.

Ok...here's one that wasn't around in WWII. How about the very internet you are using now. Or is that just an "improvement" upon the telegraph.

Your confusing a FUNCTION with an INVENTION. An aircraft carrier and a dug out canoe are both boats...but doesn't make them the same thing.

Anyone or any group of people with the means to restrict invention, have a plausible reason in atomic weapons to retard or abort new technology.

Also there is motivation to TPTB to keep things from changing and that includes invention and adaptation.

And a general tendency towards collectivism and centralization of power and authority takes away alot of the motivation from inventors, who face reduced return on their time or possibly jail time, and in the worst worst case assasination.

Didn't the rate of invention stop at about the Second World War and the detonation of atomic weapons? Nothing new but the LASER since then.

Originally posted by Semicollegiate
Anyone or any group of people with the means to restrict invention, have a plausible reason in atomic weapons to retard or abort new technology.

Also there is motivation to TPTB to keep things from changing and that includes invention and adaptation.

And a general tendency towards collectivism and centralization of power and authority takes away alot of the motivation from inventors, who face reduced return on their time or possibly jail time, and in the worst worst case assasination.

Didn't the rate of invention stop at about the Second World War and the detonation of atomic weapons? Nothing new but the LASER since then.

edit on 23-3-2012 by Semicollegiate because: (no reason given)

edit on 23-3-2012 by Semicollegiate because: (no reason given)

I am not trying to be argumentative but I disagree on advancement slowing down... depending on the field...in some cases technological advancement is hyper accelerating...(hint...the machine you made that last post with).

Did you specifically mean weaponry and machinations of war?

Well...ammunition has became extremely advanced. There are the sound cannons that can scramble your brain, rail guns that can launch things into orbit, and lets not forget our freindly neighborhood Gestapo officers best friend "advanced pepper spray". Tanks and assault vehicles (land, air and sea) have gotten wicked cool. This doesn't even touch into chemical and biological weapons...which are so ugly and scarey I try not to think about them.

read this thread. it is only the beginning.

www.technewshw.com...

reply to post by Damrod


Yes it would be ludicrous to say that the level of technology has remained the same.
However, all of the recent improvements in technology have been upgrades or adaptations of the basic inventions which exsisted about the time of WW2.

The computer goes back to WW2 era range and direction calculators and Alan Turing's decoder Bomb.

The sound cannon is like the Oprah star breaking a crystal glass
The rail gun is like the aircraft carrier catapult, (the rail gun film i've seen are Navy projects)
The pepper spray is like tear gas.

Basically since world war 2 we have invented the semiconductor and the LASER beam.

Originally posted by Semicollegiate
reply to post by Damrod

 

Yes it would be ludicrous to say that the level of technology has remained the same.
However, all of the recent improvements in technology have been upgrades or adaptations of the basic inventions which exsisted about the time of WW2.

The computer goes back to WW2 era range and direction calculators and Alan Turing's decoder Bomb.

The sound cannon is like the Oprah star breaking a crystal glass
The rail gun is like the aircraft carrier catapult, (the rail gun film i've seen are Navy projects)
The pepper spray is like tear gas.

Basically since world war 2 we have invented the semiconductor and the LASER beam.

edit on 24-3-2012 by Semicollegiate because: (no reason given)

I kinda see your point a little better but still disagree.

Our advances in medicine alone is astonishing from W2 era to today...and yes...many of the things medicinally were not even dreamed of 60+ years ago.

Cell phone technology. Yes we had walkie talkies and long range radio phones but the advancements have been huge.....leaving te intitial ideas in the dust.

But the one, biggest change I can now think of....the internet....how huge is that? No one....60+ years ago would have ever imagined a time when nearly everyone had a machine more powerful than what sent us to the moon in their homes and then have those machines connected for intsant talk and messaging....no...no one could have considered it at all.

So....the biggest advance since world war 2?....internet technology and social networking...there is NO-WAY this could have even been dreamed of till the technology reached a point and some genius recognized it's potential.....yes it is a play on telephones/telegraphs...but was monumentally changed and re-directed...that is a huge innovative development....and I stand by that.

reply to post by Damrod


I kinda skipped over the medical advances, but essentially they are all chemistry. Actually finding the genes on DNA is a pretty big step but they were assumed to be there since the turn of the century 1900.

Networking is an activity enabled by communications but people have always gotten in networks and communicated.

Heavier than air flight
Internal combustion engine
Jet engine
rocket engine
radio
TV
Chemical basis of life
nuclear fusion and fission
microbe theory of disease
satellites

Stuff like these were all quantum jumps and ther hasn't been a quantum jump, or not as many anyway, since the A-Bomb was invented.

Where is the personal rocket pack
or turbine electrical generator for your home run on grass clippings
or a recipe fro growing replacement organs in your bathtub
or the way to learn everything you need to know before highschool graduation?