Who in the last 500 years will make the biggest impact on the next 500 years?

[DanS]

Some of those technologies are not based on the concept or technology of the printing press, however. Typewriters, yes. Fax machines, no. Even handwritten pages fax just fine. Over the last 20 years or so, the printing press and its derivatives are being phased out in large part.

You could make the argument that the concept of a typeface is what bridges the technologies, but I think that's somewhat tenuous.

To apply the concept to another example... If we look at von Braun, he has dibs on the top spot if most space transportation is done in the future by a rocket through either chemical or nuclear rocket propulsion. His stature in this area is unmatched by a long shot. If it is done by a flying saucer, then he wouldn't have dibs. If it is done by electric propulsion, then Goddard has a better claim. If it is done by space elevator, then that Russian guy gets the nod, etc.

[JohnT]

Some of those technologies are not based on the concept or technology of the printing press, however.

I don't know, seems like all the things you mentioned are part of the process of mass-produced communications... which is the essential concept of the printing press.

[Ned]

Yeah, John T, communications by any form is what Gutenberg started.

[Dauphin]

Didn't the Chinese have the printing press some 400 years earlier? Not as developed, but the concept was nevertheless there.

[Ned]

Originally posted by Dauphin
Didn't the Chinese have the printing press some 400 years earlier? Not as developed, but the concept was nevertheless there.

In a way, yes.

But, as with many things first invented by the Chinese, they didn't develop it to its full potential.

[PLATO]

Ghandi

Thought that would have been rather obvious...

[Agathon]

It's a bit of an odd question really.

If you want to make it a causal question (who caused the biggest impact) then it could be anyone. I mean, it could be the guy who woke up too late and didn't run the boy Hitler down.

Or it could be the one person who caused the tipping point at the battle of Waterloo.

If you just restrict it to causes then you aren't going to get satisfactory answers.

Similarly, the person who discovered "X" isn't going to do much either. Take Watson and Crick. Yes they made discoveries but if they hadn't someone else would have - many people were working on the problem.

Better to stick to people who had massive influence or created ideas that had massive influence and who were so original that no-one else would have got near.

Newton leaps to the mind, as does Aristotle and the Buddha.

But I'm not sure that will work either.

[Bill3000]

me

[Qilue]

Originally posted by Bill3000
me

Who are you?

[RGBVideo]

A kid who used to talk a lot about this thing he calls "United Demesos" and likes to play World of Warcraft, apparently.

[Immortal Wombat]

Newton or Marx probably.

Watson and Crick are immensely over-rated, Darwin won't have a massive impact unless religion finally goes tits-up, or some nutter starts a serious eugenics program FOR SCIENCE.

Berners-Lee maybe for the next 50 years, but networking was going to be massive with or without HTML, and I think the internets will reach beyond text very rapidly.

The nuclear bomb guys if some idiot starts using them. (Unless the user is also eligable, in which case, he's in).

In terms of most important invention, the transformers which made shifting electricity around were pretty major. Home electricity pretty much changed the world.

[bayraven]

Saddam. He may have blundered into the democratization of the middle east.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Bill3000
me

Finally! I was wondering when somebody would say "me"