Mankind's most defining moments

Squiggy

ThunderDick
What, in the history of mankind, do you think were our most defining moment(s)? Those single instances that would ripple through our existance, forever changing the world as we knew it...Which do you think had the most, best, worst, or deepest affect on us as a race? I hesitate to give examples for fear of tainting responses....Give it a ponder. I think it could be an interesting discussion...;)
 

tonksy

New Member
i think the cruelest thing mankind has ever conceived of is slavery. just can't ever imagine seeing a person as property. free will is the only thing we truly have.
 

tonksy

New Member
Squiggy said:
And to think its as old as eternity and still happening...:eh:
well, you did say in the history of mankind. i think it's an important defining moment...for the bad. but all we can do it say "dude, that sucks"...AND THEN NEVER DO IT AGAIN!
 

Squiggy

ThunderDick
I'm agreeing with ya, tonks. Just pointing out how old that evil is and that it still happens today....Definately one of mankind's worst faces. :(
 

PT

Off 'Motherfuckin' Topic Elite
Mankinds defining moments...

Figuring out Global communications, not just internet, I'm talking telephone, that changed the world immensly.

The wheel, of course. Wouldn't be too far without that.

Electricity, Can you imagine not having it?

Of course, most of you will view these as good things, but for the most part, all they have done is made us lazy. There were other ways to do all of the above, it just required more effort.
 

Gonz

molṑn labé
Staff member
The argument can be made that the Wright Brothers allowed this to take place but my vote still goes to

4:17 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time, Neil A. Armstrong took the “Small Step” into our greater future when he stepped off the Lunar Module, named “Eagle,” onto the surface of the Moon, from which he could look up and see Earth in the heavens as no one had done before him.
 

IDLEchild

Well-Known Member
tonks said:
i think the cruelest thing mankind has ever conceived of is slavery. just can't ever imagine seeing a person as property. free will is the only thing we truly have.

That isn't an example of a defining moment. It is a process that has always existed and likely will exist for a good while.



A defining moment?....hmmm....9/11
 

Squiggy

ThunderDick
what do you think that defined, BCD? I think I know where you're going with it but it seems to soon to consider it as 'forever altering'...

edit: This was meant for the 9/11 reference.
 

Mirlyn

Well-Known Member
The fall of the Soviet Union and other major globalization turns

The Jungle by Upton Sinclair

Development of the nuclear age (events involving both as a resource and a weapon)

Electricity and the Telephone

Henry Ford's assembly line theories and Eli Whitney's Cotton Gin (interchangeable parts)

Its rather hard to specify defining...its highly up to interpretation. Some of these things might not be defining by themselves, yet are revolutionary in their fields. ;)
 

IDLEchild

Well-Known Member
Yes, maybe you are right. Not much has changed in the attitudes of the people.......i agree, it is too soon.
 

freako104

Well-Known Member
Buzz Aldron
Neil Armstrong
Wright brothers

9/11

Ghandi(influced the idea of passive resistence)
and the Manhattan project.


9/11 and Manhattan Project were for the worse as they were just death and violence


the others are for the positive
 

IDLEchild

Well-Known Member
Alexander Graham Bell drops battery acid on his hand and his assistant hears his pain through the first working model of the telephone in the other room....all unplanned and an accident after countless tries.......The future of communication was born that night.
 

Ms Ann Thrope

New Member
Mirlyn said:
Development of the nuclear age (events involving both as a resource and a weapon)

from this link -- http://efi.uchicago.edu/intro.html#links:

On December 2, 1942, under the grandstands of Stagg Field Stadium on the University of Chicago campus Enrico Fermi and his colleagues achieved the first self-sustaining controlled release of nuclear energy. I think about the significance of this event often, and actually visited the site yesterday with someone who was born and raised in the former Soviet Union, but is now a journalist in Ukraine. We were silenced by the thought of how Fermi helped usher in the atomic age, and what that has meant to our lives.

But the single most important event in the history of humanity, in my opinion, was the invention of the printing press. Gutenberg did more to change our world than anyone before or since. There would be no Enrico Fermi Institute, no information age, no OTC, if it hadn't been for Johannes Gutenberg.
 

IDLEchild

Well-Known Member
Development of the arabic number system which would eventually become the modern number system of 0-9.


Invention of the

The wheel

The fire (ok more like the discovery)

First language, even if it probably consisted of signs and symbols.

The guitar

Piano
 

chcr

Too cute for words
The discovery of how to manipulate fire.
Language
Writing
The superstitious belief in shamanism that led to religion.
The wood whistle or flute.
 

Squiggy

ThunderDick
I'd have to say I recognize Fermi and Gutenberg as having tremendous effect on mankind...But my number one tip of the hat goes to Albert and his little notion of relativity....That single premise has opened more doors for man than anything I can think of...
 

BeardofPants

New Member
Okay, so if we're counting fire (generally attributed to Homo erectus), then I want to mention: language, bipedalism, and tool specialisation from the oldawan culture onwards.
 
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