A little note: The person who said that was the head of the U.S. Patent Office when suggesting that it should be closed since there were no longer any significant inventions for it to handle.
And to the head of the patent office, using the vernacular of the 40’s, “Tell it to the Marines”, there’s a lot of young Edisons out there eager to patent their software!
Cap’t Jack
It seems to have been said just about the time of the Civil War or shortly afterward when the nation was probably too busy with fighting or rebuilding to do much in the way of research. He almost certainly didn’t realize this was the cause of any temporary slow down in patent applications.
Have to ever wondered if we could be reaching our apex?
Its funny you say that. I remember reading a quote once from someone very influential in the 1800’ saying something to the same effect in that he believed man had invented everything of significance that could ever be invented. Its always a bit tricky when you try to predict the limits of humanity’s ingenuity and creativity or the limits of what the universe has to offer for that matter.
. . . and you don’t see any fundamental differences between now and back in those days?
Have to ever wondered if we could be reaching our apex?
Its funny you say that. I remember reading a quote once from someone very influential in the 1800’ saying something to the same effect in that he believed man had invented everything of significance that could ever be invented. Its always a bit tricky when you try to predict the limits of humanity’s ingenuity and creativity or the limits of what the universe has to offer for that matter.
. . . and you don’t see any fundamental differences between now and back in those days?
Not really. The comment made here and the one made in the 1800’s both demonstrate the same lack of imagination. Im just glad the folks at NASA. MIT, and silicon valley dont share it.
So do you think we might someday reach some sort of limit where we’re refining things versus coming up with brand new “big” things? Like I said earlier, I think it’s helpful to come up with some categories that technology falls in. The goal being to come up with categories that cover everything and see how we’re doing in those categories. We can also speculate, somehow, on new categories, like guessing from Sci-fi or whatever.
Here’s my start:
Transportation (so we’ve progressed from on foot, to on animal, to car, plane, and rocket) —Future might be: warp rockets, transporters
Medical (progressed from incantations, to blunt surgery, to basic operations and disease control, to advanced medical techniques) —Future might be: no-cut surgery, nanobot-based healing
Communication (progressed from word of mouth, to animal based (like horseback courier), to simple signals like telegraph, to phone, to cell phone) —Future might be: ???
Religion (progressed from a variety of mythical irrational explanations of life and rules for lving to ... oh wait, we haven’t progressed) —Future might be: more of the same kinds of nonsense
Religion (progressed from a variety of mythical irrational explanations of life and rules for lving to ... oh wait, we haven’t progressed) —Future might be: more of the same kinds of nonsense
Actually I’m a little more optimistic, though not for any big change in at least 2 or 3 generations. The way I see it, religions “progression” has been this (at least in Western society):
From Church and male dominated hierarchy was everything, to Church was important, allowed women into hierarchy publically (to some extent) but became mostly personal, to Church was increasingly unimportant even personally, to church and religion being looked upon as astrology is now, to religion being just some funny old beliefs that people look back on and scratch their heads in disbelief.
Have to ever wondered if we could be reaching our apex?
Its funny you say that. I remember reading a quote once from someone very influential in the 1800’ saying something to the same effect in that he believed man had invented everything of significance that could ever be invented. Its always a bit tricky when you try to predict the limits of humanity’s ingenuity and creativity or the limits of what the universe has to offer for that matter.
. . . and you don’t see any fundamental differences between now and back in those days?
Not really. The comment made here and the one made in the 1800’s both demonstrate the same lack of imagination. Im just glad the folks at NASA. MIT, and silicon valley dont share it.
I wasn’t going to continue this because it’s too depressing and believe it or not I’m not all about being a depressed bummer.
But, your reply has spent a couple days revisiting my mind and then today this get’s put in front of me. It’s the kind of thing that draws shoot-from-the-hip derision from economic liberals, right-wingers and an assortment of other characters. But, then if one takes the time to read carefully and visit some of the many, many reports and studies referenced in that article. Jeez, we are in deep shit… and I just can’t, for the life of me, figure out how people don’t recognize a fundamental shift having to do with the very global biosphere that has nurtured and sustained us (humanity) for these past tens of thousands of years.
It’s like me listening to economic news, that obsession with GROWTH RATE, it just makes my head spin, {almost as much as those great NASA dreamers who play at seriously planning visits, or crazier still colonizing, Mars. }.
We depend on a healthy biosphere for our survival - why do the vast majority of people believe that we can dream our way around that basic fact of life?
And we are destroying that biosphere as fast as we possibly can, and always in a hurry to speed that consumption.
Like a chlorotic alcoholic who’s only thought is how to increase the flow of alcohol to numb the increasing pain.
Human-generated pressures, at their current pace, will likely drive our planet’s ecosystems to an irreversible collapse in the coming decades, according to a new paper in the journal Nature.
The paper, titled “Approaching a state-shift in Earth’s biosphere,” is the work of 18 scientists from Chile, Canada, Finland, the U.K., Spain and the United States.
That dire prediction may be one of the greatest engines for technological advancements. One would hope that 100 years from now we will out of necessity have developed better and renewable sources of energy and will be manufacturing in sustainable ways that dont damage the environment. I am no naive enough to believe its going to happen soon. The captains of industry are far more interested in profits than the environment and only pay lip service to low impact manufacturing but when the environment becomes an undeniable crisis society will finally decide that breathing is as important as jobs and force industry to reduce their environmental impact. That will require investments in energy and recycling technologies.
... when the environment becomes an undeniable crisis society will finally decide that breathing is as important as jobs and force industry to reduce their environmental impact. That will require investments in energy and recycling technologies.
By the time that happens in the United States there will be catastrophic wars in a lot of other countries. So most likely plenty of disturbing and complicated things will be happening before we reach that point.
...when the environment becomes an undeniable crisis society will finally decide that breathing is as important as jobs and force industry to reduce their environmental impact…
Maybe, or maybe the masses of workers will be convinced that they simply need to continue to work harder for the captains of industry, so that everyone can have jobs and make enough money to purchase their ration of clean air.
...when the environment becomes an undeniable crisis society will finally decide that breathing is as important as jobs and force industry to reduce their environmental impact…
Maybe, or maybe the masses of workers will be convinced that they simply need to continue to work harder for the captains of industry, so that everyone can have jobs and make enough money to purchase their ration of clean air.
But haven’t these conditions already been reached in China? Where is the revolt?
...when the environment becomes an undeniable crisis society will finally decide that breathing is as important as jobs and force industry to reduce their environmental impact…
Maybe, or maybe the masses of workers will be convinced that they simply need to continue to work harder for the captains of industry, so that everyone can have jobs and make enough money to purchase their ration of clean air.
But haven’t these conditions already been reached in China? Where is the revolt?
psik
I am not familiar enough with the conditions in China, to say, but that is my point, there may be no revolution, other than, ultimately, some general chaotic breakdown of societies.
I am not familiar enough with the conditions in China, to say, but that is my point, there may be no revolution, other than, ultimately, some general chaotic breakdown of societies.
If the same corporations that cause the pollution, could profit from the production of breathing masks, and even, from providing tanks of clean breathable air, then the economic contingencies would be in place for the promotion of more pollution, so as to further increase profits.
Hmm.. In my own way of expressing what I taught is that, its very hard to tell what would be the outcome in the future, but having a good and positive thing is much better to reach our goal.
