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With Mike Mullikin celebrating 55 years on this earth it has made me think about my lifetime and particularly the technical innovations I have seen and experienced. I have a few years on Mike so I go back a little further. For example I can remember Sputnik in 1957 and TV beginning in my home city of Perth in 1959. I saw a microwave oven in about 1966 (Philips). The first computer I encountered was an IBM 1620 and I ran a Basic program on it in 1968. This sat in a room next to a huge Cyber. Of course I watched the moon landing live in 1969. Hand held calculators arrived and I reveled in my HP-25. As a post-grad student I fired a Q switched dye laser to burn a hole in a razor blade late one night. About the same time optical fibre communications commenced. I built a Z-80 based micro from a kit in about 1981. The IBM PC came and with it with PC software (database, spreadsheet etc). Then came BBS and acoustic modems. The internet, cds, ink jet printers, flat screen displays, digital cameras, cnc machines, gps, wifi, cellphones and many other things have followed.
When I think about all these innovations my personal choice as the most amazing in my lifetime is the global positioning system (gps) which relies on many of the above technologies as well as Einstein. Fibre optics a close second. What do others think? I am especially curious about which recent innovations have grabbed people.
Peter Wasser
"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts." - Bertrand Russell
modified 8-Oct-18 8:03am.
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The most important innovation ever, was probably the Smallpox vaccine from Edward Jenner,. but aas that as 1796 it probably doesn't count...
In my lifetime? The integrated circuit which was patented 18 days before I was born (but 8 1/2 months after I was conceived, so I'm counting it) Without that, almost nothing in our modern lives would be the same ... cars, planes, mobiles, computers, medicine, electric power supplies, logistics; everything relies on them to work, or to be designed and / or built.
Sent from my Amstrad PC 1640
Never throw anything away, Griff
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
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OriginalGriff wrote: ...Edward Jenner...
Did he lop off his Gentlemen's Vegetables and become a girl too?
Michael Martin
Australia
"I controlled my laughter and simple said "No,I am very busy,so I can't write any code for you". The moment they heard this all the smiling face turned into a sad looking face and one of them farted. So I had to leave the place as soon as possible."
- Mr.Prakash One Fine Saturday. 24/04/2004
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The IC is an interesting one. I can remember a guy coming to where I was working during my holidays in the late 60's to use one of our microscopes. What was he looking at? An IC. Where did it come from? He made it in his lab at the local hospital. I'm not sure the real significance of it was recognised by any of us.
Peter Wasser
"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts." - Bertrand Russell
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If you are going back in time, then Agriculture would trump the smallpox vaccine and just about everything else except Fire.... and those are in a photo finish, depending on whether you like the veggies or the chargrilled steak better... 
"new" isn't better, just different
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Many, including Jared Diamond (author of "Guns, Germs, and Steel"), think that agriculture was the worst thing that ever happened to humankind.
The increase in carbs (wheat, rice, etc.) has really done a number on us.
From another perspective, it introduced "profit" which freed up people to innovate and develop other skills.
My jury is still out.
Cheers,
Mike Fidler
"I intend to live forever - so far, so good." Steven Wright
"I almost had a psychic girlfriend but she left me before we met." Also Steven Wright
"I'm addicted to placebos. I could quit, but it wouldn't matter." Steven Wright yet again.
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Glad I could be of service... 
As for technical innovations... that's a tough one because so many of them kind of flow from one another.
Space flight... communication satellites... weather satellites... personal computers... internet... cell phones...
But it hasn't all been flowers and kittens. We also get Facebook, Twitter and the Kardashians coming along for the ride. 
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Mike Mullikin wrote: But it hasn't all been flowers and kittens.
We are on the same page here - a generational thing I suppose.
Peter Wasser
"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts." - Bertrand Russell
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Warp drive.
Ooops. Wrong century. 
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Marc Clifton wrote: Warp drive.
Ooops. Wrong century.
So you have a Time Machine hidden away somewhere too?
Michael Martin
Australia
"I controlled my laughter and simple said "No,I am very busy,so I can't write any code for you". The moment they heard this all the smiling face turned into a sad looking face and one of them farted. So I had to leave the place as soon as possible."
- Mr.Prakash One Fine Saturday. 24/04/2004
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We're probably close to the same age.
The Cuban missle crisis
JFK, Bobby and MLK were shot
I was on my second tour in Viet Nam when man landed on the moon.
The one innovation that most amazed me was the computer.
I may not be that good looking, or athletic, or funny, or talented, or smart
I forgot where I was going with this but I do know I love bacon!
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Yes, all those historic events interspersed with the the technological advances make up our lives. You went down a track that I managed to avoid with your military service. The computer particularly the PC is very significant and amazing in many ways. There is no other invention that has become so ubiquitous. Perhaps I have become blase about them.
Peter Wasser
"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts." - Bertrand Russell
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pwasser wrote: The computer particularly the PC ... There is no other invention that has become so ubiquitous.
*cough* mobile phone *cough*
Sent from my Amstrad PC 1640
Never throw anything away, Griff
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
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That would be any of those IoT items OG keeps posting over the weekends
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Most significant technological innovation in my lifetime? That's an easy one -- the personal computer.
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Yes I forgot to mention the medical advances. Heart transplants, NMR and particularly DNA technologies. That is a big one for sure.
Peter Wasser
"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts." - Bertrand Russell
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Easy - reliable birth control! 
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I agree - the pill. It allowed the other half of us to be in control of pregnancy. So we doubled the number of people able to do interesting work and caused other societal changes as well.
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Most people around here are far too young to remember Sputnik. (I remember Apollo 11!) But lots of the inventions people would mention as made in their own life time, are not - they are much older.
Like the microwave: As a boy, I read about these in my parents' old science books dated 1951 and 1952. These books also explained how color TV was made, with a photo of a color TV screen. And of optical "fibers" - they were glass pipes, not fibers, but the principle explained in the article is that of optical fibers. The first IC came in 1949. The first digital computers were developed during WW2. FM radio was patented in 1935, the field-effect transistor in 1925.
Of my own "firsts" worth mentioning that I did play around programming APL on what I believe was the first commercial portable (/luggable) personal computer, the IBM 5100, back in 1975 - but it wasn't an "invention", just a smaller form factor.
Some times I have fun with my younger colleagues, when a crash leads to a core dump, I ask if they have ever seen a real core dump - and then I show them my old 1152 bit core memory. Or I dig up my old card decks, or punched paper tape. Even flapping floppies, 8 in size, is something new and unknown to younger people today.
Now that you mention calculators: The first generation came as four-function (+-/*) or five-function (with square root as well) variants - the latter quite a lot more expensive. A friend of mine wanted to save money by buying the cheaper one, hoping that it actually could do sqrt, if you found the solder connections for the button. He digged out a scalpel to cut an opening in the plastic case where the 5-fn model had its sqrt button ... and the button popped up! Even the button itself was there, inside the case! No soldering required, no button needed. Making an opening in the case was all that was required.
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Talking about IBM 5100, have you seen "Compaq Portable 1" restoration videos made by 8-bit guy? One of the hardest restoration projects he has done yet.
Going back on topic, 3D printer is a really cool relatively recent invention. Even they are not as significant like the other things mentioned here, I think it's pretty amazing to see your computer generated 3d model come to life. What do you think? Do you think 3D printers could become big deal in a few years and even reach general consumer market?
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An IBM 5100 (or IBN 5100) is the only computer that can derail the coming distopia! 
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No one mentioned "The Clapper"! 
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I might be about the same age as Peter Wasser - I am 67 and, like him, from Australia. My first computer was my university's IBM 7040 in 1969 which I programmed in assembly language. I have been programming ever since, although now semi-retired. These days I make apps for Android phones using Java. And while I agree on GPS and fibre optics as being significant I think I have to agree with others here that computers, especially as personal devices, and the internet are the innovations with the greatest impact. However a close contender is the mobile phone and another is the commercial use of jet aircraft.
David Shillito
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Invented a while before I was born but anyway. The late Hans Rosling said that the most important invention was the washing machine. Because that freed up a lot of time for the women not having to stand in some frozen creek in the middle of the winter washing clothes. Instead they could read to their kids, help them with homework and make higher education possible for a greater part of the population.
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