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The Wheel or the Computer? Which one has done more for humans?

No matter how advanced we become, I'll bet that somewhere there will always be wheels spinning.
 
Correct.

Has done = wheel
Will do = computer
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Wrong. Both. Which is precisely why I think it's a dumb question. Your asking to compare two completely different technologies whose time frame and application are completely different.
 
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technoextreme said:
Wrong. Both. Which is precisely why I think it's a dumb question. Your asking to compare two completely different technologies whose time frame and application are completely different.
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Imagine that! A comparison! Who could ever have an opinion on that?
 
technoextreme said:
Wrong. Both. Which is precisely why I think it's a dumb question. Your asking to compare two completely different technologies whose time frame and application are completely different.
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Well, again, let’s not get too hung up on the differences between the wheel and computing devices. As we have both said, some computing devices do depend on variants of the wheel and as I have said others do not. I have no reference to assert that the abacus might have been developed before the wheel. However, I do know that the computing device that developed the wheel was the human mind.
 
applecorped said:
Correct.

Has done = wheel
Will do = computer
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Not at all. As far as I see it, there is no real application at which a computer can bring any significant benefit. Has I have explained a computer all it does in to perform all the tedious number crushing that one could do it by hand but it takes to much time. Although a computer can be an important tool, most of the future research and new developments can by implication NOT be done whit a computer at all, but must be done by hand. A probably it will always be like this because you would need to know what it is before you build a computer to do it for you.
 
TMiguel said:
Not at all. As far as I see it, there is no real application at which a computer can bring any significant benefit.
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How about the ability to share that sentence with thousands, or potentially millions, of people easily?
 
The wheel. Until we have hovercars, at which point the wheel will become completely obsolete and we will instead worship ionflux-fusion thrusters. Where's my hovercar, dammit?!?
 
Cuddles said:
The wheel. Until we have hovercars, at which point the wheel will become completely obsolete and we will instead worship ionflux-fusion thrusters. Where's my hovercar, dammit?!?
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Even then, any steering gimballs etc. will probably be based on the wheel. To physically manipulate something you need a very advanced technology before the wheel becomes obsolete.
 
In the last 1500 years, I'd put printing and gunpowder as the most important inventions, as one allowed an intellectual debate to be fostered, and the other removed the military, and consequentlal social, economic and political dominance that armoured, trained, well-fed warriors had over even rich peasants, and burghers.

These were the two most important technologies for ending the feudal system and ending the middle ages.

In the last 500,000 years: fire*, clothes*, baskets, belts and pockets (free hands, can carry babies), pottery, agriculature,
*maybe these are earlier?

Before that, the knife and spear, as they moved humans up the food chain
 
jimbob said:
In the last 1500 years, I'd put printing and gunpowder as the most important inventions, as one allowed an intellectual debate to be fostered, and the other removed the military, and consequentlal social, economic and political dominance that armoured, trained, well-fed warriors had over even rich peasants, and burghers.

These were the two most important technologies for ending the feudal system and ending the middle ages.

In the last 500,000 years: fire*, clothes*, baskets, belts and pockets (free hands, can carry babies), pottery, agriculature,
*maybe these are earlier?

Before that, the knife and spear, as they moved humans up the food chain
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The role of homo sapiens ancestros was that of scavenger, not really a move up, more a move over. Scavnge bone marrow, sinews (string) and hides.

Not man the noble hunter, man the one that gets it after everyone else.

BTW, we don't have data on certain objects past about 14,000 years ago.
 
Zygar said:
The wheel is nothing. The axle was the real invention.
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Zygar is indeed correct. While the proto-wheel (i.e. rolling things on a bunch of heavy logs, then picking up the logs and put them ahead of the big thing again) had its uses* it was the wheel axle that made a real difference. And it was also pretty damn impressive because the wheel axle is one design you just don't find in nature. I'm not sure how many steps it took from the protowheel until the first axle as we know it, but those must have been some clever bastards to figure that one out.


*At least if you like making big monuments with very big pieces of stone in honour of yourself and/or your current favourite deity. And really, who doesn't?
 
Hawk one said:
And it was also pretty damn impressive because the wheel axle is one design you just don't find in nature. I'm not sure how many steps it took from the protowheel until the first axle as we know it, but those must have been some clever bastards to figure that one out.
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Not really. Going from an fulcrum to axle isn't really all that impressive in a leap of faith. They are both pivot points. Now having someone figure out that you could lift something 5 times your own weight using a combination of wheels,levers, and gears is more impressive.
Well, again, let’s not get too hung up on the differences between the wheel and computing devices.
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There is a reason though to. The wheel for all intents and purposes is considered one of the basic building blocks for all mechanical devices. It's pretty much a given to anyone with basic mechanical background that you are going to be working with it if you are going to build something that moves. In order to create a valid comparison you have to compare the wheel to something more electrically basic. Something more like a building block.
 
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technoextreme said:
Not really. Going from an fulcrum to axle isn't really all that impressive in a leap of faith. They are both pivot points. Now having someone figure out that you could lift something 5 times your own weight using a combination of wheels,levers, and gears is more impressive.

There is a reason though to. The wheel for all intents and purposes is considered one of the basic building blocks for all mechanical devices. It's pretty much a given to anyone with basic mechanical background that you are going to be working with it if you are going to build something that moves. In order to create a valid comparison you have to compare the wheel to something more electrically basic. Something more like a building block.
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Like a transistor...

My take on it is that computing devices and wheels are pretty much equal in terms of usefulness. Both exclusively improve the time and performance of actions you could do without them. As I see it, the primary question is whether mechanical or digital items have a greater impact on mankind. And I'd have to say it's an absolute tossup.

The digital age has lent to much better mechanical goods. Take the automobile, for example. It's been dramatically improved due to manufacturing processes only available to us due to computing. Not to mention the computers driving them.

At the same time, we'd never have been able to create the concept of computing without clockwork. Nor could we have the components to make modern computers without the significant improvements in manufacturing processes which came in the industrial age.

Today, computers are made by wheels, and wheels are made by computers. It's a tossup.
 
TMiguel said:
Any new cutting edge knowledge are on papers that are widely distributed around the world.
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Are you suggesting there's been no improvement on the distribution of knowledge between the time of the Guttenberg bible and now?
 
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