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> Almost all the important technical inventions of the 20th century happened outside Europe. Evidence please?

ur-whale 8y ago
To name a few minor ones: - The transistor - The computer - Atomic energy - The search engine - The internet Shall I go on?
- pjmlp 8y ago
  Those had many Europeans on their teams, specially German researchers, while Europe was busy recovering from WW II.
  - ur-whale 8y ago
    >Those had many Europeans on their teams, specially German researchers Thank you for proving my point. I never said Europeans were bad engineers, far from it. I'm saying they leave because it's just impossible to innovate in Europe, and that's a major problem.
    - pjmlp 8y ago
      You skipped over > while Europe was busy recovering from WW II. Many of those inventions started here during WW II. Also innovation is not only IT stuff, I bet many in US enjoy being treated with Bayer medicine, stuffing their house with IKEA furniture, doing games in Unity, talking with their friends over Skype, having a mobile phone that one can easily swap out a SIM card, ....
      - ur-whale 8y ago
        None of the stuff you list is in any way a "major" tech innovation. That's all Europe has produced in tech. in the last 70 years: crumbs off the table. And it's not going to get any better: whatever WW-II based explanation you may provide to justify the current state of affairs, it's not a solution to the problem. The problem is that European innovators operate in a hostile environment. If they stay, it cripples them. If they're smart enough to realize this, they leave and go to a place where they can be successful.
- welterde 8y ago
  Not all of those happened exclusively outside of Europe - there was some parallel development in Europe as well (transistor, computers). The transistor was independently developed in France shortly before the public announcement by Bell Labs. And the arguable first working "modern" digital computer (programmable, fully automated, using floating point) was the Z3 in 1941 (which started the Zuse KG, a computer hardware company, which lasted until ~1970). And most of the first few search engines were based in Europe (mostly Geneva).. and you might also have heard of a small invention out of CERN that you are using right now..
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - ur-whale 8y ago
    I'm very sorry, but it's hard not to laugh at this list ... and to try and be objective: these examples make my point even stronger. None of the folks who may or may not have been the first to invent these things in Europe managed to exploit the economic potential of what they had invented. It is a deeply sad commentary of how much of bright people's potential is utterly pissed down the drain every day in Europe. Oh, also, you forgot to mention that the French invented the internet first (t'was called the minitel). The minitel was a perfect example of a government-run tech. program: 10 years after it was launched, it was still operating at the original speed of 300 bps. One of very many brilliant ideas left to rot on the altar of socialist-run centralized western europe societies.
    - welterde 8y ago
      > and to try and be objective: these examples make my point even stronger. Maybe you forgot, but you claimed that almost all the important technical innovations of the 20th century happened outside of Europe. When asked for evidence you produced a list, which includes innovations that were developed in parallel in Europe as well (or even predate the development outside of Europe). Or is your argument that only who ends up winning in the end (by some arbitrary metric) is the true inventor of some technology? So how exactly does it make your point stronger? > None of the folks who may or may not have been the first to invent these things in Europe managed to exploit the economic potential of what they had invented. By all accounts the Zuse KG did quite well for a few decades, before a few questionable business decisions ended it (and it was bought out by Siemens). But initially he indeed was able to exploit it's commercial potential (in fact he was the first person to do so..). > It is a deeply sad commentary of how much of bright people's potential is utterly pissed down the drain every day in Europe. And that's not the case in the US..? And exactly how or why is this happening here and not in the US? Fair point about Minitel, but that doesn't translate into all aspects of technology.. far from it.
- growlist 8y ago
  Here's a quick selection, excuse my partisanship, I couldn't find an equivalent list for specifically European innovation: Antibiotics - British Tank - British Television - at least shared by Britain and others Stereo audio - British Computer - critical aspects conceptualised and realised in Britain Jet engine - largely German/English Radar - largely British Maglev - British Hovercraft - British Float glass process - British Carbon fibre - British Liquid Crystal (or at least a critical step) - British RSA encryption - British World wide web - British SMS - British Shall I go on?
  - ur-whale 8y ago
    The list is mostly from a country that's not exactly in Europe anymore ;) [edit] I should have been more specific and said that I didn't include the Brits in when I think of flagging innovation in western Europe. The focus was on Germany and to some extent the countries directly around it. That being said: not a single union jack in sight in the page below ... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_largest_information_technology_companies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_largest_informatio... You have to get down to #28 to find one in this list: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_Internet_companies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_Internet_compa... And that's the key: however inventive folks from a given country may be, if the socio-economic system they operate in does impede innovation (and TBH I don't know enough about your island to comment about that), then all of these great ideas are for naught, they end up benefiting others.
    - growlist 8y ago
      Getting into semantics now, but I think entrepreneurialism is perhaps better than innovation, since innovation is not exclusive to business situations. But even then I still have difficulty with what you say about innovation though - tech companies are just one area of business! Germany is the world's third largest exporter, with much of its exports containing cutting edge technology designed and manufactured in Germany, but apparently that doesn't count as innovation in your mind as its not on the Internet?

To name a few minor ones: - The transistor - The computer - Atomic energy - The search engine - The internet Shall I go on?

pjmlp 8y ago
Those had many Europeans on their teams, specially German researchers, while Europe was busy recovering from WW II.
- ur-whale 8y ago
  >Those had many Europeans on their teams, specially German researchers Thank you for proving my point. I never said Europeans were bad engineers, far from it. I'm saying they leave because it's just impossible to innovate in Europe, and that's a major problem.
  - pjmlp 8y ago
    You skipped over > while Europe was busy recovering from WW II. Many of those inventions started here during WW II. Also innovation is not only IT stuff, I bet many in US enjoy being treated with Bayer medicine, stuffing their house with IKEA furniture, doing games in Unity, talking with their friends over Skype, having a mobile phone that one can easily swap out a SIM card, ....
    - ur-whale 8y ago
      None of the stuff you list is in any way a "major" tech innovation. That's all Europe has produced in tech. in the last 70 years: crumbs off the table. And it's not going to get any better: whatever WW-II based explanation you may provide to justify the current state of affairs, it's not a solution to the problem. The problem is that European innovators operate in a hostile environment. If they stay, it cripples them. If they're smart enough to realize this, they leave and go to a place where they can be successful.
welterde 8y ago
Not all of those happened exclusively outside of Europe - there was some parallel development in Europe as well (transistor, computers). The transistor was independently developed in France shortly before the public announcement by Bell Labs. And the arguable first working "modern" digital computer (programmable, fully automated, using floating point) was the Z3 in 1941 (which started the Zuse KG, a computer hardware company, which lasted until ~1970). And most of the first few search engines were based in Europe (mostly Geneva).. and you might also have heard of a small invention out of CERN that you are using right now..
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- ur-whale 8y ago
  I'm very sorry, but it's hard not to laugh at this list ... and to try and be objective: these examples make my point even stronger. None of the folks who may or may not have been the first to invent these things in Europe managed to exploit the economic potential of what they had invented. It is a deeply sad commentary of how much of bright people's potential is utterly pissed down the drain every day in Europe. Oh, also, you forgot to mention that the French invented the internet first (t'was called the minitel). The minitel was a perfect example of a government-run tech. program: 10 years after it was launched, it was still operating at the original speed of 300 bps. One of very many brilliant ideas left to rot on the altar of socialist-run centralized western europe societies.
  - welterde 8y ago
    > and to try and be objective: these examples make my point even stronger. Maybe you forgot, but you claimed that almost all the important technical innovations of the 20th century happened outside of Europe. When asked for evidence you produced a list, which includes innovations that were developed in parallel in Europe as well (or even predate the development outside of Europe). Or is your argument that only who ends up winning in the end (by some arbitrary metric) is the true inventor of some technology? So how exactly does it make your point stronger? > None of the folks who may or may not have been the first to invent these things in Europe managed to exploit the economic potential of what they had invented. By all accounts the Zuse KG did quite well for a few decades, before a few questionable business decisions ended it (and it was bought out by Siemens). But initially he indeed was able to exploit it's commercial potential (in fact he was the first person to do so..). > It is a deeply sad commentary of how much of bright people's potential is utterly pissed down the drain every day in Europe. And that's not the case in the US..? And exactly how or why is this happening here and not in the US? Fair point about Minitel, but that doesn't translate into all aspects of technology.. far from it.
growlist 8y ago
Here's a quick selection, excuse my partisanship, I couldn't find an equivalent list for specifically European innovation: Antibiotics - British Tank - British Television - at least shared by Britain and others Stereo audio - British Computer - critical aspects conceptualised and realised in Britain Jet engine - largely German/English Radar - largely British Maglev - British Hovercraft - British Float glass process - British Carbon fibre - British Liquid Crystal (or at least a critical step) - British RSA encryption - British World wide web - British SMS - British Shall I go on?
- ur-whale 8y ago
  The list is mostly from a country that's not exactly in Europe anymore ;) [edit] I should have been more specific and said that I didn't include the Brits in when I think of flagging innovation in western Europe. The focus was on Germany and to some extent the countries directly around it. That being said: not a single union jack in sight in the page below ... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_largest_information_technology_companies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_largest_informatio... You have to get down to #28 to find one in this list: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_Internet_companies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_Internet_compa... And that's the key: however inventive folks from a given country may be, if the socio-economic system they operate in does impede innovation (and TBH I don't know enough about your island to comment about that), then all of these great ideas are for naught, they end up benefiting others.
  - growlist 8y ago
    Getting into semantics now, but I think entrepreneurialism is perhaps better than innovation, since innovation is not exclusive to business situations. But even then I still have difficulty with what you say about innovation though - tech companies are just one area of business! Germany is the world's third largest exporter, with much of its exports containing cutting edge technology designed and manufactured in Germany, but apparently that doesn't count as innovation in your mind as its not on the Internet?