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I have always thought if I was born some 200-300 years back, I would have made many scientific discoveries by myself. Science has indeed got harder.
by girishso 4y ago
I have always thought if I was born some 200-300 years back, I would have made many scientific discoveries by myself. Science has indeed got harder.
- pixl97 4y agoOne common thing seen when looking back on discoveries is many times the 'same' discovery was made independently by many people. The bottleneck was more in 'publishing', that is getting other people to know about what you figured out.
- bee_rider 4y agoWhat is "you?" If I, with my current education, was sent back 200 years... I could probably do OK with inventing stuff (engineering education, so I have some good answers backed by a nice model, much of which I'd have to work backwards to derive because who remembers 200 level engineering classes?). It took Marconi a while to realize that he had to ground the antennas, so there's a pretty good discovery for free. On the other hand, if I was actually born then... I think I'm a pretty clever guy, but not a genius. Someone like me 200 years ago would probably... I dunno, be trusted to fix mill equipment. Or maybe work on watches, depending on where I was born. Maybe I'd be a town pharmacist or something.
- nradov 4y agoUp until about 300 years ago it was possible for a wealthy person with plenty of free time to learn literally all of the scientific knowledge in western civilization.