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Ask HN: What’s the most important modern simple invention?

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Re: Ask HN: What’s the most important modern simple invention?

#541

Post by 80386 »

derefr wrote: post #318
Aperocky wrote: post #306

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> over half of them would work in farming Why would throwing more people at the problem solve or mitigate lack of fertilizer?

More land would necessarily be farmland (i.e. there'd be less land "free" to dedicate to other things); so there'd probably need to be more farmers to work the additional land. Even in the modern world where a farm is mostly robots, one person can only manage so much land and so many robots (essentially the amount of land they can easily traverse in a few hours to check up on.)

And large-scale automated farming is less productive per acre than small-scale labor-intensive farming.

Re: Ask HN: What’s the most important modern simple invention?

#542

Post by anthonypasq »

oska wrote: post #389
antepodius wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

May as well just say The Earth would be better off if people had never existed if you're going to go that route. There's more people living better lives, so things are better. There are new problems caused by our previous success that we solve next.

> May as well just say The Earth would be better off if people had never existed if you're going to go that route. No, that most certainly doesn't follow. It's entirely usual and normal for an amount of something in a system to be fine but then an excess of the same thing to be not fine. This is a very common situation in medicine, for example.

We only care about the state of the system as it relates to humans.

Re: Ask HN: What’s the most important modern simple invention?

#543

Post by chirau »

icebraining wrote: post #526
chirau wrote: post #280

I'd have to say cunnilingus and fellatio. Fewer greater joys exist. Closely followed by the water-heater and air-conditioner. Hot water and temperature-control are under-appreciated.

> I'd have to say cunnilingus and fellatio. Fewer greater joys exist. Neither are modern.

When were they invented?

Re: Ask HN: What’s the most important modern simple invention?

#544

Post by icebraining »

chirau wrote: post #543
icebraining wrote: post #526

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'd have to say cunnilingus and fellatio. Fewer greater joys exist. Neither are modern.

When were they invented?

I doubt anyone knows, but the Kamasutra is about 2000 years old, and already described both.

Re: Ask HN: What’s the most important modern simple invention?

#545

Post by new2628 »

reidjs wrote: post #289
new2628 wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And arguably, soaps available in shops are getting worse with every iteration. Enter a big store in most of the developed world, and you can hardly find a regular soap bar anymore (only liquids, "hydrating bars", etc.). Craft markets still have them luckily.

Curious as to why you prefer regular soap bar over liquid soap?

With liquid soap I always feel like I can never fully remove it from my skin, no matter how long I rinse it with water afterwards. With a soap bar my hands just feel cleaner, less greasy. They also last longer and are easier to store/transport, need less packaging, etc. Also basic soap bars have two or three main ingredients whose effects are fully understood and have been used for centuries if not millenia. The list of components of the latest liquid soaps is far more obscure, no-one knows their long-term effects on us and the environment.

Re: Ask HN: What’s the most important modern simple invention?

#546

Post by philwelch »

RandallBrown wrote: post #431
TomMckenny wrote: post #425

The cargo container: it has changed the entire planet culturally, economically and geopolitically. It would be hard to count the percentage of every day objects most people use world wide that owe their availability or existence to that standardized metal box.

The invention there was more standardization than the actual box. Cargo boxes have existed as long as people have had cargo.

Sure but having a massive steel box that can be craned onto a truck or train provides a lot of value. So does the fact that the boxes are indistinguishable and locking. Theft by stevedores used to be a massive global tax on trade.

Re: Ask HN: What’s the most important modern simple invention?

#547

Post by WalterBright »

ken wrote: post #528
WalterBright wrote: post #511

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The history of the industrial revolution since the advent of the steam engine amply makes my point.

Just because history played out one way doesn’t mean it could only have played out that way.

It played out that way in every country that adopted the steam engine, and failed to happen at all in countries that did not.

As I say, the historical evidence is as compelling as it gets.

Re: Ask HN: What’s the most important modern simple invention?

#548

Post by nojvek »

Basic hygiene. Washing hands and yourself with hot water and soap. Not exchanging needles. Covering your mouth before sneezing. Tampons / pads, toilet tissue (although I prefer a faucet and doing a first pass with water. More hygienic and less tissue used. Also much better for the bottom)

Vaccines, anti-biopics and good hygiene and sanitary practices have doubled our average life span.

With a long life we’ve been able to achieve a lot more. Women have been more productive, we’ve created more wealth, have fewer children so each child has more resources and opportunities.

The state of US healthcare really makes me sad, but I’m hopeful we’ll keep on learning more about the human body and engineer more ways of fixing it and making us all live a longer, healthier, wealthier, happier life.

Re: Ask HN: What’s the most important modern simple invention?

#550

Post by dublin »

ncmncm wrote: post #467
puranjay wrote: post #461

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then you have to carry around a sharpener with you everywhere Never seen anyone walking around with a pencil clipped to their shirt pocket.

I do, but you would mistake it for a pen. Mechanical pencils are a Thing. Pentel makes good ones.

The Pentel P225 is the best mechanical pencil ever. There can be no argument.
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