1999 : WHAT IS THE MOST IMPORTANT INVENTION IN THE PAST TWO THOUSAND YEARS?
Author; The Cancer Chronicles, The Ten Most Beautiful Experiments; Columnist, The New York Times
Writer for The New York Times
Surely one of the most powerful earthly inventions has been the ability to represent any phenomenon with numbers — either analogue or digital — and then use this representation to predict outcomes in the real world. This information revolution actually began before the year zero with the Pythagoreans and has advanced through stages that include the invention of calculus and, most recently, boolean algebra and all the advantages of digital modeling.
And just as important has been the recent humbling realization that there are limits to this scientific cartography; that, tempting as it is, the map can never be mistaken for the real thing.
