• Quick note - the problem with Youtube videos not embedding on the forum appears to have been fixed, thanks to ZiprHead. If you do still see problems let me know.

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

Wheel. It promote actually interacting physically with the world. It provides a way to efficient harvest, make things mobile, etc.
While the computer has helped, and continues to help in many ways. It promotes detached socializing which will eventually cause more social anxiety and interaction issues. Furthermore, should something ever happen to the electricity we have come to reply on, at least the wheel will still be there, even is we have to carve it the "old fashioned" way.
 
Faolan said:
Wheel. It promote actually interacting physically with the world. It provides a way to efficient harvest, make things mobile, etc.
While the computer has helped, and continues to help in many ways. It promotes detached socializing which will eventually cause more social anxiety and interaction issues. Furthermore, should something ever happen to the electricity we have come to reply on, at least the wheel will still be there, even is we have to carve it the "old fashioned" way.
Click to expand...

The wheel should be King. It isn't. It has been taken over by the computer with all its faults. Computers will exponentially insinuate itself into our lives.
 
Faolan said:
Wheel. ... Furthermore, should something ever happen to the electricity we have come to reply on, at least the wheel will still be there, even is we have to carve it the "old fashioned" way.
Click to expand...

Been reading too much SM Sterling, I see. What if something happens to all the grease?
 
Faolan said:
It promotes detached socializing which will eventually cause more social anxiety and interaction issues.
Click to expand...

Although I've been in the IT industry for less than a decade, I've noticed that the typical computer nerd is disappearing. With the "detached socializing" you get situations where people who would otherwise be isolated in their mother's basements get social training in non-threatening environments. The end result is more socialized geeks. It's popular to decry modern technology, but kids today socialize constantly and with a far wider social circle than their parents could ever hope.

ETA: That being said, everything the computer has ever done for us has the wheel as a prerequisite, so the wheel is absolutely the king.
 
Last edited:
In that the computer would have been impossible without the wheel, but the wheel does not rely on computers at all, the wheel wins hands down.
 
gdnp said:
In that the computer would have been impossible without the wheel, but the wheel does not rely on computers at all, the wheel wins hands down.
Click to expand...

Well, in that case, the simple machines win (as argued in one point here, The Lever and the Inclined Plane :D)

Seriously. This isn't a question that can be reasonably asked. The full development of neither computer nor wheel has occurred. Perhaps computers enable the invention of the grogznoxaplorx. What would civilization ever have done without that?
 
Jimbo07 said:
Well, in that case, the simple machines win (as argued in one point here, The Lever and the Inclined Plane :D)

Seriously. This isn't a question that can be reasonably asked. The full development of neither computer nor wheel has occurred. Perhaps computers enable the invention of the grogznoxaplorx. What would civilization ever have done without that?
Click to expand...

irrelevant, since the development of the computer depended on the wheel, if the grogznoxaplorx could not have been developed without computers, it could not have been developed without wheels either.
 
gdnp said:
In that the computer would have been impossible without the wheel, but the wheel does not rely on computers at all, the wheel wins hands down.
Click to expand...

Without the evolution of the biological computer it would have been impossible to invent the wheel.
 
I'd have to read up on my simple machines to figure out if components of the motive apparatus of the flagellum qualify as wheels. I suspect nature has other examples, developed independently of human thought.
 
One could technically argue both...

The computer has probably done more overall... however without the wheel, the ability to carry large computer components from one location to the other and set them up and build the buildings that carried them back in the days when computers were still gigantic, they would probably not have gotten the start they needed.

I could be wrong...


INRM
 
gdnp said:
irrelevant, since the development of the computer depended on the wheel, if the grogznoxaplorx could not have been developed without computers, it could not have been developed without wheels either.
Click to expand...

... but I guess that's part of the somewhat glib point I was making. If you say the wheel underpins most modern technologies, and was invented by Oog, I'd say the invention of the wedge by Zod wins! :D

It's a silly question.
 
Definitely the wheel. Like most modern things, most really modern forklifts have computers in them to help them to work better; but it is entirely possible to build a forklift without a computer, and most older ones don't have them or need them. But it would be nearly impossible — if not entirely impossible — to build a usable forklift without wheels.
 
The wheel, hands down.

Not convinced? Take one away and see what it's like living without it?

No computers? Basically the 1970s.

No wheels? The Stone Age.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom