How long will we wait?
Publish Date: November 30, 2011
Do we need more billions of people? Yes, we do need more billions of people in order to get a few more geniuses. What is the proportion of number of real geniuses to total number of people on this planet? I have no idea; my guess is one to one billion. What I know for certain is: we desperately need a genius to invent a source of a new energy. What kind of energy is that? It is the cleanest and cheapest energy which is accessible to everybody at little or no cost and nobody shall have any control over its production, distribution, use or price. Again, what is that Energy? I have only a basic idea about it. Where is that genius who is destined to find the way to translate my basic idea into a reality? I am not sure where that person is; not sure whether that person is already born or yet to be born.
The following is a list of selected, but critical 26 inventions that took place approximately during the last 400 years.
What were people doing before 400 years? Were they just fighting and invading others' land and grabbing their properties? Most likely!! I am not undermining a lot of other inventions that took place in the meantime.
Let us see how fast our scientists were in inventing something that is really critical, in physics or engineering fields. After inventing Electricity in 1646, it took 210 years to invent Petroleum in 1856. It took another 83 years to invent the computer in 1939. Are we slow or lazy in inventing some really useful things? Or is there a sheer shortage of geniuses on this planet? If we cannot invent things that are necessary for us to overcome our day to day problems on this planet, why should we waste our time looking at voyages to Mars or even the Moon? We are fortunate in having a lot of problems here on Earth itself to focus upon. Let us first resolve these problems, before we go Mars. Let us invent a boot that will not let us slip on ice. More seriously, let us invent an energy which is clean, cheap and accessible to everybody at little or no cost, and nobody will have any control over its production, distribution, use or price. It takes a lot of vision and intelligence to make such a breakthrough. It requires a lot of financial resources too.