How much smarter have we become in this century? And while we are at the beginning of the second decade of the 21st century, we think about what scientific knowledge from this century has already left a big mark.
In spite of the fact that many things that affect our lives have been known before, we have not looked back here at the numerous technological breakthroughs of this century based on the knowledge of the past, as well as the fact that seven million scientists today publish millions of works each year the effects will only be known in the “future”.
The world is certainly significantly different from the one we lived in before 2001, when before the age of social networking, the US president did not constantly tweet, 3D glasses were not worn in cinemas, and the century was announced (like all the previous ones) as the “century of the future.” .
The changes were, of course, contributed to by various historical processes, old and never-settled colonial challenges, globalization and the unstoppable population increase, but also the unpredictable consequences of new technologies such as the development of the Internet, mobile telephony and the use of new materials. But also new insights.
Nowadays, being surrounded with all the “tech of the future” coming up with new things seems difficult. What can you think of that doesn’t already exist? But not everything is that bad for new inventors. A lot of organizations, groups and companies such as InventHelp appeared and they can assist you from the idea to product. With that being said, you must be encouraged to start working on it.
Meanwhile, below, you can read what humanity achieved in the 21st century, which has just started! This might motivate you to do something as significant.
Social networks
There are certainly more important things that have emerged in this century, but few have had a greater impact on humanity. Something that didn’t exist less than 20 years ago is now an integral part of the lives of billions of people. It has become a major advertising spot, a lot of money is being made in various ways on social networks, and communication between people has become unthinkable without Instagram, Facebook and other networks. MySpace was one of the first, but lost in popularity through the years and lost the battle to Facebook, primarily.
Reusable rockets
Almost all the credit goes to the space company innovator SpaceX. They have succeeded in making rockets that can be reused several times, saving hundreds of millions of dollars each time they go into space, enabling far greater exploration. It will benefit mankind in many spheres, as it is known that almost all of its greatest discoveries, such as magnetic resonance imaging, have come from astronomy.
Touch screen
Something that until this century could only be seen in SF films is now available to anyone. Almost every device today has a touch screen. Almost no cell phones with keyboards are made anymore. Apple played the largest role in the invention of touch screen technology, but of course they were not the only ones, many companies were involved in the whole process.
Cryptocurrencies
Although attempts to create cryptocurrencies have existed in the past millennium, they have not come to fruition. Then in 2008, an unknown person or group of people nicknamed Satoshi Nakamoto created Bitcoin, the largest and most important cryptocurrency. To this day, it is not known who is behind all this. Since then, cryptocurrencies have played a significant role, affecting decentralization, anonymity in payments and independence from central banks. Their influence will grow more and more.
GPS
Although GPS probably has been around for much longer, for military purposes and was invented by the US military, since 2005 it has become available to all. Now it has application in every sphere. From astronomy, through the military, to vehicle navigation. Without it, autonomous vehicles would not be possible, which will also become a daily reality in the coming decades. The progress and number of satellites in space has made GPS almost infallible.
Android and iOS
Although these are not the only two mobile operating systems, 99% of the devices run on one of these two systems. The others failed to break into the market and failed. These two systems are so widespread that we cannot imagine life without them. All existing applications are programmed for them, from alarms, to games, social networks, bank account and more. Because of this, we have access to virtually everything in our smartphone that we had to go somewhere or be at home before, like watching TV, etc.
Capsule endoscopy
With the advancement of technology and the invention of increasingly smaller sensors, chips and everything else, this fantastic innovation has emerged. Now a pill-sized camera can replace the awkward procedure that accompanies this type of examination. As the patient swallows this, so the doctor can monitor the entire GI tract and thus easily detect all types of diseases.
Scientific discoveries
Gravity waves
The spectacular result of the experiment confirmed the existence of gravitational waves that no one could record before, which Einstein predicted with his General Theory of Relativity. Using two LIGO instruments in 2016, gravitational waves were caught by the collision of two black holes, creating a new, gravitational radio astronomy.
Planets outside our galaxy
Although first discovered back in the 1980s, the real revolution began in the beginning of the last decade in finding planets outside the solar system. The Kepler space telescope has since uncovered a huge number of so-called exoplanets, planets orbiting other stars in space. Nearly 4,000 planets have been discovered to date, and some of them are in the so-called habitable zone. The closest to date has been detected at a distance of 4 light years.
Water on Mars
In space exploration, tremendous results were achieved during the second decade of the 21st century, and robotic probes were sent to various worlds in the solar system. The greatest attention is drawn to the planet Mars, which in this century will also be the goal of a mission with a human crew. Among other findings, NASA reported in late 2013 that the robot confirmed that the water was in liquid state on Mars, which opened the possibility of microorganisms to develop.
Divine particles
The Large Hadron Collider at CERN near Geneva in the summer of 2012 proved the existence of the Higgs boson, popularly called the particle of God. The famous particle was captured in proton collisions at two separate detectors and experiments, CMS and ATLAS, after the LHC accelerated the proton beams. Thus, the Standard Model of Elementary Particles, a theory describing the structure of matter, is largely validated for physicists.
Conclusion
We have just mentioned some of the most important innovations and breakthroughs. So much has been designed in the first 20 years of this century that we hope that by the end of the century, humanity will look completely different and that many of the currently unsolvable problems will become easily solved. Also, life will be even more like SF film in a positive way.
