Both of our lists contained:
Airplanes
Computers
Internet
The following categories (on left below) on the list at http://www.greatachievements.org/ were analogous in one way or another with some of my entries (on right below):
Automobile ~ Cars, Tanks
Lasers and Fiber Optics ~ Lasers
Nuclear Technologies ~ Nuclear Fission
Spacecraft ~ Hubble Telescope, Moon Landing, Intnl. Space Station, GPS, weather satellites
High Performance Materials, Petroleum and Petrochemical Technologies ~ Plastics
Health Technologies ~ Antibiotics, Angioplasty, Human Genome Project
Household Appliances ~ Video Cameras, Cell Phones, Liquid Crystal Displays
Telephone ~ Cell phones
Imaging ~ Hubble Telescope
As you can see, my entries tended to be somewhat redundant because I picked several specific achievements from the same general categories. The website had more general categories and was thus able to fit in several classes of achievements that I had not even considered:
Electrification
Electronics
Radio and Television
Air Conditioning and Refrigeration
Water Supply and Distribution
Highways
Some of these categories are so obvious that you might be amused by my omission of them. Consider, however, my reasoning for each of the omissions:
Radio and Television
Being able to find news and even TV shows on the internet, I seldom have use for television and have never listened to the radio except occasionally while in a car.
Electrification
Ben Franklin did his famous lightning and kite experiment in 1752 [2]. Thomas Edison invented the light bulb in the late 1800s [2]. Knowledge of electricity and electric appliances have been around since before the 20th century, but the widespread availability of electricity for common use certainly grew dramatically in the 20th century [2]. I was not alive when this happened; during my lifetime, electricity has been taken for granted throughout most of the United States. I did not even consider electrification when writing my list.
Electronics
As for electronics, I took the concept itself for granted since it certainly didn't seem revolutionary during my lifetime, and instead listed some of the household appliances that were enabled by electronics, like video cameras, liquid crystal displays, and cell phones.
Highways
We all learned in history class that President Dwight D. Eisenhower, by signing the Federal-Aid Highway Act, pioneered the systematic building of a national highway system beginning in 1956 [3]. When I was born, this system was well in place and I took it for granted. I seldom stopped to think that the food I eat every day often comes from miles away and that millions of people commute to work daily on well maintained highways. The existence of highways to enable transportation is vital to our economy and our daily lives, and the building of the highway system in the United States was certainly a tremendous feat of civil engineering. I should not have neglected this achievement, but I did not think of it because its effects on my life, although serious, are all indirect and easily go unnoticed.
Air Conditioning and Refrigeration
I have no excuse here. This one was just plain obvious.
Water Supply and Distribution
This is perhaps the most important item on the ENTIRE LIST. The availability of fresh water resources could well be one of the greatest challenges of the 21st century, alongside such staples as including eliminating poverty and reducing health care costs. Here, however, I have a very good excuse: fresh water is something that many people take for granted. This may change, however; in the past decade, there have been sever water shortages and filtration problems in places like Atlanta, Georgia [3]. The distribution of clean, fresh water is the most important challenge that any society faces. Humans cannot survive for more than a few days without water; it is easier to starve. The 20th century saw great achievements in water purification and distribution. Today we have a variety of sources for acquiring fresh water, including harvested rain water, river water and desalination of sea water, as well as a variety of techniques for filtering water, from chlorination to reverse osmosis. The demand for water is, however, growing as the human population grows and as each human uses more and more water with our growing consumer economy. In the years to come, we will have to figure out the problem of water supply and distribution anew.
As a freshman engineering student at Penn, I truly appreciate the great achievements of the 20th century, and I hope to participate in the progress of the 21st century.
Works Referenced
[1] Constable G, Somerville B. Greatest Engineering Achievements of the 20th Century. National Academy of Engineering. 2009. Available http://www.greatachievements.org/.
[2] Energy Timelines: Electricity. Department of Energy: Energy Information Administration: Energy Kids. 2007. Available: http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/kids/energy.cfm?page=tl_electricity.
[3] History of the Interstate Highway System. U.S. Department of Transportation: Federal Highway Administration. 2009. Available: http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/interstate/history.htm.
[4] Lavelle M, Kurlantzick J. The Coming Water Crisis. U.S. News and World Report. 4 August 2002. Available: http://www.usnews.com/usnews/biztech/articles/020812/archive_022254.htm.
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