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somebody started saying you should turn the other cheek instead of hit it.
The problem is those who preached turning the other cheek were killing anybody who did not agree with them. Nice thought just the same, shame the reality never took effect.
I think it was when the monolith put the zap on the ape's brains and taught them how to use bones as weapons.
Actually, this is an unanswerable question because, as seen by the numerous nominations in this thread, there are an array of developments in human history, all of which are equally critical in ultimately developing the type of civilization which we have constructed. If the question could be answered, then so too could "Who is the single most important human who ever lived?"
If we wish to develop a definition of "significant" and we all agreed upon a single definition, then this thread would make a bit more sense because it would then be a search for the event which is most closely tied to the goals associated with our definition.
My own position is that the most significant development in human history would have to be related to whatever it was that caused humans to develop into creatures distinct from the animals. The two phenomena which jump out at us in this regard are the employment of tools, and the deliberate preservation/transmission of memory which allowed people to add the knowledge of their ancestors to their own discoveries, something which still eludes animal skill levels.
The big challenge we now face is - now that world population is starting to at last stablize (still growing at the moment, but that growth is definitely slowing) - how do we provide for the increased expectations of all those people. The world is changing dramatically and standards of living are skyrocketing all over the globe. This of course leads to a whole set of new problems - notably how to deal with the increased demand (and it's associated increase in waste generated) for pretty much EVERYTHING - but most expecially energy.
Truly a major challenge.
Ken
The most signifigent event for *this* world will be the plague or other that returns balance to the human population. Whenever massive growth has occured something has come along to reduce it drastically.
The volcanic or meteoric activity (climate change) that caused a population bottleneck about 100,000 years ago. This wiped out the specialized, less intelligent of our ancestors and reduced total human population in the world to perhaps 1,000...which then proceded to spread out over the globe.
One of the most important things which came of the Great Squeeze was the blossoming of creativity. Not only did art and decoration and wearing jewelry first appear in any significant way, but the out of the box mind set that comes of art and creative thoughts gave the survivors the ability to see an object and realize what potential it has.
Should TEOTWAWKI come, that same process of selection will once again happen as it has before.
I was going to say the harnessing of fire (the actualy ability to create rather than gather it). But this predates humans. But it did put the users of fire a step up in the food chain and in addition to language harden weapons and keep prey away.
The emergence of the opposable thumb. Without it we would still be a bunch of monkeys.
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