Today is the last day of Engineering Week, and we thought we’d try to choose the five engineering feats that had the most proofed global impact. Do you agree? Let us know!
Clean Water
Choosing clean water as having the most global impact was easy, and not because we are a water engineering firm. Read our blog from earlier this week, and you will see how dirty water causes more death than all forms of violence combined. Major disease epidemics from the past were caused by contaminated water, and still are to this day in developing countries. Clean water definitely gets our vote as #1 (even if we are a little biased.)
Telephones
Try to think of what the world would be like without telephones. Telephones forever changed the way we communicate, and connected the world in a way it never had been. From the inception of Alexander Graham Bell’s telephone to the smartphones of today, the telephone deserves a spot in the top five.
Electricity
Electricity modernized the world, and now affects nearly everything we do. It heats our homes, powers our world-changing computers, lights the darkness, and allows simple and quick automation of so many tasks that were once time-consuming (washboard, anyone?)
Computers
Like the telephone, the computer has changed the world on so many levels. From automated manufacturing to global communication to computer-assisted surgery and the internet, our lives would not be the same without the invention of the computer.
Airplanes
The airplane changed the world by allowing fast transportation of goods and people. Transcontinental voyages that once took weeks now take hours, and global trade is now commonplace. In today’s world, overnight shipping is not a luxury but an expectation, with internet super-retailer Amazon considering using drones for package shipments.
Engineering has certainly changed the face of the world in so many ways. Do you agree with our top five? And what will be the top five in the next 100 years? One thing is certain: the world wouldn’t be the same without engineers. Happy Engineering Week!