
Ask HN: What’s the most important modern simple invention? - abrax3141
Not levers and wheels and gears, but Velcro and paper clips. I’d put “modern” as after 1700, and “simple” as “you can pretty much build it yourself”, but you can argue theses (as I’m sure you will! :-)
======
sevilo
Pads and tampons. Some argue these are environmentally unfriendly and produce
too much waste, but you have to think, not everyone is privileged enough to
own a washing machine in their own home, particularly those in 2nd and 3rd
world countries. I genuinely believed pads and tampons allowed women to be
more productive in the work force and eventually lead to more equality, just
hearing my mom and grandma's story of having to hand wash your own bloody
(literally) period bands gives me nightmares, that was in the 70s, not that
long ago.

~~~
andreygrehov
I live in New York and the majority of my friends do not have washing machine
in their home. In fact, it’s a luxury to have one. In contrast, I’m originally
from Ukraine where not having a washing machine is weird to say the least.
There are many things that would make me call US a 2nd world country, so I’m
having a hard time understanding which countries are 1st world countries.

~~~
ARandomerDude
Wow. I've lived in the US all my life and I've never heard of a majority of
anyone's social group not having a washing machine.

Have others experienced this? If so, in what city?

~~~
red_hare
I live New York. 5/7 years I’ve been here I haven’t had a wash.

In my experience, an apartment with in-unit goes for 10% more than one
without. My rent is 1850/mo and my local friendly laundromat does wash-and-
fold for $0.90/lb. The math works out that an in-unit wash just isn’t worth it
to me.

Even if you’re lucky enough to afford rent in New York you probably can only
afford one or two luxuries. For me I‘ve chosen living alone and windows that
get sunlight over things like square footage, location, or a wash.

~~~
thrower123
The time savings from using a wash and fold service aren't to be denied,
either. You just drop off a huge sack of laundry once every week or two before
work, and you pick it up on the way home nicely washed and folded, better than
I, at least, would have done it. By the time you buy detergent and fabric
softener and dryer sheets, and factor in the time derping around waiting for
it to do its thing, especially in a sketchy coin-op laundry or a dank shared
basement washroom, it's a little silly to do it yourself.

Speaking of course as a bachelor. When you are coupled up, or especially when
children are involved, dirty laundry production escalates exponentially and
wash-and-fold becomes prohibitively expensive and the capital investment in
laundry equipment reduces in importance.

~~~
thraxil
Yeah, I had to use a service for a few years (no laundramats within walking
distance) and while it was definitely more expensive than doing it myself, it
was pretty great. I was always amused by getting my clothes back in this
perfectly rectilinear package. My main complaint was that the service insisted
on a pick up/drop off time that was like 7am and I lived on a 4th floor walk
up, so I have a lot of memories of getting jolted out of a sound sleep and
having to schlep a heavy bag up or down a bunch of stairs.

------
jtlienwis
The process for making ammonia from air (nitrogen) and hydrogen. Allowed a
huge increase in agricultural output that saved a few billion people from
starvation. Haber-Bosch process.

~~~
ajuc
Basically there would be ~2 times less people on Earth and over half of them
would work in farming if not for this one invention.

~~~
new2628
Would the state of the Earth be better or worse if not for this development?

~~~
antepodius
May as well just say The Earth would be better off if people had never existed
if you're going to go that route.

There's more people living better lives, so things are better. There are new
problems caused by our previous success that we solve next.

~~~
oska
> May as well just say The Earth would be better off if people had never
> existed if you're going to go that route.

No, that most certainly doesn't follow. It's entirely usual and normal for an
amount of something in a system to be fine but then an excess of the same
thing to be not fine. This is a very common situation in medicine, for
example.

~~~
anthonypasq
We only care about the state of the system as it relates to humans.

~~~
antepodius
That's certainly not true for a sizeable number of environmentalists. Have you
never heard the 'humanity is a virus on the planet' take?

------
salgernon
I’d like to recommend James Burke’s series “Connections”[1] and “The Day the
Universe Changed”[2] from the late 70s early 80s.

He was a bbc journalist covering NASA and doing science communication and one
of his particular fascinations (and mine, having grown up with his work) is
the cumulative effect of ideas and technology shape not only how we interact
with the modern world, but how we perceive it.

[1] [https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0078588/](https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0078588/)
[2]
[https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0199208/?ref_=m_nm_knf_wr_t3](https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0199208/?ref_=m_nm_knf_wr_t3)

~~~
kej
Just want to add that Connections and some of his other videos are available
on the Internet Archive:
[https://archive.org/search.php?query=subject%3A%22james+burk...](https://archive.org/search.php?query=subject%3A%22james+burke%22)

~~~
DaveInTucson
Many of these are on YouTube as well, just search for "James Burke
Connections"

------
jcranmer
Since you've allowed modern to include the Industrial Revolution, I would
submit the invention that _started_ it: the flying shuttle.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_shuttle](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_shuttle)

(How did this cause the Industrial Revolution? It made weaving so much faster,
that the spinning industry had to come up with machines to supply the weaving
industry.)

~~~
deepspace
As an aside, from the Wikipedia article:

> ... using treadles to raise and lower the heddles, which opened the shed in
> the warp threads. The operator then had to reach forward while holding the
> shuttle in one hand and pass this through the shed; the shuttle carried a
> bobbin for the weft.

That is a quite a bit of industry-specific jargon packed into a single
paragraph. Without context this could easily be mistaken for Star Trek jargon.

~~~
kragen
Any woman born in England between 1200 and 1800 would have known all of these
words except for being a bit nonplussed by “operator”. Most of the men, too.

------
jvanderbot
Hand washing. Modern disease control and prevention is borderline magic. Hand-
washing is clearly the most important lifesaving and disease preventing
invention in modern times.

Materially ... Well, "yourself" precludes anything computerized, unless you
mean "program". It also precludes a huge range of materials science advances.

Technically, you can make steel and concrete yourself with enough real-world
minecrafting, and good steel or concrete is probably hands down the most
important factor in all our chemical, structural, and industrial processes.

Luckily there's a book with the most important inventions to re-engineer a
complex, sustainable society called The Knowledge, and just about everything
in there is build-able by a determined individual or small group (until you
get to modern things). Not suprisingly, it mostly focuses on agriculture,
medicine, steel, and concrete.

~~~
kragen
This book should be called The Misinformation. It omits crucial safety
information and other details about many of the processes it mentions, and the
author doesn't maintain a public list of known errata; it's entertainment, not
education.

Three better alternatives: the Primitive Technology channel on YouTube, the
Boy Scouts Handbook, and Wikipedia, which you can download as .zim files for
offline reference. Other relevant YouTube channels include AvE, CodysLab, and
Applied Science; in more specific areas you have NileRed, Abom79, Ben Eater,
EEVblog, This Old Tony, GreatScott, ElectroBOOM, and NurdRage. Unlike the book
you're recommending, they are by people who know how to do the things they are
explaining, show their errors, and include the relevant calculations. There
are other channels like How To Make Everything and King of Random which do
not; they are entertaining but deadly.

General-purpose know-how books have gone out of fashion, though we still have
the CRC Handbook and the Machinery's Handbook. In the 19th century there were
a bunch of books like Dick's _Encyclopedia of practical receipts and
processes_ (ripped off, I think, from Cooley’s, or possibly vice versa) which
covers a wide range of topics at a level sufficient to enable you to practice
them; you could probably build a fair bit of Victorian technology from the
recipes in Dick’s. (You aren't going to get a loom out of it, though; for
that, see _The Mechanism of Weaving_ , but YouTube is far superior.) I think
the equivalent is more difficult to-day.

~~~
jvanderbot
Very good references! Thank you!

I do think the author tried to relay concepts and hints, rather than recipes.
Given the compactness, a group of people starting largely from scratch and
taking the book on faith could figure out a lot of stuff.

~~~
kragen
If they took the book on faith they would halt progress until they all died of
methanol poisoning.

------
puranjay
The humble ball point pen.

People forget how cumbersome and/or expensive it was to write before cheap
ball point pens became a thing. You had to use fountain pens. The cheap ones
leaked and were an absolute mess to carry around. The ones that didn't leak
were expensive.

I can now buy more pens for $100 than I'll ever use in years and just stash
them everywhere I want

~~~
leipert
How do you learn writing?

In Germany, as far as I know, everyone learns writing with foundation pens.
You can search for images with „Schreiblernfüller“ to get an idea how they
look.

~~~
AngryData
In the US ive never used or even seen anyone use a fountain pen, although ive
heard of enthusiasts for them here.

~~~
biztos
I have a friend who's into fountain pens and for a while worked for a company
that sells really nice ones. In that capacity he came to know some people who
collect pens.

You'd be amazed. One guy I heard of -- not-famous founder of a very famous
brand -- was so into it he'd spent tens of millions building his collection,
but outside the world of serious pen enthusiasts it wasn't "worth" anything
near that much.

A lot of the pens one collects are very limited editions but otherwise
unremarkable: say a really good pen that would cost $500 but in a different
color and they only make a thousand of them in that color and it costs
$10,000. (Made-up numbers but $10K is not that much in the pen-collecting
world.)

~~~
staz
[https://xkcd.com/1095/](https://xkcd.com/1095/)

------
michaelmcmillan
Dr. Ignaz Semmelweis on discovering the effects of washing your hands before
operating on patients. Simple, yet highly effective.

~~~
umvi
His story is so sad though. He was ostracized by the other doctors and medical
community who didn't believe him and indeed openly mocked him. He remained
outspoken about his findings until a colleague forced him into an asylum where
he was beaten by the guards and died.

~~~
tptacek
They didn't believe him in part because he was a notorious asshole, and in
part because he was insistent on a root cause analysis of hand-washing that
was clearly false. He also didn't "invent" handwashing, which was already the
normal protocol by the time he began practicing; rather, his contribution was
a particular antiseptic handwashing protocol (chlorinated lime).

~~~
sixstringtheory
How do you figure it was “clearly false”? Once his protocol was implemented,
mortality rates from childbed fever plummeted. It turned out the reason so
many people had been dying from it was that obstetricians were performing
pathological observations on mothers who had died from it and then gone
straight to delivering babies without disinfecting in between. This is readily
available info on his wikipedia but also recently appeared in an episode of
99PI which is where I learned about it. I’d be interested to see more
information presenting an alternative history.

~~~
tptacek
Antiseptic handwashing wasn't false. His theory for why it worked was; that
theory was that "cadaveric particles" \--- literally, corpse particles, and
very specifically not a more general concept of microscopic infectious agents
--- were to blame for ailments, and that chlorinated lime was the only way to
get rid of them. Other doctors noted things like ailments in patients with no
plausible contact with cadavers, to no avail: Semmelweis was insistent.

Semmelweis is, to me, an interesting story about how it's not all that useful
to be right if you're unable to persuade, and Semmelweis' difficulties with
persuasion have little to do with his adversaries bloody-mindedness and much
to do with his.

------
dcolkitt
I don't know if it's the most important, but it's a great example of how a
very simple innovation had huge benefits. The Fitch Barrier are those big
orange barrels you see on the side of the road. They're filled with sand
inside, and basically help to dampen the momentum of a car that veers off the
road.

They were invented in the 1950s by John Fitch, a Formula 1 driver who just
came up with them as a quick and dirty way to make the race track safer. One
afternoon's random idea has managed to save over 17,000 lives and billions of
dollars in damage.

~~~
quickthrowman
I would nominate Jersey barriers as well, they’re easy to mass produce and
there are machines that lay them down. Many roads would be undivided if it
were not for jersey barriers.

~~~
geocrasher
I owe my life to Jersey barriers. Around 1999 or 2000 I was driving an old
Plymouth Barracuda (Slant 6 grandma's car, not a hemi monster) at 70 miles per
hour in the fast lane on a freeway in Nevada. The car drifted to the left
naturally because it needed an alignment and as I went to correct to the right
nothing happened. The joint that connects the steering column to the steering
gearbox had become disconnected. I didn't step on the brakes because they were
also somewhat if he and might have sent me in any random direction!

Had it not been for the graduating slope of the jersey barrier I would have
either gone over into oncoming traffic which was also doing 70 miles per hour
or more, or I would have bounced back into traffic on my own side of the
freeway with random results. I would not most likely not have survived.

Instead my front left tire caught the steepest graduation at the bottom of the
jersey barrier which launched front left corner of the car up the barrier. But
then a funny thing happened. I didn't flip over and I didn't go over it.
Because the top section of the barrier is vertical I just came back down. This
cycle happened several times until the car slowed down enough just to be
sliding against the bottom of the barrier. At that point I was only doing
about 30 miles per hour and could hit the brakes without worrying about what
direction the brakes were going to take me. The car came to a stop. The only
damage was a broken ball joint, a very messed up tire and wheel, and a bent
fender lip!

A wrecker came and got me and delivered the vehicle to my house. I horse
traded that car the very next week for an old Land cruiser that tried to kill
me when it lost brakes, but that's another story. I drive better vehicles
these days but only barely

------
cosmodisk
Washing Machine. Recent iterations are more complex( repair engineer could
plug into ours and diagnose all sorts of things, including checking results of
previous washes), however the principle behind it isn't that complex. It has
made life easier for so many households.

~~~
acd
On the number of hours saved by Washing machines and Dishwashers. Liberating
women from having to do these tasks and instead contributing to the general
economy instead.

~~~
war1025
> the number of hours saved by Washing machines and Dishwashers.

This is true, but to some extent over-stated I think.

We have a family of five, and don't use our dishwasher. I just do the dishes
every morning while I listen to the news on the radio. It takes less than an
hour.

As far as washing machines, I agree that they are quite convenient, but the
truth is most clothing doesn't need to be washed nearly so often as people do.

Without a washing machine, you would just do laundry less often.

I think modern plumbing is the actual time saver. Not having to haul water
from the river or the well frees up a ton of time. Having waste water safely
disposed of is a massive boon to hygiene.

~~~
godot
I think if you spend close to an hour to wash dishes every morning, it's
actually a good proof of how much time it could save you. Being able to use
that hour productively with other means while you do it (e.g. listening to the
news or podcasts in your case) is somewhat a separate topic.

Loading and unloading the dishwasher for the same amount of dishes every day
will probably take less than 30 minutes. I would estimate you could have a
savings of 30 minutes every day if you used the dishwasher. Depending on how
you use water when you hand-wash them, you may also save some water as well.

~~~
war1025
> you could have a savings of 30 minutes every day

Maybe I'm unique in this (I don't think I am), but if anything the curse of
modern life is that we're absolutely awash in free time.

What would I do with an extra 30 minutes? Probably check Hacker News or
Facebook more than I already do.

The actual washing of the dishes really doesn't take that long. Most of it is
gathering everything up, rescuing the sink from the disaster that my wife
leaves it in (i.e. How hard is it to actually nest the dishes instead of
building them into some precarious tower?), and then washing the various big
and otherwise awkward items that you couldn't put in the dishwasher anyway.

If you want to get on the modern hype train, you can think of it as a
"mindfulness" exercise. There is something therapeutic about having busy hands
and letting the mind wander.

~~~
jodrellblank
> _If you want to get on the modern hype train, you can think of it as a
> "mindfulness" exercise. There is something therapeutic about having busy
> hands and letting the mind wander._

I don't mean to be gatekeepery here, but aren't "mindful" and "letting the
mind wander" pretty much opposites?

" _Wash every bowl, every dish as if you are bathing a baby - breathing in,
feeling joy; breathing out, smiling. Every minute can be a holy, sacred
minute. Where do you seek the spiritual? You seek the spiritual in every
ordinary thing that you do every day. Sweeping the floor, watering the
vegetables, and washing the dishes become holy and sacred if mindfulness is
there. With mindfulness and concentration, everything becomes spiritual._ " \-
Thich Nhat Hanh, in "How to Eat".

" _Zen does not confuse spirituality with thinking about God while one is
peeling potatoes. Zen spirituality is just to peel the potatoes._ " \- Alan
Watts.

It sounds more like the modern "productivity" hype train than the mindfulness
one; "do two things at once, and distract yourself from life, if your eyes are
busy, fill your ears, fill all your senses all the time".

> the disaster that my wife leaves it in (i.e. How hard is it to actually nest
> the dishes instead of building them into some precarious tower?),

mindfully criticising your wife in public for a cheap laugh. :eyes:

~~~
war1025
I will admit I don't really know where you're going with this since the two
quotes you just gave line up pretty well exactly with what I thought I said.

Seems like you aren't so much responding to what I said as to what you wish I
had said.

------
aaronblohowiak
The surface plate. Modern precision all stems from the concept of a flat
reference. However, the technique to make a surface as flat as possible (which
is based on simple geometry) was first discussed in the early 19th c.

In terms of profound impact on modernity, the metal screw-cutting lathe.

~~~
6nf
The metal lathe is not really a 'modern' invention is it?

~~~
maxerickson
There's an upward spiral of precision:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Screw-
cutting_lathe#Modern_scr...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Screw-
cutting_lathe#Modern_screw-
cutting_lathes_\(late_18th_to_early_19th_centuries\))

------
cranium
I'm surprised nobody mentioned radio communication. The AM (Amplitude
Modulation) transmission is even quite simple to understand and build.

You can even create an electric arc between the ground and the transmitting
tower as a cheap (and dangerous) receiver:
[https://youtu.be/uo9nGzIzSPw](https://youtu.be/uo9nGzIzSPw)

~~~
tgv
I don't think a layperson can understand even the basic principle behind AM,
let alone the actual device. It's not as "simple" as washing your hands.

~~~
irchans
I seem to recall building small AM transmitters in elementary school. I don't
remember if I used a transistor or not. I think it was easy to construct the
capacitor and the inductor. (I build it in the early 70's and don't really
remember how.)

We also made crystal diode radios, but I have no idea how to construct a diode
from scratch, so maybe those are not simple.

~~~
artificialidiot
cat whisker detector

~~~
dublin
This one just requires a lump of germanium and a pin or small wire.

~~~
stan_rogers
Traditionally, one would have used galena (natural lead II sulfide) crystals.
I also recall most "boys'" radios - the type you'd find in Cubs/Scouts/etc.
handbooks - using a razor blade as the contact whisker, probably because it
was the simplest way to get a small contact point and stiffness at the same
time with materials a kid would likely have to hand.

------
wincy
Someone didn’t think of putting wheels on luggage until relatively recently,
in 1987.

[https://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/05/business/05road.html](https://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/05/business/05road.html)

~~~
todd8
A few weeks ago I was going through some stuff in our storage unit and found
an originally very nice suitcase. It's of no value to me now because it has no
wheels.

Imagine how much more difficult air travel would be without the wheels!

~~~
PascLeRasc
Imagine it? I've been living it and it's so much better. Try to get from one
side of O'Hare to the other for your connection leaving in 20 minutes with a
rolling suitcase vs with a comfortable medium-large backpack.

Boarding flights is easier, getting around outside is easier (try rolling your
suitcase around the cobble streets of Paris), fitting into tight restaurants
is easier.

Look into /r/onebag if you want to learn more. Check out the Minaal, it's
literally life-changing if you travel often.

~~~
ghaff
Wheeled checked luggage is nice when I'm on a trip that requires a lot of
year. (Because of outdoor activities or whatever.) However, for typical trips
I just take a carry-on travel backpack and a small bag for electronics/camera
even for trips that are 2-3 weeks. IMO, most people travel with way too much
stuff.

------
kd5bjo
The modern idea of a library catalog came around in the early 1800s, and
probably accelerated the pace of knowledge transfer and acquisition quite a
bit. In its original form, index cards, it was ubiquitous for almost 200 years
before being replaced by computerized systems.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Library_catalog](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Library_catalog)

~~~
azepoi
More recently
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mundaneum](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mundaneum)

------
davidw
Bicycles are pretty amazing, although there's no way you could 'build one
yourself'.

~~~
miguelmota
Bicycles may seem simple but took many decades to get it right.

Your comment also reminded me of this gallery of drawings from people
attempting to create a bicycle from memory which is pretty funny
[https://twistedsifter.com/2016/04/artist-asks-people-to-
draw...](https://twistedsifter.com/2016/04/artist-asks-people-to-draw-bicycle-
from-memory-and-renders-results/)

~~~
plopz
What a frustrating article, they say its missing a key component but doesn't
say what.

~~~
ogre_codes
It's the Chainstays. You need two bars connecting the bottom bracket to the
rear hub or the rear wheel is extremely unstable.

Most modern bikes are fundamentally 2 triangles joined at the base.

------
acvny
The greatest invention/discovery of modern times is electricity. It is the
second fire and much much more..

~~~
abrax3141
Fire is old. Electricity-- or at least it's control -- not so old, but I'm not
sure I'd count it as simple. Making a functional battery or generator that
doesn't just create or store trivial amounts energy is quite a challenge.

~~~
stan_rogers
Huge powerful batteries are simple. It's making them small and lightweight
that's the hard part.

------
dTal
3D printing.

I know, I know - overhyped. But you know what's a funny thing? It's incredibly
basic tech. Stepper motors and thermoplastic. We could have had something like
it at pretty much any time over the past century, and in its modern form from
about 1960 or so. It has unquestionably revolutionized prototyping and short-
run manufacturing, and we _just didn 't think of it_. The idea was just too
zany and expensive - the people with enough money to invent a 3d printer could
afford to just pay someone to make their prototype by hand. It's a rare modern
example of the "ancient greek railway problem"; Hellenistic culture posessed
all the technology to begin making crude steam trains, and almost certainly
had the technical drive to approach making practical ones, if only they had
thought of it or considered it a worthwhile thing to do.

(Although there is the interesting question of data management. The .gcode for
a small print can still run into the megabytes. CAD software was thin on the
ground in 1970 too. So maybe therein lies the difficulty - what good is a 3D
printer if you must painstakingly transcribe your blueprints into movement
instructions _by hand_?)

~~~
hooande
I respectfully disagree. 3D printing has not lived up to its hype or
potential. The process is slow and sensitive to conditions. The commercial
applications are relatively limited. It has radically transformed rapid
prototyping, which is very important. But it's hard to compare it to the
ubiquitous daily utility of paperclips or even velcro.

I have much more hope for the next generation of 3D printing, whatever that is

~~~
romwell
I disagree with that.

It has also transformed hobby/craft markets and arts. The only thing stopping
it is UX at this point (you still need to have both craft and computer skills
to use them).

I have very little use for paperclips, actually, but if I needed one, I could
easily 3D print it. And that ability - to _imagine_ things and have them come
out of the machine - gives the magical empowering feeling that most of the
people still have yet to encounter.

I disagree that it's a _simple_ invention, though. The hardware is simple,
yes, but it's nothing without software. And the software we need to make 3D
printing less of an exercise in patience is simply not yet there, even now.

CAD is not accessible. Slicing is not accessible (sure, Cura will spit G-code
without you doing anything - but what do you do when your print fails or falls
apart because one of the myriad settings was not set right for this particular
print?). Mesh leveling was not a thing on consumer 3D printers five years ago
(!). Ditto for variable-width layers. And no slicers have the printhead follow
curves in 3D, it's layer by layer in everything I've used, even if the model
allows for something more.

What I'm saying is that that we don't have the software to utilize the
existing simple hardware to its fullest potential. And without software, a 3D
printer is a glorified glue gun.

(Sure, we could've had "3D-printing" pens a-la 3Doodler decades ago. They are
fun, but hardly revolutionary).

~~~
richk449
> I have very little use for paperclips, actually, but if I needed one, I
> could easily 3D print it.

Out of curiosity, how good would a 3D printed paperclip be compared to the
metal ones I am used to? I suspect the performance would be significantly
worse due to material properties.

~~~
kragen
You could make it stronger and more durable, but it will definitely be larger
and heavier if you make it out of PLA, and more expensive than a bit of bent
wire if you FDM it.

~~~
romwell
>and more expensive than a bit of bent wire if you FDM it

Yeah, but the whole point of 3D printing is that you can make small-scale
custom runs that would be exorbitantly expensive with traditional
manufacturing.

You can have paperclips that double as markers/tags/have your name on
them/send a message, e.g.[1].

Same goes for other things. 3D printing is a way to make custom things at
small scale on demand, but automating away most of the steps after the design
stage.

[1][http://www.mkrclub.com/2016/02/make-football-paper-clip-
fast...](http://www.mkrclub.com/2016/02/make-football-paper-clip-fast-
useful-3d.html)

~~~
kragen
CNC wire bending is a lot better than 3-D printing for small-scale custom runs
of custom things at small scale on demand, automating away most of the steps
after the design stage. But the sets of designs you can make with the two
processes are almost disjoint.

------
akeck
Maybe not "most important", but a few dollars worth of post-it notes can turn
any wall into a "business application" that can potentially cost thousands to
turn into code.

~~~
pcurve
I don't know if you were being sarcastic, but the post it note meetings only
provide illusion of getting things done and they can often be destructive if
not conducted well or relied on too heavily. Your mileage will vary of course.

~~~
013a
Though, many people say the exact same thing about Jira, so...

------
maxioatic
Rubber o-rings, or as a generalization, rubber gaskets.

They allow the use of fluids in an extremely wide range of applications.

Also, unfortunately they led to the Challenger explosion in 1986.

------
jedberg
I highly recommend the podcast "50 things that made the modern economy".

They're in season two now, with a second set of 50 things.

Every podcast is about a simple invention that had a huge impact.

Incidentally the Haber-Bosch Process (mentioned in this thread) is number two,
after the diesel engine.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/50_Things_That_Made_the_Modern...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/50_Things_That_Made_the_Modern_Economy)

------
austincheney
The most important overlooked or ignored invention is the antibiotic via
syringe:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernest_Duchesne](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernest_Duchesne)

------
candiddevmike
Aluminum beverage cans are an engineering marvel:

[https://youtu.be/hUhisi2FBuw](https://youtu.be/hUhisi2FBuw)

~~~
TimSchumann
Fun fact -- 15,000+ aluminum cans are manufactured every second. Every.
Second.

Really hope Bill keeps putting out videos, but I understand how life gets and
it's not his full time job.

~~~
s9w
is that right? That would be something like 5 per day per person on earth.

~~~
TimSchumann
If it's off, it's likely less than an order of magnitude off. It's based on
the numbers in the video, which he states as half a trillion cans a year from
2015. If anything, I'd guess the number is a touch low.

~~~
PopeDotNinja
Well I just drank my daily 8 cans of Diet Pepsi.

------
TopHand
Window screens and indoor plumbing are the 2 greatest improvements for our
daily lives.

~~~
allhacks
Since OP didn’t provide reasons, I will.

Window screens: malaria prevention.

Indoor plumbing: make sanitation so convenient that you don’t have any reasons
not to use it (vs throwing the old night bucket outta the window). Obviously
city scale sanitation == no dysentery, cholera...etc.

~~~
nickserv
Sanitation systems are really old, though.

I was impressed with the sophistication of the one present in Glanum, a small
(but wealthy) Roman provincial town abandoned in the 2nd century. The sewer
system runs underneath the main street: baths, villas, and the abatoir connect
to it.

To say nothing of the ones in major cities of the time.

------
juliend2
I would say the Telegraph.

In the book [CODE: The Hidden Language of Computer Hardware and
Softwar]([https://www.amazon.com/Code-Language-Computer-Hardware-
Softw...](https://www.amazon.com/Code-Language-Computer-Hardware-
Software/dp/0735611319)), Charles Petzold talks about how it's foundational to
the eventual invention of the computer.

Back then, it also meant coast to coast communications were almost
instantaneous. And soon after, transatlantic cable-enabled telegraph boosted
commerce between America and Europe.

------
lebuffon
I think the concept (rather than an invention) of negative feedback is very
important. By that I mean envisioning that a machine can change it's own
behaviour. This seems to have not been understood with early steam engines.
People had to manually control valves to operate the first steam engines used
as pumps in the U.K. James Watt and Mathew Bolton realized that coupling the
output to the steam control valve would make it cycle automagically,

This concept permeates modern design so we don't always see it for the
important development that it is IMHO.

~~~
abecedarius
Good idea, but there was feedback control in antiquity.

------
dvirsky
Seat-belts maybe. Not as important as the car itself obviously, but definitely
simple and super impactful.

~~~
acd
Volvo opened up the patent for modern three way seat belts.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seat_belt](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seat_belt)
[https://www.volvotrucks.com/en-en/news/volvo-trucks-
magazine...](https://www.volvotrucks.com/en-en/news/volvo-trucks-
magazine/2019/may/seatbelts.html)

------
mishal153
Mosquito net. Modern cities may not find use for them but there is a pretty
big chunk of world's population for whom this simple item is indispensable.
Its cheap. Protects against diseases like malaria, dengue etc. And definitely
helps with getting a good sleep. Many villagers in India build it themselves
for the community and i hope it stays that way. I know its is popular in the
subcontinent (India,pakistan, bangladesh, sri lanka.) Would love to know if
other countries also use them

------
JoeAltmaier
Maybe some non-device inventions: the staff system; the germ theory of
disease; currency without a gold standard; public health; public education

~~~
arbitrage
as in musical staves? good one!

~~~
madhadron
Musical staves aren't after 1700, though. The five line staff we used today
was widespread by the 16th century, and staff notation goes back to the 11th
century.

------
some1else
> A twistlock and corner casting together form a standardized rotating
> connector for securing shipping containers. The primary uses are for locking
> a container into place on a container ship, semi-trailer truck or railway
> container train, and for lifting of the containers by container cranes and
> sidelifters.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twistlock](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twistlock)

~~~
dvirsky
Actually the shipping container itself is pretty much high up there I guess.
Pretty revolutionary for a box.

~~~
hencq
You might already be familiar with it, but I can heartily recommend the book
The Box by Marc Levinson [1]. It describes how a simple idea of putting items
in a container first, instead of directly on a ship, completely changed the
world. It is for example the reason why Oakland and New Jersey eclipsed San
Francisco and New York as ports. When Malcolm McLean, the inventor of the
humble container, died in 2001, container ships all over the world, at an
agreed moment, sounded their horns in tribute.

[1] - [https://g.co/kgs/vCK3nB](https://g.co/kgs/vCK3nB)

------
kwhitefoot
The telegraph and the telephone. The enabled economies of scale and speed of
decision making that were not possible before.

~~~
axilmar
This. This is what enabled our modern world. None of what the other mentions
would be possible without communications.

------
TomMckenny
The cargo container: it has changed the entire planet culturally, economically
and geopolitically. It would be hard to count the percentage of every day
objects most people use world wide that owe their availability or existence to
that standardized metal box.

~~~
RandallBrown
The invention there was more standardization than the actual box. Cargo boxes
have existed as long as people have had cargo.

~~~
philwelch
Sure but having a massive steel box that can be craned onto a truck or train
provides a lot of value. So does the fact that the boxes are indistinguishable
and locking. Theft by stevedores used to be a massive global tax on trade.

------
dossy
The incandescent light bulb.

"In 1761, Ebenezer Kinnersley demonstrated heating a wire to incandescence."

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incandescent_light_bulb](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incandescent_light_bulb)

~~~
Jaruzel
I _still_ don't think LED (or Halogen) house bulbs are anywhere near as good
as the classic incandescent bulb.

Most LED bulbs give me a headache. Bad LED bulbs cause 'strobing' in my vision
which is even worse.

~~~
clashandcarry
I find Philips brand bulbs appear to have circuitry to "smooth out" the
voltage and provide consistent light levels. I use my phone camera's slow
motion mode to record my bulbs and see the flicker. Every brand I've tested
via the above method, save for Philips, have suffered from flicker.

Give Philips a try? May just be worth the premium. Hopefully a standard like
the one mentioned in a comment below is put into place.

~~~
Jaruzel
I will, thanks!

------
leoh
It's not as simple as you'd like, but the little known Bosch-Haber process,
which produces ammonia for farming, staved off mass famines and may be why
many readers of HN are alive today.

~~~
new2628
Would the world be better or worse off without the population boom that
resulted from the invention?

~~~
robbrown451
Better to whom? How do you define "better" if not relative to some entity able
to appreciate the difference between good and bad?

~~~
dredmorbius
Looking at the long-term consequences might be illuminating, though that
presupposes agreement on what that long-term consequence is.

If it is a high, stable, prosperous, and happy population, sustainable over
the long term, arguably good.

If you start deviating from these criteria, things don't look so good.

H-B _has_ given us "large _. Is that population stable? Is it prosperous (and
if so or if not, where and why)? Is it happy? And is it sustainable over the
long term? If not, what does the end-stage look like, and how does it compare
to the_ status quo ante*, prior to H-B?

As with tackling complex projects, addressing difficult questions sometimes
becomes more tractable when decomposed into sub-problems and components.

As with mathematical proofs, sometimes presuming one result, then walking that
to its inevitable conclusions, leads to a proof by contradiction.

------
cuspycode
The condition "you can pretty much build it yourself" forces me to exclude
many things with important impact like for example nuclear reactors, LSD,
birth control pills, and the silicon transistor. But I think steam engines (or
Rankine cycle engines in general) and penicillin are simple enough to qualify.

~~~
Synaesthesia
When I read Alexander Shulgin, the psychedelic chemist’s biography, I was
struck by the fact that when he wanted to do LSD with some friends, he
actually synthesised it in his lab.

~~~
cuspycode
Yeah, Shulgin was a special case, he was a genius biochemist after all. And
there are of course lots of people who have synthesized LSD using fairly
standard lab equipment. But it's not like something anyone could do.

------
kingkawn
Rivets

Ingenious Mechanism + strong as hell

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rivet](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rivet)

------
omarhaneef
Ah, the problem is that modern inventions are really embedded in a practice
and theory. The invention may be simple but the practice and theory are not.

So I would put up soap as a contender. Simple, saves hundreds of thousands of
life, prevents diseases and so forth.

But soap, as an invention, is embedded in the modern practice of washing,
which requires our modern knowledge of germs and diseases, as well as our
modern effective plumbing system to bring the clean water and dispose of the
dirty water.

Of course if it didn't require those it wouldn't be modern.

~~~
avian
"The earliest recorded evidence of the production of soap-like materials dates
back to around 2800 BC in ancient Babylon." [1] Soap is not a modern invention
and its usefulness in cleaning was recognized way before modern knowledge
about diseases.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soap#Ancient_Middle_East](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soap#Ancient_Middle_East)

~~~
new2628
And arguably, soaps available in shops are getting worse with every iteration.
Enter a big store in most of the developed world, and you can hardly find a
regular soap bar anymore (only liquids, "hydrating bars", etc.). Craft markets
still have them luckily.

~~~
AngryData
Many of those are likely detergents rather than soaps because it is less harsh
on your skin and thus easier to market and sell.

I hate moisturizers and greasy bullshit or whatever else in soap though which
is a lot of liquid soaps.

~~~
oska
Detergent is _more_ harsh on your skin than (real) soap.

------
iancmceachern
Refrigeration, particularly because it has revolutionized our food
infrastructure.

~~~
jessaustin
Many inventions only make sense in our specific modern context. Every primate
that has ever lived could appreciate refrigeration and air conditioning.

------
nathell
Zipper (1851) and ballpoint pen (1888) would be my picks.

~~~
ryanmercer
The development, and successful commercialization, of the ballpoint pen is a
really interesting hole to dive down.

John Loud is like check this cool thing I made, it doesn't really work though.
Laszlo Biro comes along and makes it viable, everyone tries to rip him off,
then Marcel Bich comes along and is like "Biro, let me have that, everyone sit
down Bic has this!".

Stuff You Should Know did a podcast episode about it once. IIRC it was a
decent listen
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXB7479t0XM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXB7479t0XM)

------
Jaruzel
The basic internal combustion engine.

Without it, we'd still be spending half our lives travelling places.

~~~
abyssin
Not saying it didn't have an impact, but I'm nitpicking about the impact it
had on how we spend our time: "Marchetti's constant is the average time spent
by a person for commuting each day, which is approximately one hour. [...]
Ever since Neolithic times, people have kept the average time spent per day
for travel the same, even though the distance may increase due to the
advancements in the means of transportation."

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marchetti's_constant](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marchetti's_constant)

------
pyfgcrl123
How about electromechanical relay switch. As far as digital electronics goes,
relay can, with some mental gymnastics, be considered grandfather of
transistor (which, in turn, is one of the most important inventions of all
time, but too complicated).

~~~
lebuffon
They were invented (I believe) to "relay" telegraph messages over long lines
so it was indeed a digital amplifier. (Former Western Union employee)

------
nsfyn55
Unix Pipes - BWK pointed out in his memoir how a small piping implementation
done in a single day changed Unix(and computing) forever.

~~~
abrax3141
APL was around in the late '60s and is basically just pipes.

------
dossy
Binder clips.

"The binder clip was invented in 1910 by Washington resident Louis E.
Baltzley, who ultimately was granted U.S. Patent 1,139,627 for his invention."

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binder_clip](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binder_clip)

------
hoistbypetard
I think the soldering iron has to be in the hunt on all three (important,
modern, simple) counts.

~~~
mNovak
Sort of implies that electricity was really the important innovation, to
warrant the need for soldering? (Unless I'm totally missing the important
application of soldering.)

I'd argue basic electric applications are pretty simple, and easily made by
hand.

~~~
AWildC182
Sort of implies that copper smelting was really the important innovation, to
warrant the need for electricity?

In all seriousness though, the printed circuit board might be a good one to
bundle with that. The old methods of creating a mechanically robust compact
electrical package were nowhere near as efficient. They're also very recent
and very easy to make yourself, even if it's thin plywood with tinfoil glued
on.

------
ThePhysicist
Sterilization of medical equipment. Easy to do even at home if you know how,
probably saved hundreds of millions of lives since it was invented.

------
harryh
Standardized shipping containers massively decreased the cost of global
commerce which is perhaps the most important force in the modern world.

~~~
arcturus17
Nice one, but we could get into a debate on whether a convention counts as an
invention.

~~~
harryh
Ya, I dunno if it counts either. Just seemed like an interesting answer so I
threw it out there.

------
mjd
I'm late to the party, but I think the winner is the bra.

Wikipedia says:

> The Dresden-based German, Christine Hardt, patented the first modern
> brassiere in 1899. Sigmund Lindauer from Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt, Germany,
> developed a brassiere for mass production and patented it in 1912. In the
> United States, Mary Phelps Jacob received a patent in 1914 for the first
> brassiere design that is recognized as the basis for modern bras.

> A bra is one of the most complicated garments to make. A typical design has
> between 20 and 48 parts, including the band, gore, side panel, cup, apex,
> neckline, underwire, strap, ring, slider, strap join, and closure.

------
divbzero
The modern flush toilet. [1]

[1]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flush_toilet](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flush_toilet)

Technically invented in the 1500s but not widely produced until the 1800s.

~~~
dredmorbius
And of limited use without something to hook it up to.

The toilet itself is an input (or depending on your perspective, output)
device. Without the additional process it's connected to, it doesn't buy you
much.

London's first flush toilets were connected to existing cesspits, in the late
19th century. Connection to the (storm-water-handling) sewers was an
unauthorised hack by plumbers of the day. Tim Harford has covered this in his
podcast on major inventions.

------
heavyarms
I'm not sure about the whole "build it yourself" part, but the "Bessemer
process" for making steel was a simple innovation improving on something that
existed but made it so much more affordable that many experts think it was a
significant contributor to a "second" industrial revolution.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Industrial_Revolution](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Industrial_Revolution)

------
awaze
Equally important is contraception and elective abortion. Being able to
control the timing of raising a family allows a much higher degree of freedom
and also ensures a safer and more healthy environment to raise a child. I
think the most important prerequisite to being a parent is the desire to be a
parent.
[https://www.awazeuttarpradesh.com/blog/1337x/](https://www.awazeuttarpradesh.com/blog/1337x/)

------
vahid4m
The idea of Open Source software

------
DonaldFisk
General anaesthesia.

------
the_arun
The basic ground breaking conceptual innovation is - "self serve".

The innovations with respect to tools - either support or serve that basic
need.

All hygiene tools - Nail cutters, Contact Lenses, tooth pick, soap, tooth
brush, shaving blade may fall in this category.

If we step little outside - I feel bicycle is one of the biggest innovation
which triggered modern day - self serve - without depending on/troubling
animals.

------
aidenn0
Smokeless gunpowder? It completely changed the dynamics of the battlefield,
and you said "important" not necessarily "good"

------
ryanmercer
Common soap bars, they weren't really a thing until the mid 1850's and you had
to make your own soap unless you were wealthy prior to that.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soap#19th_century](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soap#19th_century)

Similarly, liquid soap which came to be around the same time.

~~~
pppp
Liquid soaps are a poor choice from an environmental/cost standpoint. Most of
the soap goes down the drain and is wasted. Bar soap stays on your hands and
last many times longer.

~~~
ryanmercer
That may be the case now, but liquid soaps revolutionized laundry when they
came to be. Washing clothes with bar soap is a royal pain. Powdered laundry
detergents really didn't start to catch on until the 1940's
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laundry_detergent](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laundry_detergent)

Also, washing machines didn't really start to catch on until the mid 1940's,
prior to that it was still pretty much scrub boards. Scrub boards are bad
enough with liquid soap.

~~~
new2628
I found soap nuts to be the cheapest, most eco-friendly, and reasonably
efficient detergent there is. Just drop a bunch of soap nuts in a cloth bag
into the washing machine, and it produces enough foam to make everything
clean.

------
ZguideZ
Canning and food preservation. It used to be all about salt salt salt.

------
sjwright
At the risk of being controversial, perhaps the most modern simple invention
is the internet and its ability to let randoms ask a basic question and have a
thousand people contribute hundreds of cumulative man-hours to answering it.

(Maybe I'm being cynical, but I feel like the OP is asking this question for
reasons beyond pure curiosity.)

------
gramakri
Washing machine and dish washer

~~~
ganzuul
That's actually a big one because of how much time women would spend on these
chores.

------
mjd
I read “modern” as “post-world-war-II” and suggest:

Drywall.

------
mongol
Would be interesting to hear about most famous inventions in other countries.
From Sweden, or Swedish inventors: Dynamite. The sun valve
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun_valve](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun_valve)).
The milk separator. Tetrahedron-shaped plastic-coated paper carton packaging.
The self aligning ball bearing. All these were part of early history of what
became larger companies existing to this day.

The adjustable spanner, the zipper and the propeller are also sometimes
mentioned in this category within Sweden, but are the also referring to
inventors with partly Swedish origin or for improvements of previous designs.

------
mhh__
The metric system is pretty good

~~~
Smoosh
I can't believe they never implemented metric time and dates (calendar). Now
we seem to be forever* stuck with what we have - a glaring inconsistency in
some fundamental units of measurement.

* Forever is a long time; after several civilizations crumble and rebuild, perhaps there will be an opportunity.

~~~
dublin
Metric time and dates notably fail to work with the observed motion of the
Solar system. The time metrics we use are determined by the rhythms of the
Earth, Moon, and Sun. Metric time offers no benefit. (And for the record,
Napoleon tried to decree decimal dates and times, but even the French weren't
having any of that crap...)

------
techbio
I'll suggest the thermostat (and throw in the rest of control theory).

------
WalterBright
Engines - replacement of muscle power. A steam engine isn't that hard to make
(I built one in high school).

The Romans got pretty far without it, but it's hard to see them going further.

~~~
ken
I disagree: [http://www.lowtechmagazine.com/2010/03/history-of-human-
powe...](http://www.lowtechmagazine.com/2010/03/history-of-human-powered-
cranes.html)

> "There is no limit to the weight that humans can lift by sheer muscle power.
> Nor is there a limit to the height to which this weight can be lifted. The
> only advantage that [powered] cranes have brought us is a higher lifting
> speed."

We moved to engines because they were cheaper, not because we were anywhere
near the limits of muscle power.

~~~
WalterBright
The history of the industrial revolution since the advent of the steam engine
amply makes my point.

~~~
ken
Just because history played out one way doesn’t mean it could only have played
out that way.

~~~
WalterBright
It played out that way in every country that adopted the steam engine, and
failed to happen at all in countries that did not.

As I say, the historical evidence is as compelling as it gets.

------
cyanbane
Birth Control.

~~~
turc1656
Very interesting proposal. I actually remember hearing some professor (of some
sort of biological/sociological background) describe birth control as arguably
creating a new species as far as females go because never before did they have
any sort of reliable control over their reproduction. He actually believed
that it was such an incredible event in human history that we have yet to
fully understand its total impact on society and that we should consider
modern women as fundamentally different now - to such a large degree that he
considers them a new species of human females.

------
hooande
The phonograph. The idea of "record something and play it again later" has
significantly impacted all of our lives, and was barely even imagined prior to
invention

~~~
dublin
^^THIS^^ is one of the best answers here. There's no doubt the ancient Greeks
could have built a phonograph - the Anitkythera mechanism is proof.

------
metaloha
Rice cookers. Totally ingenious.

~~~
abrax3141
Not sure this counts as "simple".

~~~
mhh__
My dad still uses the family (his dad's) rice cooker from the mid 1950s, so
they aren't that complicated, they're basically a heater and thermal cutoff

PSA for anyone who doesn't: Wash your fucking rice

~~~
EL_Loco
-> Wash your fucking rice

What? Sure, if you want to remove some of the starch, but what if you don't? I
don't really know why you should if you don't want to, unless it was dirty,
but rice today comes pretty clean of debris and bugs. Plus, it's going to be
cooked, so no problem there.

~~~
mhh__
It's not for safety: it's because starchy rice sticks together and makes
clumpy bad-tasting rice, it's also much more easily seasoned in my experience
if you wash it first.

------
octokatt
Plastic. We're now drowning in a new problem, but plastic and its impact on
sanitation (particularly medical sanitation, like disposable needles, which
then supports vaccinations) has dramatically improved life quality and length.

Losing a child to disease before the age of five is no longer a universal
human experience, portrayed in the Robert Frost poem below.

[https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/53086/home-
burial](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/53086/home-burial)

~~~
ken
Can I make plastic myself?

~~~
arbitrage
Simple ones, sure!

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plastic#History](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plastic#History)

------
derefr
Apropos time to link my favorite blog:
[https://rootsofprogress.org/](https://rootsofprogress.org/). It's an
exploration of the things that helped humanity leap forward.

Spoilers: empirically-informed hygiene, and textile manufacturing techniques.

------
sebastianconcpt
The sanitation system.

~~~
jfk13
Ours may be more sophisticated in various ways, but sanitation systems were
invented _long_ ago.
[https://www.harappa.com/lothal/14.html](https://www.harappa.com/lothal/14.html)

~~~
sebastianconcpt
Totally.

------
callmeed
I recommend reading _How We Got to Now: Six Innovations That Made the Modern
World_

[https://www.amazon.com/How-We-Got-Now-
Innovations/dp/1594633...](https://www.amazon.com/How-We-Got-Now-
Innovations/dp/1594633932)

------
maxerickson
Wood pulp paper, dimensional lumber (and related framing methods), and I see
someone already mentioned the AM radio.

The manipulation of the aether thoroughly meets your definition of modernity,
and the principles of _constructing_ a simple radio aren't terribly
complicated.

------
bachmeier
In terms of economic importance, the assembly line was extremely simple yet
had a massive impact.

------
meekaaku
Not post 1700, Luca Pacioli's double entry accounting is simple but extremly
effective one.

------
acoye
Compressor, so we can have refrigeration and feed million of people safely
between other things.

------
DoingIsLearning
1953 -'Ambu' bags i.e. 'bag valve masks'

They are as simple as it gets but have saved millions of lives.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bag_valve_mask](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bag_valve_mask)

------
pmdulaney
It's kind of an oxymoron because if it were simple it would have been invented
before modern times.

But I'll say backpacks for everyday commuter use and trashcans with wheels
(what they refer to in British TV shows as "wheely bins").

~~~
aidenn0
Simplicity is only somewhat related to invention.

The compound bow was not invented until 1966, but any technically-inclined
person from the early-modern era would immediately understand how it works
from a picture.

~~~
willvarfar
Tangential, but if you want to nerd out on bow tech, the slingshot channel is
awesome! Rapid fire repeating bows with half draw-weight, all made in the
classic mad inventor in a garage charm!

A good intro [https://youtu.be/f3fcNyZoEIw](https://youtu.be/f3fcNyZoEIw)

------
Boll4
The menstrual cup.

It is definitely more ecological and practical, without any chemicals or
fragrance that are found in tampons / pads these days. I definitely see it as
a more affordable (the initial cost is higher, but think long-run) solution.

------
somberi
For me: Electric Kettle, Umbrella and Bicycle.

I have used them for the last 45 years in the same shape and form.

If you gave me any of the "older" models from 40 years ago, the utility value
will be similar to what I buy from the store today.

~~~
akgerber
The bicycle is only debatably simple, considering that it's the culmination of
quite a few relatively-advanced technologies and processes: steelmaking,
pneumatic tires, interchangeable parts, ball bearings, bowden cables, etc.

~~~
InitialLastName
Don't forget about very smooth roads, without which you would want even more
technology.

------
estebarb
"simple" is a strong requirement. I don't know how to make anything of most
things proposed!!!

If we were thrown to the Earth 10000 years ago, we would be able to bootstrap
our current tech in less than a century?

~~~
kwhitefoot
Yes. So long as we had a few reference works, freedom from attack by competing
tribes, and landed on productive agricultural land.

Simple radios are very easy and allow us to stick together over wider ranges
than the locals, knowledge of simple medical concepts and sanitation keeps us
alive and healthy longer.

Understanding how to build effective shelters and storage systems allows us to
keep an agricultural surplus which enables some of us to devote our time to
bootstrapping.

The biggest problem would be people jockeying for short term power instead of
pulling together for long term success.

~~~
war1025
The thing you are missing, which is a massive hurdle that is underappreciated,
is that you need access to raw materials. Most of the modern gadgets we use
require things that you can't just find out your front door.

~~~
kwhitefoot
That's why it takes a hundred years. You first have to create the
infrastructure that allows you to free up people to prospect and mine. However
if we concentrate on energy first then most of the materials one needs to get
started are indeed just outside one's front door. All you need for an
electronics industry is glass and metal. We can use valves until we have a
supply of indium, etc.

------
roosgit
Liquid paper.

Invented in 1956 by a typist, in her kitchen.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid_Paper](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid_Paper)

~~~
ph4
I'm having trouble seeing how this even makes the top 100 list of "most
important".

~~~
estebarb
12 years ago we still relayed on notebooks and pens for everything. Then
smartphones appear and life changed forever. And also devices like clocks,
calculators, cameras, gps, planners, maps, agendas, erasers and liquid paper
become redundant.

~~~
AnimalMuppet
12 years ago was 2008. _Most_ of us didn't type manually by then. Most of us
had word processors, and keyboards with a backspace button.

------
yarone
Contact Lenses. My favorite and most day-to-day useful technology.

------
gwbas1c
Electricity: The ability to send energy down a wire, and then to have energy
available "on tap" at any moment.

Many of the inventions I see listed here rely on some form of electricity.

------
Duke-Nukem-64
Modern day plumbing/water/waste management. Clean water comes in, waste goes
out. Don't have to give two thoughts about it.

------
manoj_venkat92
Printing press. Without it, spread of knowledge would've been dwarfed and it
put the industrial revolution in its full swing.

------
LeoPanthera
Earplugs! Improved sleep quality can have huge health benefits and the world
is noisier than ever.

...might have been invented before 1700 though.

~~~
dartdartdart1
They cause inner ear bacteria to quintuple overnight, shouldn't be a problem
with a healthy immune system, but still

~~~
LeoPanthera
I would imagine that the improvement to sleep quality outweighs any possible
ear bacteria problems, at least in otherwise healthy people sleeping in noisy
locations.

I also question the “quadruple” claim, a quick internet search doesn’t back
that up.

~~~
jrace
One ear infection and you may not agree.

------
dinjin
Internet. I know you can't build it easy. But if the building blocks were in
place, its straight forward.

------
say_it_as_it_is
The idea of human rights is simple, fairly modern, and very important -- one
of the most important today.

~~~
Synaesthesia
I think it’s not such a new idea, I mean there was the Magna Carta

------
powellzer
The modern clothespin wasn’t invented until 1887. It was then that the coiled
fulcrum came into play.

------
lowdose
The wheels under the suitcase. Somebody came up with that idea after we got a
man on the moon.

------
exabrial
Sewers - literally prevents plagues

~~~
jbay808
Deployed widely in modern times, but invented in antiquity.

------
gumby
The limited liability corporation

~~~
bdowling
This. The ability for investors to fund risky business ventures without being
personally liable for the debts of the venture is what enabled the industrial
revolution and led to most of the other inventions on this list.

Number two is casualty and other types of insurance.

------
ilamont
Bending light (1840s)

-> Fiber optics (1954)

\--> fast network connectivity

\---> Internet

\---> Telephony

\--> fiber optic endoscopy (1956)

\---> better disease detection

\---> laparoscopic surgery

~~~
dnautics
I love that fiber optics are really rather complex in the underlying theory,
but they're so simple in construction (ok it can take some very complex
machinery, but when it boils down to it you could easily make a functional,
basic example yourself, useful for real purposes, say piping in sunlight to a
room)

------
0027
Modern mathematical notation, binary, or pretty much any software development
language

------
ImaTigger
Ice making (someone else said refrigeration, but this is more specific).

------
zh3
The drill and digger (for fossil fuel).

"Important" is perhaps a loaded word in this case.

~~~
dublin
Howard Hughes Sr's tricone rock bit truly revolutionized the world, and made
the oil and gas industry possible. It's success was staggering: only a few
years after he dropped dead of a heart attack, his son Howard, Jr (the one you
usually think of) took over the company and was personally making _over a
million dollars a day_ \- In the depths of the Depression!

------
jshowa3
scientific method

------
danielovichdk
Toothbrush.

------
acd10j
General Purpose Computers,It single handed accelerated lots of industries.

------
bravoetch
The bicycle. I'm stunned it didn't come along earlier.

------
sunstone
The toilet and sewer system has got to be down there somewhere.

------
nojvek
Basic hygiene. Washing hands and yourself with hot water and soap. Not
exchanging needles. Covering your mouth before sneezing. Tampons / pads,
toilet tissue (although I prefer a faucet and doing a first pass with water.
More hygienic and less tissue used. Also much better for the bottom)

Vaccines, anti-biopics and good hygiene and sanitary practices have doubled
our average life span.

With a long life we’ve been able to achieve a lot more. Women have been more
productive, we’ve created more wealth, have fewer children so each child has
more resources and opportunities.

The state of US healthcare really makes me sad, but I’m hopeful we’ll keep on
learning more about the human body and engineer more ways of fixing it and
making us all live a longer, healthier, wealthier, happier life.

------
s3nnyy
Wheels on suitcases (taken from antifragile by N.Taleb)

------
kraig911
The invention of speech or is that to 'old'

------
achenatx
plumbing and sewers increased life expectancy more than any other improvement.

After that maybe the steam engine, electric generator, light bulb

------
shubidubi
A/C Productivity, mortality and convince.

------
bouncycastle
Screws!

Or more accurately, the ability to mass produce them.

------
nodivbyzero
Electric battery

~~~
abrax3141
As elsewhere, making a non-trivial battery ain't so simple.

------
mikro2nd
Mains sewerage.

------
snarf21
1) Indoor plumbing 2) Washing machine

------
PAGAN_WIZARD
The electric motor/generator.

------
adv0r
roundabouts

------
fudged71
Biogas reactors

Silage

Pads/Tampons

Wearable Pedometers and Heart Rate sensors

------
glitchc
Microwave. Self-explanatory.

------
netule
The hypodermic needle.

------
eucryphia
Running hot water.

------
fortran77
One Click Ordering

------
batoure
Waterless urinals

------
wufufufu
Cardboard boxes?

------
tylerjwilk00
. Duct Tape

. Bungie Straps

. Zip Ties

Not necessarily in that order.

------
sys_64738
Shoelaces. Without them we'd be tied in knots.

------
irchans
Post-it Notes

~~~
UnFleshedOne
Doesn't that require specific adhesive (that is rather bad at being sticky)?

------
technotarek
Antibiotics?

~~~
abrax3141
Not simple.

------
brandav
transistor.

~~~
abrax3141
Also not simple.

------
mn1024
Pacifier

------
pgt
Soap

------
superkitty
Whatsapp!

------
robot
bicycle?

------
brutt
Software.

~~~
rhacker
Definitely far from simple, but definitely important.

------
fit2rule
The IUD.

~~~
abrax3141
IUDs aren't simple. The concept of contraception is simple, and condoms (as
mentioned elsewhere are), but both of those are old.

~~~
fit2rule
I dunno, I think Gräfenbergs Ring is pretty darn simple:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gräfenberg%27s_ring](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gräfenberg%27s_ring)

------
werber
Condoms

~~~
jfk13
How modern do you think they are?

[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3649591/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3649591/)

~~~
werber
wow, awesome source, thanks!

------
slipwalker
toilet paper, maybe ?...

~~~
jfk13
Why? Cleaning with water works fine - better, in many people's opinion.

~~~
rafaelvasco
First water of course, and then paper to dry it. If any residue is found,
repeat the process.

------
superkitty
calculator

------
robofanatic
a Pen

~~~
willvarfar
The pencil, surely? Although you can get a long way with chalk, slate and
charcoal, so perhaps not?

~~~
mathgeek
Pencils are not a modern invention [0], which is why it doesn't fit the
question. The ballpoint pen, as an example, is a 19th century patent [1], so
pens in general might fit.

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pencil#History](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pencil#History)
[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ballpoint_pen](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ballpoint_pen)

------
crtlaltdel
plastics

~~~
abrax3141
Def. not simple!

~~~
crtlaltdel
idk...as far as complexity goes, plastics are not really all that bad. i'd
argue that many machines are far more complex than a polymer when you consider
what it's comprised of and how it functions.

------
wiggles_md
The Toyota Way. Totally transformed manufacturing.

------
0xff00ffee
The latex condom.

------
superkitty
Amazon prime!

------
geoffreyy
Someone has to say it... Squatty Potty

------
sedigive
It's not the inventions that are most important but the thinking processes and
curiosity that continue to investigate, tinker, design, and test new ideas and
processes. Humans are problem solvers by nature and by survival instinct.
Every invention is a product of the mind.

