Firsts

There are so many subjects and areas that can be covered by Firsts and that is before it can be narrowed down to the personal. The first humans, your first kiss, the first train, the first time Birmingham City win the FA Cup, but that will be next season so doesn’t count.

I decided after much thought that I’d go with my selection of First discoveries that made a difference to the human race. Not the accidental ones like the use of fire but ones that were as a result of human thought. I was going to try a list of importance but that led to problems so I’m going chronologically.

Cuneiform Script

Writing: I think there is a very strong case to be made for the invention of writing to be the most important of all inventions. Everything else, for humanity, follows on from it. And for that we have to go back to Mesopotamia (where else) in around 3,200 BCE. In southern Iraq there were a series of city states including, for instance, Uruk and at first symbols were inscribed on clay tablets by a reed stylus to show how many goats or beer etc were being counted. That eventually became too cumbersome a system and over only a few years the symbols were modified to create characters representing the sounds of the Sumerian language and consequently other languages. This system is called Cuneiform. Ignore any claims made by Egyptologists.

The Earth is Round: Not an obvious statement from the literal standpoint of a human being. However, in the year 240 BCE a certain Eratosthenes, a Greek citizen from the city of Cyrene (now part of Libya) observed that at noon on the Summer Solstice in Alexandria, the Sun was directly overhead. He knew that in Aswan, about 800 kilometres to the south, the Sun would be at an angle of 7.2 degrees from vertical at the same time. By measuring the angle of the Sun’s rays at both locations and using geometry, Eratosthenes was able to calculate that the Earth had a circumference of about 28,735 miles. This is close to the modern value of 24,850 miles. Apart from the practical advantages from discovering this fact I do feel that this must have been a real psychological jolt to people at the time. I will add to this the first time that it was found that the Earth went round the sun.

Calculating Earth's Circumference

Electromagnetism: the first half of the 19th Century saw an extraordinary growth in the understanding of science and engineering. No one person could claim to have discovered or invented all parts of that growth. Despite what the movies say science doesn’t work like that. But that doesn’t mean that individuals don’t make their mark. In 1831 Michael Faraday discovered electromagnetic induction, the principle behind the electric transformer and generator. This discovery was crucial in allowing electricity to be transformed from a curiosity into a powerful new technology. Electromagnetism quickly started the use of electrical energy production, transformation and distribution, light, heat, and sound production and detection, wireless communication, sensors, computation, electrolysis, electroplating and mechanical motors and actuators etc. And the movies.

Cinema: I’m not sure about this one but it seems to me that although humanity has always made images of themselves the invention of a method to actually see oneself moving and talking from youth to age might have a profound influence on human psychology.

Yuri Gagarin

Space: I can’t not include the first time a human being left the confines of our planet. I vividly remember staying up all night (together with most of humanity) watching the moon landings but the honour of the first person into space belongs to Yuri Gagarin. On April 12, 1961, aboard the spacecraft Vostok 1, he became the first human being to travel into space. During the flight, the 27-year-old test pilot and industrial technician also became the first man to orbit the planet, a feat accomplished by his space capsule in 89 minutes. Vostok 1 orbited Earth at a maximum altitude of 187 miles and was guided entirely by an automatic control system. The only statement attributed to Gagarin during his one hour and 48 minutes in space was, “Flight is proceeding normally; I am well.”

I’m going to stick to a top 5 but I’m sure that others will have a different, but wrong, opinion.

The Four Quartets by T S Eliot

Number 1

Burnt Norton

Time present and time past
Are both perhaps present in time future,
And time future contained in time past.
If all time is eternally present
All time is unredeemable.
What might have been is an abstraction
Remaining a perpetual possibility
Only in a world of speculation.
What might have been and what has been
Point to one end, which is always present.
Footfalls echo in the memory
Down the passage we did not take
Towards the door we never opened
Into the rose-garden. My words echo
Thus, in your mind.
                               But to what purpose
Disturbing the dust on a bowl of rose-leaves
I do not know.

Thanks for reading, Terry Q.