Date | Great idea |
| |
| 2,500,000 BC | Oldowan pebble tools |
| 2,000,000 BC | carrying devices (bark "baskets") |
| 1,500,000 BC | fire (captured) |
| 1,400,000 BC | Acheulean stone tools |
| 500,000 BC | clothing |
| 400,000 BC | huts |
| 400,000 BC | fire (made at need) |
| 300,000 BC | hafting (handles on tools) |
| 200,000 BC | Levallois stone tools (core technique) |
| 100,000 BC | religion/magic |
| 60,000 BC | boats (to reach Australia) |
| 50,000 BC | music (Neanderthal flute) |
| 30,000 BC | art |
| 30,000 BC | calendar (hints of month-counting) |
| 25,000 BC | weaving |
| 20,000 BC | bow & arrow |
| 12,000 BC | domestication of animals |
| 10,000 BC | pottery |
| 10,000 BC | cities |
| 10,000 BC | money |
| 10,000 BC | fermentation (beer, wine, bread, cheese) |
| 8000 BC | agriculture (Middle East) |
| 8000 BC | agriculture (Africa) |
| 6000 BC | agriculture (Asia) |
| 6000 BC | agriculture (Americas) |
| 3500 BC | wheeled carts |
| 3500 BC | writing |
| 3000 BC | plow |
| 3000 BC | metal working (Bronze Age) |
| 500 BC | abacus |
| 100 BC | glass-blowing |
| 1000 AD | printing press (China) |
| 1230 | rocket (China) |
| 1280 | lenses (eyeglasses) |
| 1450 | printing press & movable, metal type (Gutenberg) |
| 1620 | scientific method |
| 1657 | clock, pendulum |
| 1769 | steam engine |
| 1796 | vaccines |
| 1800 | electricity (Voltaic battery) |
| 1801 | Jacquard loom (punched cards--first program) |
| 1816 | photography |
| 1837 | electrical communication (telegraph) |
| c 1850 | synthetic chemistry (dynamite 1866) |
| 1876 | internal combustion engine |
| 1895 | radio |
| 1897 | cathode ray oscilloscope |
| 1917 | hybrid corn |
| 1928 | antibiotics (discovery of penicillin) |
| 1930 | jet engine |
| 1945 | A-bomb (Trinity) |
| 1947 | transistor |
| 1957 | satellites (Sputnik) |
| 1973 | recombinant DNA |
| 1992 | Internet |