The scientific advancement evaluation?

hey (((random)))

i think i'd like to nominate john scott russell's soliton. you may disqualify me, as he was working over a century ago but i reckon if i got a good lawyer (s)he might get me off on a technicality :) his beautiful idea did not really come of age until this century.

i came upon this man quite by chance on a documentary i was watching last night on bbc, here's a little extract from the programme information blurb:

"a remarkable natural phenomenon discovered accidentally on this coast in 1834. First seen in the water of a canal near Edinburgh and dubbed the 'Soliton', it's a rare type of wave that appears to travel endlessly, without losing energy and without breaking up, even when it collides with another Soliton wave. Now engineers have created tiny Soliton light waves, which could revolutionise the next generation of fibre-optic communication by transmitting messages effortlessly between continents."

anyway, i think it ties in neatly with ourscott's 'communication'. and, to be honest, it may not be the most profound or the highest impact discovery but right now what i'm into is the celebration of more 'obscure' giants (upon whose shoulders we now stand).

http://www.ma.hw.ac.uk/solitons/LocalHeroes/sr.htm...

http://www.ma.hw.ac.uk/~chris/scott_russell.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soliton#History

edit: wow! i did miss that - didn't know it was going to be on, gonna go and see if it's on catch-up! if not, i'll have to find some other means... thanks for letting me know random, i appreciate that :)

Your talking 1900 - 2000 with this one?

Two things came to my thoughts.

First was Einstein theories, if you consider they lead to the atomic bomb, and the understanding of space-time (necessary to adjust GPS clocks).

But my personal choice would be the invention of the transistor. All the following development of electronics, from industry including to the level of personal carry around devices. Computers too, how can the transistor be denied.

Quantum physics--the concept that our macro-world sits on and is built out of the subatomic world that operates under totally different rules. It's humbling and opens us up to non-materialistic thinking.

I'd say communications, starting with radio, then TV and now the net.

A close second would be transportation with trains, cars, planes and rockets.

There are already some absolutely best answers here already, but I have to toss in here this one:

Birth control.

Thank you science!