If you could un-invent something, what would it be?
A guy called Otto I believe in the 1870’s onwards, along with those chappies Benz and Diesel, made engines and motor transport possible. They changed the way we got around forever. The horse was replaced by something which was a wonderful invention initially. Now, there are too many, too large and too polluting.
A great idea gone wrong. The internal combustion engine has polluted our planet.
Yes, it has made our lives easier, or has it?
Were we any less happy and content before the first motor car trundled out of the factory? I doubt it.
Slick advertising and marketing created a desire for something that we had lived thousands of years without beforehand.
Interesting theory. Stop for a moment and think about how far that 4-stroke engine has permeated our lives. Could you imagine a life without its main function, powering the motor car?
We all walked, or rode horses before the engine was invented and powered a car. What would happen if overnight all those cars disappeared? Remember Covid? In the UK it was possible to walk on some bits of road normally impossible. Food for thought, no? Pollution fell, we could breathe again.
So the ICE is the one thing that I wish we had never seen. If we hadn’t invented it, our lives would be simpler, less complex and our pace of life slower. Life would be harder and probably shorter too. There’s a price to pay for un-inventing the engine.