You know what I love? The State

[TheReal_ND]

People are rioting against the state in Minnesota and Brazil.

[Montegriffo]

People are rioting against the state in Minnesota and Brazil.

Yes, but are they wearing masks and staying at least 6' apart while they are doing it?

[C-Mag]

Once you have stored grain, ie wealth, you have to have a state to come along and tax it to redistribute it for the common good.

Humans stored grain for 5000 years.
Explain why storing grain finally led to a technological revolution?

[C-Mag]

The bureaucratic state had not only been tried, but successfully implemented in enough of the world to make precision tools possible by the 18th century.

Order is the engine of our flourishing.

Explain how the technological revolution took off in a th time of chaos and upheaval?

This is the time of both the French and American Revolutions.

[Montegriffo]

Once you have stored grain, ie wealth, you have to have a state to come along and tax it to redistribute it for the common good.

Humans stored grain for 5000 years.
Explain why storing grain finally led to a technological revolution?

Probably even longer.

Division of labour. Once you have a secure food supply you can grow your society and some people can specialise.
Specialisation is the key to technological innovation.
StA has argued that there were ways of storing grain before pottery which may well be true but pottery was a cheap and easy way to do it well and more reliable in terms of losses due to insects, rodents, mould etc.

[Montegriffo]

Sorry if I've hijacked your thread Hanarchy. That's the risk you take though if you make something then leave it unattended.

It's still here though if you want to come back and take control of it again.

[C-Mag]

Again, division of labor existed for thousands of years. Hell, read the list of specialized jobs in Medieval England. It's not a short list.

But medieval society was really not much more advanced than Rome a thousand years earlier

[Montegriffo]

But medieval society was really not much more advanced than Rome a thousand years earlier

Blimey, that's a whole different discussion in itself. I wouldn't agree btw, just look at the differences in metallurgy for a start.

[C-Mag]

No its not.

Human civilizations throughout history advanced from the first nations to 1800.

Then all of a sudden technology takes off at a crazy pace.

Not Storing grain, division of Labor, nor a beauracratic State explain this sudden leap. All those things were present throughout history.

It's only when the all steel slide lathe is made that results in modern society.

[Montegriffo]

No its not.

Human civilizations throughout history advanced from the first nations to 1800.

Then all of a sudden technology takes off at a crazy pace.

Not Storing grain, division of Labor, nor a beauracratic State explain this sudden leap. All those things were present throughout history.

It's only when the all steel slide lathe is made that results in modern society.

Science and technology advances at an exponential rate, that's not really very contentious. Advances in one field transfer to several other applications and things speed up at an ever-increasing rate.
Trying to isolate one thing which kicks it all off is much harder to do.

The theories about what started off the industrial revolution are wide and varied. I like the theory that it was the Dutch when they invented the water-powered sawmill. No longer were they reliant on human power to carry out industrial tasks and that could be argued as the starting point of mechanisation. That followed on from mechanical flour grinding in wind and watermills.
One idea as to why science and technology advanced in Europe while the previous leading innovators, China, stood still is the development of glass.
Without glass, the Chinese were unable to produce lenses and that shortened the careers of scientists there. The degradation of eyesight with age meant they couldn't read about the latest innovations whereas the west was able to produce spectacles and extend the useful life of their best brains. Also, we could develop tools like microscopes and telescopes which led to new insights and scientific advancements.
None of this points to the first innovation which started it all off though and I'm still sticking to the invention of pottery which allowed civilisations to grow in size and the resultant specialisation led to all other subsequent advancements.
Unless you want to go even further back and just say agriculture itself was what started civilisation and led to the state and the advancement of the species.