Who is the greatest person that ever lived?

[Anubis]

Corby Fundleton.

[SCOUSE TAPAS]

James Patrick Page for bringing the magic of Led Zeppelin to life.

[Pony Princess]

I was thinking today that as some other person posted that da Vinci was prehaps the greatest who lived.

 

He challenged totally established ideas, he proved the earth orbits the sun and not vice versa, and was nearly sent to jail or worse for science.

 

Was a polymath. That means he was great at everything - he learned to play instruments to a high standard in days, could draw anything he saw with an almost photographic memory.

 

He did shit that was really iffy back then in the name of science. He went to anatomy lessons where they dissected cadavers for education - that shit was dangerous back then, they were pushing for science and understanding at a time when you would be sent to jail for questioning half of the stuff the bible quotes.

 

He put down the blueprints for things that would become commonplace in a couple of centuries - oh here's a helicopter. It won't work NOW because we don't have the materials or combustion engine but this is how it will work.

 

** he was vegetarian and that shit doesn't fly back then. He invented vegetarianism. I know he didn't but lets say it anyway. He invented loads of stuff.

 

*** he also did a few sketches. particularly one that is like... one of the most reproduced in the world. Yeah you might have seen it. Fucking hell, he was boss. I mean, what is she smiling at?

 

I mean seriously, that guy was an alien or a gift from a passing celestial deity who took pity on how primative we were.

 

Leonardi da Dinci. Legend.

[Captain]

Sir Isaac Newton for me, nuff said. Da Vinci is a good shout too.

[gingerhulk]

Ranulph Fiennes

 

Fucking legend, quite possibly the greatest living Englishman.

 

This guys knows his shit!

 

Sir ranulph is a monster of a man. got his autobiography last christmas, truly outstanding human being.

[Hermes]

An interesting question.

 

Some people would say Alexander Fleming, who discovered penicillin and saved millions of lives.

 

Some would say J.Robert Oppenheimer, inventor of the atomic bomb which prevented wars between major countries and possibly WWIII and the countless millions of lives that would have led to.

 

But my vote goes to John Hampson, inventor of venetian blinds. Without him it would have been curtains for every one of us.

[Anny Road]

Freddie Mercury. Love the guy, pity he took too many bullets.

In my opinion the greatest entertainer the world has ever seen.

[kop]

I agree on a few of the suggestions so far, so I will just add a couple of influencial persons not yet mentioned.

 

Cài Lún - the inventor of paper, and Johannes Gutenberg who invented the printing process. Both made it possible to share and store information on a whole new level. And whoever invented the dishwasher; the greatest invention ever!

[Sugar Ape]

I agree on a few of the suggestions so far, so I will just add a couple of influencial persons not yet mentioned.

 

Cài Lún - the inventor of paper, and Johannes Gutenberg who invented the printing process. Both made it possible to share and store information on a whole new level. And whoever invented the dishwasher; the greatest invention ever!

 

God?

[Hermes]

And whoever invented the dishwasher; the greatest invention ever!

 

A superfluous invention. Woman have been around since the time of Eve.

[Sugar Ape]

A superfluous invention. Woman have been around since the time of Eve.

 

You are an hour late with that joke.

[Steve Holt]

I was thinking today that as some other person posted that da Vinci was prehaps the greatest who lived.

 

He challenged totally established ideas, he proved the earth orbits the sun and not vice versa, and was nearly sent to jail or worse for science.

 

Was a polymath. That means he was great at everything - he learned to play instruments to a high standard in days, could draw anything he saw with an almost photographic memory.

 

He did shit that was really iffy back then in the name of science. He went to anatomy lessons where they dissected cadavers for education - that shit was dangerous back then, they were pushing for science and understanding at a time when you would be sent to jail for questioning half of the stuff the bible quotes.

 

He put down the blueprints for things that would become commonplace in a couple of centuries - oh here's a helicopter. It won't work NOW because we don't have the materials or combustion engine but this is how it will work.

 

** he was vegetarian and that shit doesn't fly back then. He invented vegetarianism. I know he didn't but lets say it anyway. He invented loads of stuff.

 

*** he also did a few sketches. particularly one that is like... one of the most reproduced in the world. Yeah you might have seen it. Fucking hell, he was boss. I mean, what is she smiling at?

 

I mean seriously, that guy was an alien or a gift from a passing celestial deity who took pity on how primative we were.

 

Leonardi da Dinci. Legend.

 

Regarding Heliocentrism, you're confusing Da Vinci with Nicolaus Copernicus, who wasn't even the first to point out that the Earth orbits the Sun. He was just the first one that was widely listened to in Western culture.

 

Also, there was nothing dangerous about studying cadavers. It wasn't illegal to dissect the bodies of criminals in Renaissance Florence.

 

I generally agree with the rest of what you say. He was a fucking legend.

[Steve Holt]

I was talking to a workmate one day about Mother Theresa when he mentioned that his sister had been a nun in Mother Theresa's order in Calcutta. She was a trained nurse at the time but she was frustrated because she could see that the large amounts of money donated weren't being spent on much-needed medical supplies. When she raised the issue she was told that they weren't in the business of saving lives, they were in the business of saving souls. Although my mate's sister was a devout Catholic she felt that this was wrong. She left the order, gave up being a nun and wrote a book about her experience. Because I was interested, my mate arranged a meeting one day. It was an interesting meeting to say the least and she lent me a copy of her manuscript which was eventually published.

One of the things she mentioned was that she got the impression that MT had at some time in her past had committed a great sin that she was trying to atone for by "saving souls". She stressed that it was just an impression though.

Interesting bird, as I said. She graduated in medicine and went to work in remote Aboriginal communities...and became an atheist.

 

Mother Teresa was a fucking whore for the Catholic Church. In all the time she was accepting donations she never once built a hospital with the money. She never once offered any kind of medical aid to the dying people who came to her for help. She spent it all building fucking convents and spreading the good old word of Catholicism to every corner of the globe and giving people "Catholic deaths". It's utterly sick. The people who came to her whorehouse in Calcutta were left to die.

 

I've heard of women like the one you talk about who went there to help and watched people, who could easily have been saved with even basic medical treatment, die in front of them. Women who told her that these people weren't beyond help and were told not to interfere with God's Will.

 

She took hundreds of millions of dollars from the likes Charles Keating and the Duvaliers of Haiti. Money that was PROVEN to have been stolen from the poor. Did she ever give a penny of it back when she was presented with that fact? Did she fuck. There aren't words that could describe the hatred I have for this woman. She was a fundamentalist, mass-murdering, cunt.

 

That's what a fucking saint is in the Catholic church. Makes me sick.

[Steve Holt]

My shout is King Leonidas I of Sparta.

 

The man had massive bronze balls that he used to hold back a ridiculously huge army, knowing he was going to die doing it, to give the rest of Greece time to rally together.

 

Because of what he and his soldiers did, the Persians did not take over all of Greece before ideas like Democracy had the chance to exist. The Persian empire was massive. If they'd taken Greece, the rest of Europe was most likely next. Imaging how different the world would be today if Western culture had been obliterated in it's infancy.

 

I can't think of anyone else who has done something that has had such a profound effect of the rest of history.

[Lee909]

I'm not sure how much of the history of the battle you know but for me while it was a amazing fight from the Spartan alot is myth written to make them look better.

For me the true hero of the Greek forces was Themistocles who commanded the Greek navy and destroyed the Persian fleet at Salamis, it was this action that stopped the Persian fleet moving around behind the Greeks.The Thespians stayed with the Spartans aswell.

100 or so years later King Phillip and Alexander crushed the Persians empire and even after his death it stayed featured.

[Mendoza]

Stefan Dennis

[Section_31]

It's a tough one, doubt I could just pick one but I'm going to give a 'shout out' to Alexander Fleming, the chap who 'discovered' penicillin. The amount of lives and suffering modern anti-biotics are responsible for saving must run into the hundreds of millions, if not billions.

[Carvalho Diablo]

Who invented crisps ?

[Total Longo]

Recently deceased journalist and writer Tom Hibbert. Responsible for the silly and sarcastic sense of humour I have.

[Steve Holt]

I'm not sure how much of the history of the battle you know but for me while it was a amazing fight from the Spartan alot is myth written to make them look better.

For me the true hero of the Greek forces was Themistocles who commanded the Greek navy and destroyed the Persian fleet at Salamis, it was this action that stopped the Persian fleet moving around behind the Greeks.The Thespians stayed with the Spartans aswell.

100 or so years later King Phillip and Alexander crushed the Persians empire and even after his death it stayed featured.

 

There is a huge difference between the top and bottom estimates of the numbers at Thermopylae. But even just taking the bottom estimates, it's still an incredible achievement to hold them off for so long. On the Greek side you have a total of about 7000 men, including Thespians, Lacedemonians, Arcadians etc. On the Persian side you have at least 70,000 and possibly as much as 300,000. That is still an overwhelming difference.

 

Themistocles achievements were obviously great as well. Not only at Salamis, but he fought in the Battle of Marathon. He also convinced Athens it needed to pour shed loads of money into its navy which would ultimately see them through.

 

But the man, by all historical accounts, was a bit of a cunt. He was an arrogant, ambitious arsehole who played the people of his own country against each other when it suited him. He turned his back on Greece and spent the last ten years of his life serving the Persian King. For that, I don't think he can be considered ahead of Leonidas.

 

Also Leonidas was one of the only Spartan kings to ever train at the Agoge, where Spartan boys earnt their citizenship. The fact that he was chosen to lead the combined Greek forces was in itself a tribute to his military leadership.

 

If anything they can be considered equal. One man gave his life for the protection of Greece. The other achieved more but never made a sacrifice so great.

[Lee909]

I dont want to take anything away from what the Greek land forces achieved,it was a amazing feat.Maybe im just sick of listening to some people who watched 300,Rome and spout off about history without having a clue.Obviously you do not come under that though.Its nice to see somebody else who has a interest in ancient/military history.I have not been reading as much as i used too but just starting to rekindle my interest.

[Rafiagra]

The man who invented footy

[brucespanner]

The man who invented footy

 

Henry the 8th? He was a bit of a bastard all things considered.

[Flying Pig]

Anyone claiming musicians as the greatest person that ever lived needs to have a kick up the arse. They sing and play instruments. That is all, they haven't saved anyones life or invented a life changing machine. Sad fuckers.

 

 

I'm going for Bobby Davro.

[Jose Jones]

It's a tough one, doubt I could just pick one but I'm going to give a 'shout out' to Alexander Fleming, the chap who 'discovered' penicillin. The amount of lives and suffering modern anti-biotics are responsible for saving must run into the hundreds of millions, if not billions.

 

Nah, Fleming was just a lucky bastard who didn't do anything with what he "discovered" (actually first "discovered" by some French student 30 years earlier) and got all the credit for everyone else's work. Fleming only discovered penicillium after cocking up an experiment where his plates got infected with mould.

 

Howard Florey and his team of dudes were the ones who worked out how to extract the active ingredient (penicillin, obv.) from the mould, purify and manufacture it, plus the first ones to give it to infected patients during the second world war.

 

Florey was also boss because he refused to patent any of the processes so that it would be available freely to everyone.

 

When I was a student of science I wanted to be like Fleming - shit but lucky.