The end of COTW

Gramphos · November 23, 2001, 18:28

www.civ3.com has updated again, now featuring the last civ: Americans

What will happen now? Will there still be SOTWs?

Ecthy · November 23, 2001, 20:12

The essay mentiones the automobile as an American invention, when in fact it was invented by Germans. Wheter you drive a Diesel or not, the engine is named after either Rudolf Diesel or Nikolaus August Otto, both German engineers, though Diesel was just a capitalist who paid the relevant engineer but oh well. And then it was people like Benz (Mercedes, fellas!) who built and sold the first automobiles, so I just don't know how america can be considered the country where the automobile was invented.

Alex 14 · November 23, 2001, 23:36

This has puzzled me too, maybee they will just get rid of that section.

Gramphos · November 24, 2001, 03:53

Automobiles can have steam-engines

Actually the first scale model of a steam-driven carriage was constructed by Father Verbiest, a Belgian missionary in China, at the end of the 17th Century, and as automobile means "something that moves of itself" I think he should get the credit. For the first full-scale automobile it was constructed by Nicolas Cugnot, an officer from Lorraine, to transport cannons.

Oerdin · November 24, 2001, 05:55

The automobile as we know is a German invention. The U.S. has such a long list of inventions it is hard to understand why Firaxis couldn't come up with a few correct ones.

History Guy · November 24, 2001, 10:45

I'll bet Bismarck met up with a snark or something, as the Germans are no longer in the list of Civs of the Week. Someone forgot to put them in their rightful place when Abe Lincoln stepped in.

Gramphos · November 24, 2001, 13:30

Quote:

Originally posted by History Guy
I'll bet Bismarck met up with a snark or something, as the Germans are no longer in the list of Civs of the Week. Someone forgot to put them in their rightful place when Abe Lincoln stepped in.

It still thinks German is selected(Americans show in the default list). Germans are shown in the list at http://www.civ3.com/civoftheweek.cfm?civ=Americans

cavebear · November 24, 2001, 15:57

Very few inventions spring forth complete and functional from the mind of a single person or country. They are more usually snuck up on from different directions and improved by many people. In the case of the automobile, they are probably crediting it to the Americans because of Henry Ford's development of low-cost, assembly-line production that allowed the automobile to become available to the general public.

To whom, for example, would you credit the invention of the diving bell, the helicoptor, the computer, the parachute, or the submarine? Do you credit the conceiver? The builder of the first working model? The person who makes a "oner"? The person who really introduces it to the masses?

Solver · November 25, 2001, 10:31

I think that Civ 3 has got the usual fate of official game sites, after Civ 3 was released. Any info there would no longer be interesting. Strategies on Apolyton appeared way faster, ask the civ team became useless, as you could ask people on Apolyton and get faster answers anyway, and so on.
Official sites are good for releasing new game info before the game actually come to the shelves, but after that, there's almost no way an official site can keep on par with a fan site, such as Apolyton.

xane · November 27, 2001, 11:23

Solver, are you implying they made the mistake deliberately to see who was still interested

!!!

cavebear has it right, inventions such as the Helicoptor and Hovercraft spring to mind as American inventions, yet their design and research originated in other countries, only America provided the funds and environment for making them successful.