Cars are too prevalent in most countries, but they are undeniably very useful when used correctly. I would probably say the social media does more harm than cars, but idk if it's the worst invention. Lots of candidates.
this post was submitted on 13 Feb 2026
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What about the idea of burning oil products in general? Sure, that made powerful and light engines possible, and they have transformed economies, logistics, trade, and entire countries. However, if we hadn’t invented that, progress would have been a lot slower.
Nevertheless, I would argue that the past 200 years of industrial progress weren’t worth the climate crisis.
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Advertising.
The only correct answer in this thread.
It's the biggest industry in the world by a very large margin and the most destructive one on a global scale.
Even advertising isn't necessarily bad, having people telling you about things you might like used to be a good thing.
I personally think it's people like Edward Bernays who had the idea of, I guess, 'Malicious Advertising'. They really solidified the idea of applying propaganda techniques to advertising strategies and that just kind of become expected and the norm.
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This begs the question: What level of advertising is okay?
Some level of advertising is surely okay, right?
If I open a bakery and put a sign out front that says "Baked good for sale!" I don't think anyone would complain but that IS advertising.
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Religion. So many of today's issues stem from the magical thinking inherent in religion.
Amen
nuclear weapons, too feckin dangerous to have
I'm in mixed mind about them because you're right, they're too destructive, but for the time being their existence has prevented conflicts from breaking out, and since wars are typically only waged with the promise of financing it afterwards via looting or expansion, nobody is really willing to render land unusable in the process of conquering it.
The problem is that it only takes one ruler insane enough to use them to wipe out most of humanity.
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So far crypto currencies. So far they seem to expend a huge amount of electricity and used mostly for speculation.
Easy question:
AI
Net negative pushing us toward unavoidable global ecosystem collapse: it produces nothing but the unfulfilled promise of eventually replacing human workers, which it has never shown the capability to do and according to the researchers who founded the AI companies will never do due to "AI Scaling Laws". It has increased power consumption and costs by over 30% in some US States.
A financial system that breeds billionaires
It's a three way tie between:
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Leaded Gas
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Aerosols
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Nuclear bombs
Interesting fact, the same man, Thomas Midgely Jr, invented both tetraethyl-lead as a fuel additive and CFCs, almost killing everyone on earth twice over.
Karma got him in the end after he got tangled in one of his contraptions after he became bedridden with polio and died of strangulation.
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Slavery. Even after banning it pretty much everywhere, people still find ways to treat others as disposable property.
24 hour news networks.
News used to just be the news when there was a half hour of local, half hour of national twice per night with a morning show for fluff, weather, and brief news updates. 24 hour news needed to fill the whole 24 hours and also pay for itself by getting eyeballs on advertisers. That’s when all of the sensationalist stuff started taking over.
Religion
Head on! Apply directly to the forehead
https://youtu.be/Is3icfcbmbs
Never actually did anything and never actually claimed to. Most people assumed it was a headache relief but the company never said that. They just said to put the shit on your forehead
Shareholders.
It's likely LLMs in their current corporate circular funding form and cryptocurrency.
Disposable vapes come to mind, although the real answer is probably some extremely depraved torture device.
The wheel. Everything went downhill from there.
In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move.
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Social media year over year shows it was a mistake.
The 40+ hour work week.
That was actually a great invention, considering it replaced the unlimited hour work week (60-96 hours being normal in Victorian times). I agree that we should go further though.
Always room for improvement, but to think the 40 work week was a bad idea shows how little history they know.
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Weapons of mass destruction, obviously.
Weapon of mass destruction
Leaf blowers. They solve nothing permanently, it just moves around the leaves, meaning the blowers will be back again tomorrow, waking me up...
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Money.
Leaded Gasoline comes to mind...
Money
industrialization.
it's caused unfathomable damage to us, our planet, and the organisms we share our world with.
it's also saved just as many as it's harmed, but there is an upper limit when our planet dies and we all die with it.
I think it has to be something that poses an existential threat to human life on this planet, so cars (and other inventions dependent on fossil fuels) is a pretty good pick for the top of the list, IMO. I saw someone in the comments pick animal agriculture, and that, too, contributes to the existential threat of a warming planet; so that, too, feels like a good pick for the top of the list.
For me, though, nuclear weapons has to be the worst thing we've ever invented. No other invention is capable of ending human life on this planet so quickly and so thoroughly.
Property ownership
Meta
Coffee pods. Just when we were getting close to maybe reduce or reliance and dependency on plastics BOOM! coffee pods everywhere, by the trillions.
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