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Heres what I though of, while i was writing something few years ago..

is Competition the only reason why we have new discoveries?

imagine a world with one king, a total ruler. A world like that has no enemies, and noone to fight.
Would such a world ever advance?

I think the answer is no.. I think competition is the only cause of advancements and discoveries. Its one of the only things that motivates people.. therefore Competition acts as a catalyst. the discoveries would happen eventually, but competition works as a catalyst on people and makes them occur faster..

Is there anything else that can make new discoveries?

Edit: after writing this,, i think theres somethign else.. a common future goal, this can motivate people to work towards it..
so apart from these two, is there anything else?

Conflict at best speeds up the adaptation and acceptance of new technologies through necessity.

I don`t think many of the scientists behind many brakethroughs were working with the explicit awareness of national conflict in the backs of their minds. I don`t think hawkings does his work to shaft the frenchies for instance heh. Besides, the past 20 years have been the golden age of science. And thats post cold war.

You contradict yourself, AssAsinX.

You claim that competition is "the only cause of advancements and discoveries" and then claim that those discoveries would eventually be made, but that competition acts as a catalyst that accelerates the process. I would certainly not disagree with the latter assertion, but the former is an absolute that does not strike me as particularly true, nor is it compatible with the assertion that does.

There are different reasons for which humans would want to advance, that is, and putting it simply, "to find a better way to do things". Personal comfort may be a motivator and a creative individual may get far with that motive alone. There are moving tales of individuals whose personal tragedies motivated them to solve a particular problem so that others wouldn't have to live through that through which they had to endure. Inventive individuals sometimes only wish to express themselves and find interesting solutions to everyday problems.

An interesting note on advancement is that with many new advancements, one has a new tool with which one can once again advance. This has the effect of radically speeding up the rate at which discoveries are made.

Other motivational forces may be other forms of personal gain, such as financial gain, but that is admittedly but a manifestation by proxy of aforementioned motivational forces.


Agapooka

i think you are correct here