[gaius]

No, I'm just saying that that's what did happen. You can always say "if someone didn't invent something someone else would have eventually".

[ojbyrne]

destroys an enormous amount of economic value, but it's not true that military spending is bad for progress. I don't see how you can say the first part, and still agree with the second part. The logical conclusion is, not only that someone would have invented everything that was invented, but in fact they would have invented more.