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One can find numerous candidates to claim the title of “planet’s most significant innovation.” The circular axle. The movable type. The combustion motor.

As per a recent publication, however, that honor belongs to the automated sawmill invented by Dutchman Cornelis Corneliszoon in 1593.

“Prior to automated sawing, constructing a simple merchant vessel required approximately ten sawyers working over 90 days,” notes Jaime Dávila. “Using wind-powered sawmills, an identical quantity of cut lumber could be manufactured in less than a week.”

Thanks to this speedy automated cutter, which converted timber to planks with virtually no human effort, Dutch builders could build ships more quickly than anyone else, an advantage that sparked a century of Dutch maritime, economic as well as artistic supremacy across Europe and the globe.

The First Genuine Manufacturing Machine

Corneliszoon’s sawmill, contends Dávila, was “humanity’s initial authentic industrial apparatus.” A wind turbine turned a wheel. A single part converted the rotary movement into vertical action for the saw. Another component changed that same spinning motion into a sideway’s movement feeding the log to the blade. A ratchet system moved the wood forward one precise increment per cycle.

“Each element seemed modest by itself. Corneliszoon’s genius was to integrate these parts in order that they operated in a perfectly controlled order, sawing on every downward motion and advancing with each upward motion. It was a remarkably intelligent use of basic parts.”

A fact that brings us up to today’s puzzle. The task is you to reinvent a key the fundamental ideas underpinning Corneliszoon’s machine.

Circular to Vertical

Construct a machine that turns circular movement into vertical motion. Your available these items exclusively: A rotating disc. Two pins. Two rods. A “guide”, that is a cylinder or sleeve through which a single the rods can slide perfectly. (Assume you can mount components on a base, so the parts do not fall down.)

I’ll be back later today UK time with the answer.

In the interim, NO SPOILERS. Instead, please suggest (less celebrated) candidates as the planet’s most impactful invention.