Comment by estebank

It's fine to question that "great men" are the prime movers of history. But you're taking it too far by saying something like "all discoveries would have been made by someone else so individuals get no credit". First, that's obviously not true -- we can't know that every bit of knowledge would have been discovered by someone else. Second, it's beside the point -- the discoveries weren't made by someone else.

"Great men" vs. "impersonal historical process" is one of those dichotomies that will never be resolved. If you find yourself at either extreme, you're making an obvious error. Find a comfortable place somewhere in the middle.

So invention itself is not laudable because it’s inevitable? That’s an odd attitude. Newton’s laws of motion would have been discovered by someone, somewhere, so there’s no point in remembering and praising Newton for his work? It’s nihilistic.