1

Independence Day

Image: Jason W

Nothing beats a classic apocalyptic alien invasion, where extraterrestrials arrive to destroy the planet, but encounter a group of humans willing to give everything to save humanity. This is the premise of Independence Day (1996), one of the most famous disaster films. Starring Will Smith, the movie marked a turning point in science fiction, showcasing visual effects that, although they may not be as surprising today, set a new standard at the time.

2

Armageddon

Image: Javier Miranda

It’s hard to keep track of how many explosions light up the screen in Armageddon (1998), but rest assured, there are a lot of them. This film follows the classic natural disaster formula: a massive asteroid threatens Earth, and the only hope for survival is to destroy it. When the planet’s at risk, who better to call than Bruce Willis? Alongside Ben Affleck, he steps up to risk everything in a race against time.

Do you also remember this movie every time you hear Aerosmith's "I Don't Wanna Miss a Thing"? You are one of us!

3

The Day After Tomorrow

Image: Mason Mulcahy

A new Ice Age threatens humanity after a series of devastating storms strike the planet in The Day After Tomorrow (2004), a film that takes climate change and pushes its possible consequences to the extreme. With spectacular disaster sequences and visuals, the movie became a total box office success worldwide.

4

I Am Legend

Image: Natalya Letunova

Imagine waking up one day and realizing that you are, as far as you can tell, the last survivor in the city. This is what happens to scientist Robert Neville, played by Will Smith, in I Am Legend (2007). The now-classic apocalyptic theme is a deadly virus that has devastated humanity, and it is Dr. Robert Neville who appears to be the only one capable of doing something to reverse the effects of this.

5

Interstellar

Image: Guillaume Le Louarn

In 2014, we saw one of the most exciting movies to hit the big screen: Christopher Nolan's Interstellar . Acclaimed by audiences and critics alike for its visual effects and its complex and thrilling plot, this film is one of those you’ll find hard to forget. Set on an Earth that is becoming uninhabitable, Matthew McConaughey plays Cooper, a former NASA pilot who joins a mission to travel through a wormhole near Saturn in search of a new place for humanity.

Fun fact: It’s not surprising that it has been well received even by the scientific community, since a Nobel Prize–winning physicist collaborated on the script.

6

Planet of the Apes

Image: Mateusz Suski

In the original Planet of the Apes (1968), the story takes us to a distant future planet where chimpanzees, gorillas, and orangutans have evolved to possess human-like intelligence and social structures, dominating that world while humans are reduced to an oppressed species. Featuring one of the most shocking and unforgettable plot twists in cinema history, the film stands as an essential classic of dystopian science fiction.

7

Night of the Living Dead

Image: Daniel Jensen

We couldn’t leave Night of the Living Dead off this list, the 1968 film that changed cinema forever. While the concept of "zombies" may feel familiar today, this George A. Romero’s film was the first to present the idea of the dead rising again and becoming a real threat to the living.

8

12 Monkeys

Image: Liam Andrew

Bruce Willis is once again called upon to help humanity (or what remains of it) in the 1995 film 12 Monkeys , this time alongside none other than Brad Pitt, who earned an Oscar nomination for this role. Set in a dark future, most of humanity has been wiped out by a deadly virus, and Willis’s character must travel back in time to gather information about its origins and help find a way to stop it.

9

Dawn of the Dead

Image: airci K

Of course, George A. Romero wasn’t going to appear just once on this list. In 1978, Dawn of the Dead was released, once again portraying the end of the world brought on by the return of the undead. A group of survivors takes refuge in a shopping mall, but human conflicts soon emerge as a threat equal to, or even greater than, that posed by the zombies themselves.

10

The Day the Earth Stood Still

Image: Michael Herren

The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951) is definitely a science fiction classic. Unlike the other films on this list, its catastrophe is not inevitable; disaster can still be avoided. Rather than centering on spectacular destruction, the film delivers a philosophical warning to humanity. An alien visitor arrives on Earth to deliver a stark message: abandon nuclear violence, or face devastating consequences.

1

The light bulb

Image: Zach Lucero

Delivering electricity to the masses was one of the greatest technological advances in human history. The mid-1800s saw great competition in this area, as inventors around the world raced to invent their own electric light. The first filament bulb was developed by British inventor Warren de la Rue in 1840, but his use of a platinum filament made it expensive and impractical.

A few years later, Joseph Swan in the UK and Thomas Edison in the US each independently invented bulbs using cheaper elements. However, Edison received a patent on his bulb in early 1880, slightly before Swan. The light bulb, an invention that quickly reached every home, revolutionized life around the world, led to the development of the electrical grid, and set the stage for our modern electricity-dependent society.

2

The telephone

Image: viarami

In this modern era of emails and text messages, it can be hard to appreciate that the telephone was once revolutionary. The telegraph, the phone’s predecessor, only transmitted brief written messages. The telephone, however, allowed people to speak with one another in real time over long distances.

Inventor, scientist, and engineer Alexander Graham Bell invented the electric telephone in 1876. Although Bell was Scottish-born and also lived in Canada, he patented his invention in the US . The telephone was a game-changing technology that improved business efficiency, enabled instant global connections, and allowed emergencies to be reported as they occurred. It effectively made the world more connected and faster-paced.

3

The fire escape

Image: Lewis J Goetz

When we think of US inventions, the first things that come to mind are usually the light bulb or the telephone. But did you know that the modern fire escape was also a US innovation? Designed in 1887, this simple yet life-saving invention changed building safety forever.

In the late 1800s, fires were devastating cities across America. One woman, Anna Connelly, saw this horror up close and decided to do something about it. She designed an external iron staircase system, and in 1887, she patented it. At a time when women couldn’t even vote, Anna’s invention became a safety standard in most major cities, saving thousands of lives. Today her name is barely known, but next time you see a fire escape, remember the woman who made them possible.

4

The cash register

Image: Di Du

The first mechanical cash register for calculating and recording sales transactions was invented by saloonkeeper James Ritty following the American Civil War. He was looking for a way to stop cashiers from stealing, and finally patented his novel invention in 1879.

When a transaction was completed, Ritty's Incorruptible Cashier made a bell sound, and the amount was displayed on a large dial on the front of the machine. During each sale, a paper tape was hole-punched so the vendor could keep track of sales. Pretty ingenious, don’t you think?

5

Interchangeable parts

Image: gayulo

Standardized interchangeable parts for machines are now a staple of modern manufacturing, but it’s not a new idea. There’s evidence that thousands of years ago, ancient Carthage used them to build warships, and ancient China applied the idea to crossbows. Many centuries later, French experimentation with interchangeable musket parts inspired Thomas Jefferson.

In 1798, President George Washington and his Congress finally agreed to Jefferson’s idea of implementing the technology in America. They awarded a contract to Eli Whitney—the inventor of the cotton gin—to supply the government with 20,000 muskets. Whitney recognized the potential of developing firearms with identical parts and mechanisms. His advancements in interchangeable parts laid the foundation for modern manufacturing, enabling improved quality control, reduced costs, and faster production of goods.

6

The assembly line

Image: Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

For most of human history, manufactured goods were custom-made. Every model of a machine, piece of clothing, or tool was unique. The development of interchangeable parts was a huge advancement, but automobile manufacturer Ransom Olds took it a step further with the assembly line in 1901. By standardizing and automating many aspects of manufacturing, uniform goods could be created faster and at lower costs.

Olds’ vehicle, the Oldsmobile Curved Dash, became the first mass-produced car . His method was later adopted and perfected by Henry Ford, whose moving assembly line for the Model T in 1913 revolutionized manufacturing. Today, the assembly line combines human labor and automation to produce nearly every mass-market product on Earth. Many experts agree it was one of the most significant technological developments of the 20th century.

7

The airplane

Image: Wright Brothers, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

People have always observed birds and insects and dreamed of flying. The Greeks told the story of Icarus and Daedalus, who crafted wings of wax and feathers; Leonardo da Vinci sketched and theorized flying machines, but it wasn’t until 1903 that the airplane became a reality in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina.

Wilbur and Orville Wright experimented with aeronautics for several years before achieving their successful first flight. A few years later, airplanes were first used in warfare. Within seven decades, their technology evolved and took us to the Moon. Today, the airplane is an indispensable technology that allows us to transport goods and people around the world in no time.

8

GPS

Image: Stanislav Kondratiev

It’s hard to imagine life without GPS—but do you know how it began? When the Soviet Union launched Sputnik in 1957, American physicists realized they could track the satellite’s radio transmissions using the Doppler effect.

Soon after, the U.S. military began testing and launching the Navstar Global Positioning System satellites. In 1983, President Ronald Reagan approved GPS for civilian use, and by the start of the 21st century, GPS devices were widely available in vehicles and mobile phones . Today, GPS is an essential technology for business, travel, and military operations.

9

Personal computers

Image: Unidentified U.S. Army photographer, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

The first electronic general-purpose computer, ENIAC, was built in 1946 at the University of Pennsylvania. It occupied 1,800 square feet of floor space and weighed 30 tons. At the time, imagining a consumer-grade computer small enough to fit in every home would have seemed impossible. Yet, just one generation later, the impossible became reality.

Over the years, computers became smaller, cheaper, and more powerful than the ENIAC’s creators could have imagined. In 1971, John Blankenbaker developed the first PC, the Kenbak-1. Fifty years later, it is clear that personal computing has fundamentally shaped the modern world.

10

The internet

Image: Lorenzo Herrera

Revolutionary technologies such as the wheel, the internal combustion engine, the telephone, and the airplane have forever changed the way we travel and communicate. The internet is no exception; it gives people access to the entirety of human existence with just a few clicks.

In 1969, computer scientists at the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) created the first network connecting labs at UCLA and Stanford. Over time, their network expanded, connecting anyone with a device. Since then, the internet has revolutionized the way human beings access resources and share information.

11

E-mail

Image: Brett Jordan

After the personal computer and the Internet, we only needed to invent a modern method of sending messages and letters to each other. The Advanced Research Projects Agency Network, known as ARPANET, sent the first email in 1971. Within five years, the majority of exchanges within the ARPANET community were via email.

With the introduction of attachments in the early 1990s, electronic mail became the fastest and easiest way to send information from point to point. By the start of the 21st century, email enabled people around the world to communicate quickly and inexpensively, and the technology quickly became one of the primary tools for global communications.

12

Magnetic resonance imaging

Image: MART PRODUCTION

The impact of the MRI machine on medicine is invaluable. The principles behind nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) have been known since at least the end of World War II. Yet, two researchers in the late 1960s and early 1970s recognized the potential of this technology to revolutionize medicine forever.

American chemist Paul Lauterbur and physician Raymond Damadian separately experimented with NMR in scanning for cancer cells. After publishing the promising results of their experiments, a patent was filed. By 1977, the first full-body scanner was developed. Since then, millions of lives have been saved by the MRI machine. For his contributions, Lauterbur was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2003.

1

Driving barefoot

Image: Ashley Byrd

No federal or state law in the U.S. bans driving barefoot. Though sometimes discouraged for safety reasons, driving barefoot is legal in all 50 states (and in most countries worldwide as well).

While police might ask you to put your shoes on during a traffic stop, it’s merely a suggestion, not a legal requirement. In most modern cars, driving barefoot presents no significant safety risks, but it could affect insurance claims. If you’re involved in an accident while barefoot, you might face increased scrutiny from insurers.

2

Riding in the back of a pickup truck

Image: Richard Lu

This is a bit of a gray area. There is no federal law regulating the practice, but some states or local jurisdictions may impose restrictions, often including age limits.

In rural areas, most people won’t bat an eye if you ride in the bed. However, it can be considered a safety risk and may serve as an aggravating factor if you’re stopped for speeding or other traffic violations.

3

Cursing in public

Image: Kristina Flour

While it’s common courtesy not to go around hurling insults and profanity, the truth is no one can legally require you to stop if you are so inclined.

This is because profanity is generally protected speech. However, "generally" is doing some heavy lifting here, as depending on the context, it could be considered provocation or incitement to violence.

4

Sleeping in your car

Image: lucas Favre

It’s not illegal to sleep in your car unless local ordinances specifically prohibit it in certain areas, such as city streets or commercial lots.

Often, it has nothing to do with sleeping whatsoever, as in some places, all overnight parking at rest stops is prohibited or limited to just a few hours. Some Walmart lots might allow it, but that’s a private policy—not a law—and you should check with the local manager to be sure.

5

Eating while driving

Image: Dmitriy Frantsev

There’s no blanket law against eating while driving, though it can be considered a distraction. If it leads to unsafe driving, you could be cited.

Washington State’s distracted driving law bans holding electronic devices and allows extra fines for erratic driving caused by distractions , including eating or drinking . Some states, such as New Jersey, have considered banning it entirely, but most proposed laws are too vague to be enforced clearly.

6

Owning a flamethrower

Image: Tali Despins

Surprisingly, there’s no federal law in the U.S. that bans civilian flamethrower ownership. However, a few states do impose restrictions; California and Maryland have strict laws prohibiting or regulating them.

Some companies even market flamethrowers for agricultural use, like controlled burns or weed clearing. But misuse of a flamethrower can lead to serious legal charges—for instance, arson, reckless endangerment, or other criminal or civil liabilities.

7

Ignoring someone knocking at your door

Image: Aaron Burden

No law requires you to open your door to anyone, including police, unless they have a warrant.

If you're pulled over while driving or stopped on the street, you’re generally required to comply with police instructions. But if you're inside your home with the door closed—and ideally locked—you’re under no obligation to respond at all.

8

Selling homemade food without a license

Image: Museums of History New South Wales

Most states require permits or inspections to sell food commercially. However, many states have "cottage food laws" that allow limited sales of certain homemade goods without a license.

But if you scale up beyond small-batch home production, you’ll likely face a citation—and a hefty fine—from the authorities.

9

Backyard burials

Image: Jennifer Grismer

Believe it or not, there’s no federal law against burying human remains on private property. Many states allow it, provided you have the proper paperwork, such as a death certificate and burial permit. Local zoning laws may regulate factors like location, depth, and proximity to water sources or property lines.

Similarly, pet burials are generally permitted, but local ordinances can vary —so it’s important to check them first.

10

Using a fake name online

Image: Sander Sammy

Unless it’s used for fraud or to impersonate a real person, using an alias on social media or online forums isn’t a crime.

Some platforms may prohibit it in their terms of service, but that’s a civil matter—not a criminal one. Legal issues generally arise only if the alias is used to cause harm, deceive others, or commit financial fraud.

11

Flying the U.S. flag at night without lighting

Image: Shelley Pauls

The U.S. Flag Code suggests that the flag should be illuminated if flown at night, but this is just a general guideline, not a legally enforceable law.

Stricter requirements may apply to government buildings, but for private citizens, the code is purely advisory and symbolic.