I don’t think we could ever prove which invention from the Age of Enlightenment was the greatest. Possibly through monetary gain, or number of lives it saved, and maybe in that way my choice may have been the worst invention, it has been argued that way. I believe it had the most devastating effects, and was the most impactful on society. The Cotton Gin was patented by Eli Whitney in 1793, and cut down the time it took to pick and clean cotton drastically. In the South of the United States the cotton industry boomed, which led to an inflation of slave importation, by the mid 1800’s cotton production exceeded 1,000,000 pounds and around 12.5 millions slaves had been shipped to America. The south provided two-thirds of the world's cotton, and