sidster you are loosing the way here. Your original questions were are/were non whites good for anything and turns out they are. At the moment whites might be really prevailant but that is changing. See the old theories developed by asians might not be used nowa days but they had in them to discover them before anyone else. Whites have been influential only after post renassiance period. Dude everyone has their time. Why did asians remain behind then, thats exactly why UK are behind US. There is strange life cycle of each civilization. Much like life cycle of human beings. It starts small, and it grows big and strong and as the age catches it slowly fades away. It has been true for all major known civilizations like Indus valley,Egyptian,Greek,Roman,Chinese,Incas,Mayas all of them. Now it is US and in the future its gonna be some one else. Anyway the way u think is the obvious way to think. Because you are basically surrounded by masses of facts present at the moment. And by the way no one can invent electricity it can be only discovered. If u talk about discoveries, who discovered concept of zero? Obvioiusly that is pretty important to go forward in mathematics. And what about algebra, alchemy etc. So its time u start to think out of the box instead of just accepting the facts fed to you. And if you feel you are so incompetent compared to whites u I assure you , you can do better. And i really have nothing against whites, as a matter of fact i am going out with a white girl. But it doesnt meant u can take anything away from the fact what other people did or doing.