Steam Engine Required Knowing Atmosphere Exists

The steam engine could not have been invented without the prior scientific discovery that the earth is surrounded by an atmosphere exerting pressure; Newcomen's 1712 atmospheric engine depended on 17th-century work by Torricelli, von Guericke, and Pascal, which is why the Chinese could not have built one—demonstrating that major machines require conceptual breakthroughs, not just incremental tinkering.