The year 1947 in science and technology included many events, some of which are listed here.

Anthropology

• August 7 - Thor Heyerdahl's balsa wood raft the Kon-Tiki, smashes into the reef at Raroia in the Tuamotu Islands after a 101 day 4,300 mile journey across the Pacific Ocean proving that pre-historic peoples could have traveled from South America.

Computer science

• July 29 - After being shut off on November 9, 1946 for a refurbishment, ENIAC, one of the world's first digital computers, is turned on after a memory upgrade. It will remain in continuous operation until October 2, 1955.

Awards

• Nobel Prizes
  • Physics - Edward Victor Appleton
  • Chemistry - Sir Robert Robinson
  • Medicine - Carl Ferdinand Cori, Gerty Cori, Bernardo Houssay

Births

• January 29 - Linda B. Buck, biologist, Nobel prize winner, 2004

Deaths

• October 4 - Max Planck (b. 1858), theoretical physicist.
• December 17 - J. N. Brønsted (b. 1879), physical chemist.
• Godfrey Harold Hardy (b. 1877), mathematician.