You might argue that if the ancient Egyptians would have discovered electricity they may have avoided the suffering of the ninth plague of darkness. This week’s parsha Bo describes a week of darkness in Egypt as the second-to-final plague that befell Egypt and led to the exodus of the Jewish people.
But the Midrash tells us, “There were six days of darkness... during the first three, "a man saw not his fellow"; during the last three days, he who sat could not stand up, he who stood could not sit down, and he who was lying down could not raise himself upright.”
So maybe electric lighting would not have sufficed. But, a deeper examination of this plague might make the debate a moot point.
The Chassidic master Rabbi Yitzchok Meir of Gur explained the plague as far more than a physical punishment. It was a spiritual sentence of far greater impact:
There is no greater darkness than one in which "a man saw not his fellow" -- in which a person becomes oblivious to the needs of his fellow man. When that happens, a person becomes stymied in his personal development as well -- "neither rose any from his place."
We may have discovered – through electricity and night-vision goggles – the ability to see each other during nighttime. But the greater question is, can we see each other – in a spiritual and emotional sense – even during the daytime?