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Book Cover
E-book
Author Ayres, Robert U., author

Title The history and future of technology : can technology save humanity from extinction? / Robert U. Ayres
Published Cham : Springer, [2021]
©2021

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Description 1 online resource (xviii, 830 pages) : illustrations (chiefly color)
Contents Intro -- Preface -- Acknowledgments -- Contents -- Part I: Before the Industrial Revolution -- 1: Introduction -- 2: Fire and Water: Technologies Extending Nature -- 2.1 Bipedalism: Down from the Trees -- 2.2 Pottery, Cooking, and Mobility -- 2.3 Keeping the Dark at Bay -- 2.4 Pain, Anesthesia, and Surgery -- 2.5 Water Management and Farming -- 2.6 Agriculture -- 2.7 Extensions of the Legs: Mobility and Transport -- 3: Extensions of the Body -- 3.1 From Skin to Fibers -- 3.2 From Fibers to Fabrics and Clothing -- 3.3 From Caves to Walls to Settlements
3.4 From Teeth and Claws to Bows and Arrows -- 3.5 Metallurgy -- 3.6 Firearms and Explosives -- 4: Words and Music -- 4.1 Cave Art -- 4.2 Writing and Stories -- 4.3 Tokens, Numbers, Ideographs, Pictographs, and Cuneiform -- 4.4 Logography: Shift from Visual to Aural -- 4.5 The Alphabet: Segmentation of Sounds -- 4.6 Musical Notation -- 4.7 Musical Instruments -- 4.8 From Numbers to Arithmetic And Algebra -- 5: Printing, Movable Type, and Books -- 5.1 Precursors of Paper -- 5.2 Gutenberg, Movable Type, and the Bible -- 5.3 The Protestant Reformation and the Rise of Knowledge
Part II: The Age of Fossile Fuels -- 6: The Enlightenment: The Rise of Science -- 6.1 Money and Credit -- 6.2 Universities and "Higher Learning" -- 6.3 Alchemy and Chemistry -- 6.4 Magnetism and Electricity -- 6.5 Philosophy and Astronomy -- 6.6 Entropy, Complexity, and the Universe as a "Heat Engine" -- 7: The First Stage of Industrialization: Coking and Canals (1712-1820) -- 7.1 Coking and Iron Smelting -- 7.2 Coal and Canals -- 7.3 Foundations of Chemistry -- 7.4 The Alkali Industry and Soap Making -- 7.5 Phosphorus and "Safety Matches" -- 7.6 Rubber
8: Machine Tools and Mechanization -- 8.1 Attaching Metals: Welding, Soldering and Brazing, Riveting -- 8.2 Screws, Machines, and Machine Tools -- 8.3 Ball Bearings and Roller Bearings -- 8.4 Printing Inventions -- 8.5 Clocks, Automata, and Watches -- 8.6 Locks and Keys -- 8.7 The Repeating Rifle and the Safety Pin -- 8.8 The Zipper Fastener -- 8.9 The Bicycle -- 9: The Triumph of Steam and Steel (1820-1876) -- 9.1 From a Pump to an Engine -- 9.2 Trevithick's High-Pressure Steam Engine -- 9.3 Mechanization of Textile Manufacturing -- 9.4 George Stephenson and the Railway Boom
9.5 The Hot Blast and Cheap Steel -- 10: Petroleum and Petrochemicals -- 10.1 Petroleum, the New "Black Gold" -- 10.2 Coal Gas for Streetlighting -- 10.3 Aniline Dyes -- 10.4 Synthetic Fibers: From Rayon to Orlon -- 10.5 Fertilizers and Nitrogen Fixation -- 10.6 Petroleum Refining Technology -- 11: Anesthesia, Surgery, and Modern Medicine -- 11.1 Anesthesia, Analgesics, and the Conquest of Pain -- 11.2 Antiseptics and Antibiotics -- 11.3 Immunology and Vaccines -- 11.4 Opiates and Drug Injection -- 11.5 Sulfa Drugs -- 12: Mobility: From Rails to Roads to Space Travel
Summary Eminent physicist and economist, Robert Ayres, examines the history of technology as a change agent in society, focusing on societal roots rather than technology as an autonomous, self-perpetuating phenomenon. With rare exceptions, technology is developed in response to societal needs that have evolutionary roots and causes. In our genus Homo, language evolved in response to a need for our ancestors to communicate, both in the moment, and to posterity. A band of hunters had no chance in competition with predators that were larger and faster without this type of organization, which eventually gave birth to writing and music. The steam engine did not leap fully formed from the brain of James Watt. It evolved from a need to pump water out of coal mines, driven by a need to burn coal instead of firewood, in turn due to deforestation. Later, the steam engine made machines and mechanization possible. Even quite simple machines increased human productivity by a factor of hundreds, if not thousands. That was the Industrial Revolution. If we count electricity and the automobile as a second industrial revolution, and the digital computer as the beginning of a third, the world is now on the cusp of a fourth revolution led by microbiology. These industrial revolutions have benefited many in the short term, but devastated the Earths ecosystems. Can technology save the human race from the catastrophic consequences of its past success? That is the question this book will try to answer
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references and index
Notes Online resource; title from PDF title page (SpringerLink, viewed August 6, 2021)
Subject Technology -- History
Technology -- Social aspects.
Technology and civilization.
Technology
Technology and civilization
Technology -- Social aspects
Genre/Form History
Form Electronic book
ISBN 9783030713935
3030713938