Technology and the West

by Reynolds, Terry S.; Cutcliffe, Stephen H.

• ISBN13: 9780226710341
• ISBN10: 0226710343
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1997-10-01
• Publisher: Univ of Chicago Pr

Summary

This broad-ranging anthology provides a condensed overview of technology in Western civilization. Its twenty-one carefully selected articles and overview essays demonstrate the complex relationship between technological and social change from antiquity to the present. Specific topics include the origins of contemporary social and political institutions in the irrigation civilizations of antiquity, technology and the military, popular perceptions of the early industrial revolution in Europe, the difference between invention and innovation, the role of government in the development of technology, the nature of technical expertise, and nuclear power and the environment. General readers and students will find this collection accessible and engaging.

Table of Contents

Introduction

Overview: Technology and History: "Kranzberg's Laws"

Technology and the West Through Britain's Industrial Revolution (To Ca. 1850)

Technology in the Preindustrial West

The First Technological Revolution and Its Lessons

Greek Catapults and Catapult Technology: Science, Technology, and War in the Ancient World

The Technical Act: The Act of Invention: Causes, Contexts, Continuities and Consequences

Air Pollution and Fuel Crises in Preindustrial London, 1250-1650

The Replacement of the Longbow by Firearms in the English Army

On the Social Explanation of Technical Change: The Case of the Portuguese Maritime Expansion

Muskets and Pendulums

Leonhard Euler, and the Ballistics Revolution

The Philosophy of Luddism: The Case of the West of England Woolen Workers, ca. 1790-1809

Roads, Railways, and Canals: Technical Choices in 19th-Century Britain

The Expansion and Diffusion of Western Industrial Technology (Ca. 1850 to Present)

Technology and the Industrial West

Economic Development and the Transfer in Technology: Some Historical Perspectives

The Weapons of the West: Military Technology and Modernization in 19th-Century China and Japan

The "Industrial Revolution" in the Home: Household Technology and Social Change in the 20th Century Ruth

The Development of the Diesel Engine

The Emergence of Basic Research in the Bell Telephone System, 1875-1915

Flexibility and Mass Production at War: Aircraft Manufacture in Britain, the United States, and Germany, 1939-1945

Spage-Age Europe: Gaullism, Euro-Gaullism, and the American Dilemma

Nuclear Power and the Environment: The Atomic Energy Commission and Thermal Pollution, 1965-1971

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