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The Culture of Technology examines our often conflicting attitudes toward nuclear weapons, biological technologies, pollution, Third World development, automation, social medicine, and industrial decline. It disputes the common idea that technology is "value-free" and shows that its development and use are conditioned by many factors-political and cultural as well as economic and scientific. Many examples from a variety of cultures are presented. These range from the impact of snowmobiles in North America to the use of water pumps in rural India, and from homemade toys in Africa to electricity generation in Britain-all showing how the complex interaction of many influences in every community affects technological practice. Arnold Pacey, who lives near Oxford, England, has a degree in physics and has lectured on both the history of technology and technology policy, with a particular focus on the development of technologies appropriate to Third World needs. He is the author of The Maze of Ingenuity (MIT Press paperback).
The new edition of a milestone work on the global history of technology. This milestone history of technology, first published in 1990 and now revised and expanded in light of recent research, broke new ground by taking a global view, avoiding the conventional Eurocentric perspective and placing the development of technology squarely in the context of a "world civilization." Case studies include "technological dialogues" between China and West Asia in the eleventh century, medieval African states and the Islamic world, and the United States and Japan post-1950. It examines railway empires through the examples of Russia and Japan and explores current synergies of innovation in energy supply a...
A thoughtful meditation on the role of meaning and purpose in the development of technology.
How monuments such as Wells Cathedral or York Minster were conceived and built will always excite wonder, but for the first time this book presents newly discovered clues based on some of the builders' drawings. It also offers a long view of craftsmen's drawing techniques over five centuries. Several of the discovered drawings are on plaster tracing floors or on walls, but drawings on parchment and paper are also considered. The author also investigates the drawing techniques of carpenters and wood-carvers. He shows that the medieval drawing techniques continued in use after the end of the Middle Ages, and demonstrates how craftsmen working for Christopher Wren used some of the old techniques. This is a work of major importance for all architectural historians and medieval historians.
From cathedrals to star wars, Arnold Pacey looks at the interaction of technologies and society over the last thousand years and uses that survey to argue for a more humane form of future technological development.
In this insightful and incisive essay, Eugene Ferguson demonstrates that good engineering is as much a matter of intuition and nonverbal thinking as of equations and computation. He argues that a system of engineering education that ignores nonverbal thinking will produce engineers who are dangerously ignorant of the many ways in which the real world differs from the mathematical models constructed in academic minds.
This, the first book in the series, explores cities from the earliest earth built settlements to the dawn of the industrial age exploring ancient, Medieval, early modern and renaissance cities. Among the cities examined are Uruk, Babylon, Thebes, Athens, Rome, Constantinople, Baghdad, Siena, Florence, Antwerp, London, Paris, Amsterdam, Mexico City, Timbuktu, Great Zimbabwe, Hangzhou, Beijing and Hankou Among the technologies discussed are: irrigation, water transport, urban public transport, aqueducts, building materials such as brick and Roman concrete, weaponry and fortifications, street lighting and public clocks.
This book emphasizes the importance of social, economic, and environmental considerations when planning and implementing projects. For rural development workers, it aims to fill the gap in existing literature on the gathering and storage of rainwater.
There are many stories we can tell about the past, and we are not, perhaps, as free as we might imagine in our choice of which stories to tell, or where those stories end. John Arnold's Very Short Introduction is a stimulating essay about how we study and understand history. The book begins by inviting us to think about various questions provoked by our investigation of history, and explores the ways these questions have been answered in the past. Concepts such as causation, interpretation, and periodization, are introduced by means of concrete examples of how historians work, giving the reader a sense of the excitement of discovering not only the past, but also ourselves. ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.
From cathedrals to star wars, Arnold Pacey looks at the interaction of technologies and society over the last thousand years and uses that survey to argue for a more humane form of future technological development. The second edition of The Maze of Ingenuity concentrates on Europe and North America and incorporates recent insights from the history and sociology of technology. A new series of chapters extends Pacey's discussion of the role of ideas and ideals in technology in the period since the industrial revolution. Contents The Cathedral Builders: European Technical Achievement between 1100 and 1280 • A Century of Invention: 1250-1350 • Mathematics and the Arts: 1450-1600 • The Practical Arts and the Scientific Revolution • Social Ideals in Technical Change: German Miners and English Puritans, 1450-1650 • The State and Technical Progress: 1660-1770 • Technology in the Industrial Revolution • Conflicting Ideals in Engineering: America and Britain, 1790-1870 • Institutionalizing Technical Ideals, 1820-1920 • Idealistic Trends in Twentieth-Century Technology