The first use of the word technology

I have always loved history. There is a deep seeded belief in me that it is vitally important to know where we came from in order to know where we are going.  As a person who calls himself a technologist I wanted to understand where the word technology comes from in order to better to understand where technology is going. In this post I examine the origin of the word technology in a hope of better understanding its evolution and thus purpose in my practice as a technologist.

It’s Greek to Me

Technology is not an old word in English. The ancient Greeks used the word techne which meant skill with art, or craft. In fact Plato and Plotinus had an entire hierarchy of knowledge that expanded in an ascending scale from crafts to science and it moved from the physical to the intellectual. Technical art ranked somewhere in the middle of this schema.

Aristotle had a more neutral, simpler and far less value-laden concept of techne, which he described in the Nicomachean Ethics, Book 6, Chapters 3 and 4, where he used architecture as his example. He defined techne as a “rational faculty exercised in making something…a productive quality exercised in combo with true reason.” Aristotle believed that the business of techne is to “bring something into existence  which has its efficient cause in the maker and not in itself.” It is also important to note that Aristotle related techne to the crafts and sciences, most notably through mathematics.

To the Greeks, work with the hands was inferior to philosophical speculation and techne was a more restricted term than the capacious modern term of technology that we use today. Since the Greeks use of the word techne was more focused, many classical thinkers believed that the Greeks were just as mistrustful of technological change as they were with political and social change.

When in Rome

By contrast the Romans had a much deeper appreciation for techne than their Greek counterparts. In De Natura Deorum the Roman philosopher Cicero praised the human ability to transform the environment and create a “second nature”. Other Roman poets praised techne as well with the construction of roads and the conveniences of well-built villas.

The Roman poet Statius devoted an entire poem to praising techne and technological progress. The Roman writer Plity the Elder too often praised techne and technological progress with his writings of the skilled laborers of the day.

Medieval Times

The term technology did not exist in the Middle Ages.  Writers of the time instead used the word mechanical arts when referencing crafts and art with a physical aspect such as architecture, weaponry, agriculture, commerce and theatre.  What we would call technological innovation during the Middle Ages typically took place with little reference to scientific knowledge or information.

The Renaissance

It is during this time period that a full expression of the modern attitude toward technology appeared. In his 1627 book New Atlantis, Francis Bacon imagined a perfect society whose king was advised by scientists and who’s engineers were organized into research groups at an institution that was called Salomon’s House. These scientists and engineers could predict the weather, had invented refrigeration, submarines, flying machines, loudspeakers and conducted amazing medical procedures. Bacon’s vision later served as the inspiration to others to form the Royal Society in London in 1662,

Danke

We own thanks to Germany for their broader definition of words like teknologie and the even broader technik. In fact in the early 20th century the word technik was translated into English as technics. Teknologie, from 1775 , meant a system of classification for the practical arts until it was abandoned in 1840.

In the 1800’s, German engineers made the word technik a central part of their self-definition and elaborated on a discourse that related the word to philosophy, economics and higher culture. In fact the word technik meant the “totality of tools, machines, systems and processes used in the practice arts and engineering.”

Present Meaning

It was somewhere between 1820 and 1910 that the word technology acquired its present meaning. The word, however, remained unstable until the later half of the 20th century where it evolved into vague abstraction that was further complicated in the 1990’s when newspapers, stock traders and bookstores made technology a synonym for computers, telephones and ancillary devices as David Nye argues in his book Technology Matters: Questions to Live With.

The word technology has only be part of the English language for a little over 100 years  where it has come to reference all of the skills, machines and systems one might study at a technical university, or a term for complex systems of machines and the techniques in which we use to operate them.

Why This Matters?

Technology empowerment relies on the understanding that the word holds many different meanings to many different people. In some respects the word holds cultural and societal attitudes deeply towards it, its uses and its teachings. In modern times the word is so abstract that if you were to Google “What is Technology?” you would receive over 3 billion results.

It is my belief that the culture in which the technology is going to be used, served and taught should be the one to clearly define it. In order to accomplish this we must look to the past to see how the word’s meaning has evolved over time and then look towards the future to understand how the word will continue to evolve and then prepare ourselves and our learners for those inevitable shifts that are most likely to occur.

References

Nye, D. E. (2006). Technology matters: Questions to live with. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Whitney, E. (2004). Medieval Science and Technology. Greenwood Publishing Group.

Источник

Photo of technicians working on a steam turbine

Technology is the application of knowledge for achieving practical goals in a reproducible way.[1] The word technology can also mean the products resulting from such efforts,[2]: 117 [3] including both tangible tools such as utensils or machines, and intangible ones such as software. Technology plays a critical role in science, engineering, and everyday life.

Technological advancements have led to significant changes in society. The earliest known technology is the stone tool, used during prehistoric times, followed by the control of fire, which contributed to the growth of the human brain and the development of language during the Ice Age. The invention of the wheel in the Bronze Age allowed greater travel and the creation of more complex machines. More recent technological inventions, including the printing press, telephone, and the Internet, have lowered barriers to communication and ushered in the knowledge economy.

While technology contributes to economic development and improves human prosperity, it can also have negative impacts like pollution and resource depletion, and can cause social harms like technological unemployment resulting from automation. As a result, there are ongoing philosophical and political debates about the role and use of technology, the ethics of technology, and ways to mitigate its downsides.

Etymology

Technology is a term dating back to the early 17th century that meant ‘systematic treatment’ (from Greek Τεχνολογία, from the Greek: τέχνη, romanized: tékhnē, lit. ‘craft, art’ and -λογία, ‘study, knowledge’).[4][5] It is predated in use by the Ancient Greek word tékhnē, used to mean ‘knowledge of how to make things’, which encompassed activities like architecture.[6]

Starting in the 19th century, continental Europeans started using the terms Technik (German) or technique (French) to refer to a ‘way of doing’, which included all technical arts, such as dancing, navigation, or printing, whether or not they required tools or instruments.[2]: 114–115  At the time, Technologie (German and French) referred either to the academic discipline studying the «methods of arts and crafts», or to the political discipline «intended to legislate on the functions of the arts and crafts.»[2]: 117  Since the distinction between Technik and Technologie is absent in English, both were translated as technology. The term was previously uncommon in English and mostly referred to the academic discipline, as in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.[7]

In the 20th century, as a result of scientific progress and the Second Industrial Revolution, technology stopped being considered a distinct academic discipline and took on its current-day meaning: the systemic use of knowledge to practical ends.[2]: 119 

History

Prehistoric

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Tools were initially developed by hominids through observation and trial and error.[8] Around 2 Mya (million years ago), they learned to make the first stone tools by hammering flakes off a pebble, forming a sharp hand axe.[9] This practice was refined 75 kya (thousand years ago) into pressure flaking, enabling much finer work.[10]

The discovery of fire was described by Charles Darwin as «possibly the greatest ever made by man».[11] Archeological, dietary, and social evidence point to «continuous [human] fire-use» at least 1.5 Mya.[12] Fire, fueled with wood and charcoal, allowed early humans to cook their food to increase its digestibility, improving its nutrient value and broadening the number of foods that could be eaten.[13] The cooking hypothesis proposes that the ability to cook promoted an increase in hominid brain size, though some researchers find the evidence inconclusive.[14] Archeological evidence of hearths was dated to 790 kya; researchers believe this is likely to have intensified human socialization and may have contributed to the emergence of language.[15][16]

Other technological advances made during the Paleolithic era include clothing and shelter.[17] No consensus exists on the approximate time of adoption of either technology, but archeologists have found archeological evidence of clothing 90-120 kya[18] and shelter 450 kya.[17] As the Paleolithic era progressed, dwellings became more sophisticated and more elaborate; as early as 380 kya, humans were constructing temporary wood huts.[19][20] Clothing, adapted from the fur and hides of hunted animals, helped humanity expand into colder regions; humans began to migrate out of Africa around 200 kya, initially moving to Eurasia.[21][22][23]

Neolithic

Photo of Neolithic tools on display

An array of Neolithic artifacts, including bracelets, axe heads, chisels, and polishing tools

The Neolithic Revolution (or First Agricultural Revolution) brought about an acceleration of technological innovation, and a consequent increase in social complexity.[24] The invention of the polished stone axe was a major advance that allowed large-scale forest clearance and farming.[25] This use of polished stone axes increased greatly in the Neolithic but was originally used in the preceding Mesolithic in some areas such as Ireland.[26] Agriculture fed larger populations, and the transition to sedentism allowed for the simultaneous raising of more children, as infants no longer needed to be carried around by nomads. Additionally, children could contribute labor to the raising of crops more readily than they could participate in hunter-gatherer activities.[27][28]

With this increase in population and availability of labor came an increase in labor specialization.[29] What triggered the progression from early Neolithic villages to the first cities, such as Uruk, and the first civilizations, such as Sumer, is not specifically known; however, the emergence of increasingly hierarchical social structures and specialized labor, of trade and war amongst adjacent cultures, and the need for collective action to overcome environmental challenges such as irrigation, are all thought to have played a role.[30]

Continuing improvements led to the furnace and bellows and provided, for the first time, the ability to smelt and forge gold, copper, silver, and lead  – native metals found in relatively pure form in nature.[31] The advantages of copper tools over stone, bone and wooden tools were quickly apparent to early humans, and native copper was probably used from near the beginning of Neolithic times (about 10 ka).[32] Native copper does not naturally occur in large amounts, but copper ores are quite common and some of them produce metal easily when burned in wood or charcoal fires. Eventually, the working of metals led to the discovery of alloys such as bronze and brass (about 4,000 BCE). The first use of iron alloys such as steel dates to around 1,800 BCE.[33][34]

Ancient

Photo of an early wooden wheel

The wheel was invented circa 4,000 BCE.

After harnessing fire, humans discovered other forms of energy. The earliest known use of wind power is the sailing ship; the earliest record of a ship under sail is that of a Nile boat dating to around 7,000 BCE.[35] From prehistoric times, Egyptians likely used the power of the annual flooding of the Nile to irrigate their lands, gradually learning to regulate much of it through purposely built irrigation channels and «catch» basins.[36] The ancient Sumerians in Mesopotamia used a complex system of canals and levees to divert water from the Tigris and Euphrates rivers for irrigation.[37]

Archaeologists estimate that the wheel was invented independently and concurrently in Mesopotamia (in present-day Iraq), the Northern Caucasus (Maykop culture), and Central Europe.[38] Time estimates range from 5,500 to 3,000 BCE with most experts putting it closer to 4,000 BCE.[39] The oldest artifacts with drawings depicting wheeled carts date from about 3,500 BCE.[40] More recently, the oldest-known wooden wheel in the world was found in the Ljubljana Marsh of Slovenia.[41]

The invention of the wheel revolutionized trade and war. It did not take long to discover that wheeled wagons could be used to carry heavy loads. The ancient Sumerians used a potter’s wheel and may have invented it.[42] A stone pottery wheel found in the city-state of Ur dates to around 3,429 BCE,[43] and even older fragments of wheel-thrown pottery have been found in the same area.[43] Fast (rotary) potters’ wheels enabled early mass production of pottery, but it was the use of the wheel as a transformer of energy (through water wheels, windmills, and even treadmills) that revolutionized the application of nonhuman power sources. The first two-wheeled carts were derived from travois[44] and were first used in Mesopotamia and Iran in around 3,000 BCE.[44]

The oldest known constructed roadways are the stone-paved streets of the city-state of Ur, dating to circa 4,000 BCE,[45] and timber roads leading through the swamps of Glastonbury, England, dating to around the same period.[45] The first long-distance road, which came into use around 3,500 BCE,[45] spanned 2,400 km from the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean Sea,[45] but was not paved and was only partially maintained.[45] In around 2,000 BCE, the Minoans on the Greek island of Crete built a 50 km road leading from the palace of Gortyn on the south side of the island, through the mountains, to the palace of Knossos on the north side of the island.[45] Unlike the earlier road, the Minoan road was completely paved.[45]

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Ancient Minoan private homes had running water.[47] A bathtub virtually identical to modern ones was unearthed at the Palace of Knossos.[47][48] Several Minoan private homes also had toilets, which could be flushed by pouring water down the drain.[47] The ancient Romans had many public flush toilets,[48] which emptied into an extensive sewage system.[48] The primary sewer in Rome was the Cloaca Maxima;[48] construction began on it in the sixth century BCE and it is still in use today.[48]

The ancient Romans also had a complex system of aqueducts,[46] which were used to transport water across long distances.[46] The first Roman aqueduct was built in 312 BCE.[46] The eleventh and final ancient Roman aqueduct was built in 226 CE.[46] Put together, the Roman aqueducts extended over 450 km,[46] but less than 70 km of this was above ground and supported by arches.[46]

Pre-modern

Innovations continued through the Middle Ages with the introduction of silk production (in Asia and later Europe), the horse collar, and horseshoes. Simple machines (such as the lever, the screw, and the pulley) were combined into more complicated tools, such as the wheelbarrow, windmills, and clocks.[49] A system of universities developed and spread scientific ideas and practices, including Oxford and Cambridge.[50]

The Renaissance era produced many innovations, including the introduction of the movable type printing press to Europe, which facilitated the communication of knowledge. Technology became increasingly influenced by science, beginning a cycle of mutual advancement.[51]

Modern

Photo of a Ford Model T on a road

The automobile revolutionized personal transportation.

Starting in the United Kingdom in the 18th century, the discovery of steam power set off the Industrial Revolution, which saw wide-ranging technological discoveries, particularly in the areas of agriculture, manufacturing, mining, metallurgy, and transport, and the widespread application of the factory system.[52] This was followed a century later by the Second Industrial Revolution which led to rapid scientific discovery, standardization, and mass production. New technologies were developed, including sewage systems, electricity, light bulbs, electric motors, railroads, automobiles, and airplanes. These technological advances led to significant developments in medicine, chemistry, physics, and engineering.[53] They were accompanied by consequential social change, with the introduction of skyscrapers accompanied by rapid urbanization.[54] Communication improved with the invention of the telegraph, the telephone, the radio, and television.[55]

The 20th century brought a host of innovations. In physics, the discovery of nuclear fission in the Atomic Age led to both nuclear weapons and nuclear power. Computers were invented and later shifted from analog to digital in the Digital Revolution. Information technology, particularly optical fiber and optical amplifiers led to the birth of the Internet, which ushered in the Information Age. The Space Age began with the launch of Sputnik 1 in 1957, and later the launch of crewed missions to the moon in the 1960s. Organized efforts to search for extraterrestrial intelligence have used radio telescopes to detect signs of technology use, or technosignatures, given off by alien civilizations. In medicine, new technologies were developed for diagnosis (CT, PET, and MRI scanning), treatment (like the dialysis machine, defibrillator, pacemaker, and a wide array of new pharmaceutical drugs), and research (like interferon cloning and DNA microarrays).[56]

Complex manufacturing and construction techniques and organizations are needed to make and maintain more modern technologies, and entire industries have arisen to develop succeeding generations of increasingly more complex tools. Modern technology increasingly relies on training and education – their designers, builders, maintainers, and users often require sophisticated general and specific training.[57] Moreover, these technologies have become so complex that entire fields have developed to support them, including engineering, medicine, and computer science; and other fields have become more complex, such as construction, transportation, and architecture.

Impact

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Technological change is the largest cause of long-term economic growth.[58][59] Throughout human history, energy production was the main constraint on economic development, and new technologies allowed humans to significantly increase the amount of available energy. First came fire, which made edible a wider variety of foods, and made it less physically demanding to digest them. Fire also enabled smelting, and the use of tin, copper, and iron tools, used for hunting or tradesmanship. Then came the agricultural revolution: humans no longer needed to hunt or gather to survive, and began to settle in towns and cities, forming more complex societies, with militaries and more organized forms of religion.[60]

Technologies have contributed to human welfare through increased prosperity, improved comfort and quality of life, and medical progress, but they can also disrupt existing social hierarchies, cause pollution, and harm individuals or groups.

Recent years have brought about a rise in social media’s cultural prominence, with potential repercussions on democracy, and economic and social life. Early on, the internet was seen as a «liberation technology» that would democratize knowledge, improve access to education, and promote democracy. Modern research has turned to investigate the internet’s downsides, including disinformation, polarization, hate speech, and propaganda.[61]

Since the 1970s, technology’s impact on the environment has been criticized, leading to a surge in investment in solar, wind, and other forms of clean energy.

Jobs

Photo of a car assembly line, with numerous robots

Since the invention of the wheel, technologies have helped increase humans’ economic output. Past automation has both substituted and complemented labor; machines replaced humans at some lower-paying jobs (for example in agriculture), but this was compensated by the creation of new, higher-paying jobs.[62] Studies have found that computers did not create significant net technological unemployment. [63] Due to artificial intelligence being far more capable than computers, and still being in its infancy, it is not known whether it will follow the same trend; the question has been debated at length among economists and policymakers. A 2017 survey found no clear consensus among economists on whether AI would increase long-term unemployment.[64] According to the World Economic Forum’s «The Future of Jobs Report 2020», AI is predicted to replace 85 million jobs worldwide, and create 97 million new jobs by 2025.[65][66] From 1990 to 2007, a study in the U.S by MIT economist Daron Acemoglu showed that an addition of one robot for every 1,000 workers decreased the employment-to-population ratio by 0.2%, or about 3.3 workers, and lowered wages by 0.42%.[67][68] Concerns about technology replacing human labor however are long-lasting. As US president Lyndon Johnson said in 1964, “Technology is creating both new opportunities and new obligations for us, opportunity for greater productivity and progress; obligation to be sure that no workingman, no family must pay an unjust price for progress.” upon signing the National Commission on Technology, Automation, and Economic Progress bill.[69][70][71][72][73]

Security

With the growing reliance of technology, there have been security and privacy concerns along with it. Billions of people use different online payment methods, such as WeChat Pay, PayPal, Alipay, and much more to help transfer money. Although security measures are placed, some criminals are able to bypass them.[74] In March 2022, North Korea used Blender.io, a mixer which helped them to hide their cryptocurrency exchanges, to launder over $20.5 million in cryptocurrency, from Axie Infinity, and steal over $600 million worth of cryptocurrency from the games owner. Because of this, the U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned Blender.io, which marked the first time it has taken action against a mixer, to try and crack down on North Korean hackers.[75][76] The privacy of cryptocurrency has been debated. Although many customers like the privacy of cryptocurrency, many also argue that it needs more transparency and stability.[74]

Environmental

Technology has impacted the world with negative and positive environmental impacts, which are usually the reverse of the initial damage, such as; the creation of pollution and the attempt to undo said pollution,[77] deforestation and the reversing of deforestation,[78] and oil spills. All of these have had a significant impact on the environment of the earth. As technology has advanced, so has the negative environmental impact, with the releasing of greenhouse gases, like methane and carbon dioxide, into the atmosphere, causing the greenhouse effect, gradually heating the earth and causing global warming. All of this has become worse with the advancement of technology.[79]

Pollution

Pollution, the presence of contaminants in an environment that causes adverse effects, could have been present as early as the Inca empire. They used a lead sulfide flux in the smelting of ores, along with the use of a wind-drafted clay kiln, which released lead into the atmosphere and the sediment of rivers.[80]

Philosophy

Philosophy of technology is a branch of philosophy that studies the «practice of designing and creating artifacts», and the «nature of the things so created.»[81] It emerged as a discipline over the past two centuries, and has grown «considerably» since the 1970s.[82] The humanities philosophy of technology is concerned with the «meaning of technology for, and its impact on, society and culture».[81]

Initially, technology was seen as an extension of the human organism that replicated or amplified bodily and mental faculties.[83] Marx framed it as a tool used by capitalists to oppress the proletariat, but believed that technology would be a fundamentally liberating force once it was «freed from societal deformations». Second-wave philosophers like Ortega later shifted their focus from economics and politics to «daily life and living in a techno-material culture,» arguing that technology could oppress «even the members of the bourgeoisie who were its ostensible masters and possessors.» Third-stage philosophers like Don Ihde and Albert Borgmann represent a turn toward de-generalization and empiricism, and considered how humans can learn to live with technology.[82][page needed]

Early scholarship on technology was split between two arguments: technological determinism, and social construction. Technological determinism is the idea that technologies cause unavoidable social changes.[84]: 95  It usually encompasses a related argument, technological autonomy, which asserts that technological progress follows a natural progression and cannot be prevented.[85] Social constructivists[who?] argue that technologies follow no natural progression, and are shaped by cultural values, laws, politics, and economic incentives. Modern scholarship has shifted towards an analysis of sociotechnical systems, «assemblages of things, people, practices, and meanings», looking at the value judgments that shape technology.[84][page needed]

Cultural critic Neil Postman distinguished tool-using societies from technological societies and from what he called «technopolies,» societies that are dominated by an ideology of technological and scientific progress to the detriment of other cultural practices, values, and world views.[86] Herbert Marcuse and John Zerzan suggest that technological society will inevitably deprive us of our freedom and psychological health.[87]

Ethics

The ethics of technology is an interdisciplinary subfield of ethics that analyzes technology’s ethical implications and explores ways to mitigate the potential negative impacts of new technologies. There is a broad range of ethical issues revolving around technology, from specific areas of focus affecting professionals working with technology to broader social, ethical, and legal issues concerning the role of technology in society and everyday life.[88]

Prominent debates have surrounded genetically modified organisms, the use of robotic soldiers, algorithmic bias, and the issue of aligning AI behavior with human values[89]

Technology ethics encompasses several key fields. Bioethics looks at ethical issues surrounding biotechnologies and modern medicine, including cloning, human genetic engineering, and stem cell research. Computer ethics focuses on issues related to computing. Cyberethics explores internet-related issues like intellectual property rights, privacy, and censorship. Nanoethics examines issues surrounding the alteration of matter at the atomic and molecular level in various disciplines including computer science, engineering, and biology. And engineering ethics deals with the professional standards of engineers, including software engineers and their moral responsibilities to the public.[90]

A wide branch of technology ethics is concerned with the ethics of artificial intelligence: it includes robot ethics, which deals with ethical issues involved in the design, construction, use, and treatment of robots,[91] as well as machine ethics, which is concerned with ensuring the ethical behavior of artificial intelligent agents.[92] Within the field of AI ethics, significant yet-unsolved research problems include AI alignment (ensuring that AI behaviors are aligned with their creators’ intended goals and interests) and the reduction of algorithmic bias. Some researchers have warned against the hypothetical risk of an AI takeover, and have advocated for the use of AI capability control in addition to AI alignment methods.

Other fields of ethics have had to contend with technology-related issues, including military ethics, media ethics, and educational ethics.

Futures studies

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Futures studies is the systematic and interdisciplinary study of social and technological progress. It aims to quantitatively and qualitatively explore the range of plausible futures and to incorporate human values in the development of new technologies.[93]: 54  More generally, futures researchers are interested in improving «the freedom and welfare of humankind».[93]: 73  It relies on a thorough quantitative and qualitative analysis of past and present technological trends, and attempts to rigorously extrapolate them into the future.[93] Science fiction is often used as a source of ideas.[93]: 173  Futures research methodologies include survey research, modeling, statistical analysis, and computer simulations.[93]: 187 

Existential risk

Existential risk researchers analyze risks that could lead to human extinction or civilizational collapse, and look for ways to build resilience against them.[94][95] Relevant research centers include the Cambridge Center for the Study of Existential Risk, and the Stanford Existential Risk Initiative.[96] Future technologies may contribute to the risks of artificial general intelligence, biological warfare, nuclear warfare, nanotechnology, anthropogenic climate change, global warming, or stable global totalitarianism, though technologies may also help us mitigate asteroid impacts and gamma-ray bursts.[97] In 2019 philosopher Nick Bostrom introduced the notion of a vulnerable world, «one in which there is some level of technological development at which civilization almost certainly gets devastated by default», citing the risks of a pandemic caused by bioterrorists, or an arms race triggered by the development of novel armaments and the loss of mutual assured destruction.[98] He invites policymakers to question the assumptions that technological progress is always beneficial, that scientific openness is always preferable, or that they can afford to wait until a dangerous technology has been invented before they prepare mitigations.[98]

Emerging technologies

Photo of a scientist looking at a microscope pointed at a petri dish

Experimental 3D printing of muscle tissue

Emerging technologies are novel technologies whose development or practical applications are still largely unrealized. They include nanotechnology, biotechnology, robotics, 3D printing, blockchains, and artificial intelligence.

In 2005, futurist Ray Kurzweil claimed the next technological revolution would rest upon advances in genetics, nanotechnology, and robotics, with robotics being the most impactful of the three.[99] Genetic engineering will allow far greater control over human biological nature through a process called directed evolution. Some thinkers believe that this may shatter our sense of self, and have urged for renewed public debate exploring the issue more thoroughly;[100] others fear that directed evolution could lead to eugenics or extreme social inequality. Nanotechnology will grant us the ability to manipulate matter «at the molecular and atomic scale»,[101] which could allow us to reshape ourselves and our environment in fundamental ways.[102] Nanobots could be used within the human body to destroy cancer cells or form new body parts, blurring the line between biology and technology.[103] Autonomous robots have undergone rapid progress, and are expected to replace humans at many dangerous tasks, including search and rescue, bomb disposal, firefighting, and war.[104]

Estimates on the advent of artificial general intelligence vary, but half of machine learning experts surveyed in 2018 believe that AI will «accomplish every task better and more cheaply» than humans by 2063, and automate all human jobs by 2140.[105] This expected technological unemployment has led to calls for increased emphasis on computer science education and debates about UBI. Political science experts predict that this could lead to a rise in extremism, while others see it as an opportunity to usher in a post-scarcity economy.

Movements

Appropriate technology

Some segments of the 1960s hippie counterculture grew to dislike urban living and developed a preference for locally autonomous, sustainable, and decentralized technology, termed appropriate technology. This later influenced hacker culture and technopaganism.

Technological utopianism

Technological utopianism refers to the belief that technological development is a moral good, which can and should bring about a utopia, that is, a society in which laws, governments, and social conditions serve the needs of all its citizens.[106] Examples of techno-utopian goals include post-scarcity economics, life extension, mind uploading, cryonics, and the creation of artificial superintelligence. Major techno-utopian movements include transhumanism and singularitarianism.

The transhumanism movement is founded upon the «continued evolution of human life beyond its current human form» through science and technology, informed by «life-promoting principles and values.»[107] The movement gained wider popularity in the early 21st century.[108]

Singularitarians believe that machine superintelligence will «accelerate technological progress» by orders of magnitude and «create even more intelligent entities ever faster», which may lead to a pace of societal and technological change that is «incomprehensible» to us. This event horizon is known as the technological singularity.[109]

Major figures of techno-utopianism include Ray Kurzweil and Nick Bostrom. Techno-utopianism has attracted both praise and criticism from progressive, religious, and conservative thinkers.[110]

Anti-technology backlash

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Technology’s central role in our lives has drawn concerns and backlash. The backlash against technology is not a uniform movement and encompasses many heterogeneous ideologies.[111]

The earliest known revolt against technology was Luddism, a pushback against early automation in textile production. Automation had resulted in a need for fewer workers, a process known as technological unemployment.

Between the 1970s and 1990s, American terrorist Ted Kaczynski carried out a series of bombings across America and published the Unabomber Manifesto denouncing technology’s negative impacts on nature and human freedom. The essay resonated with a large part of the American public.[112] It was partly inspired by Jacques Ellul’s The Technological Society.[113]

Some subcultures, like the off-the-grid movement, advocate a withdrawal from technology and a return to nature. The ecovillage movement seeks to reestablish harmony between technology and nature.[114]

Relation to science and engineering

Drawing of Lavoisier conducting an experiment in front of onlookers

Engineering is the process by which technology is developed. It often requires problem-solving under strict constraints.[115] Technological development is «action-oriented», while scientific knowledge is fundamentally explanatory.[116] Polish philosopher Henryk Skolimowski framed it like so: «science concerns itself with what is, technology with what is to be.»[117]: 375 

The direction of causality between scientific discovery and technological innovation has been debated by scientists, philosophers and policymakers.[118] Because innovation is often undertaken at the edge of scientific knowledge, most technologies are not derived from scientific knowledge, but instead from engineering, tinkering and chance.[119]: 217–240  For example, in the 1940s and 1950s, when knowledge of turbulent combustion or fluid dynamics was still crude, jet engines were invented through «running the device to destruction, analyzing what broke […] and repeating the process».[115] Scientific explanations often follow technological developments rather than preceding them.[119]: 217–240  Many discoveries also arose from pure chance, like the discovery of penicillin as a result of accidental lab contamination.[120] Since the 1960s, the assumption that government funding of basic research would lead to the discovery of marketable technologies has lost credibility.[121][122] Probabilist Nassim Taleb argues that national research programs that implement the notions of serendipity and convexity through frequent trial and error are more likely to lead to useful innovations than research that aims to reach specific outcomes.[119][123]

Despite this, modern technology is increasingly reliant on deep, domain-specific scientific knowledge. In 1979, an average of one in three patents granted in the U.S. cited the scientific literature; by 1989, this increased to an average of one citation per patent. The average was skewed upwards by patents related to the pharmaceutical industry, chemistry, and electronics.[124] A 2021 analysis shows that patents that are based on scientific discoveries are on average 26% more valuable than equivalent non-science-based patents.[125]

Other animal species

Photo of a gorilla walking hip-deep in a pond, holding a stick

The use of basic technology is also a feature of non-human animal species. Tool use was once considered a defining characteristic of the genus Homo.[126] This view was supplanted after discovering evidence of tool use among chimpanzees and other primates,[127] dolphins,[128] and crows.[129][130] For example, researchers have observed wild chimpanzees using basic foraging tools, pestles, levers, using leaves as sponges, and tree bark or vines as probes to fish termites.[131] West African chimpanzees use stone hammers and anvils for cracking nuts,[132] as do capuchin monkeys of Boa Vista, Brazil.[133] Tool use is not the only form of animal technology use; for example, beaver dams, built with wooden sticks or large stones, are a technology with «dramatic» impacts on river habitats and ecosystems.[134]

Popular culture

The relationship of humanity with technology has been explored in science-fiction literature, for example in Brave New World, A Clockwork Orange, Nineteen Eighty-Four, Isaac Asimov’s essays, and movies like Minority Report, Total Recall, Gattaca, and Inception. It has spawned the dystopian and futuristic cyberpunk genre, which juxtaposes futuristic technology with societal collapse, dystopia or decay.[135] Notable cyberpunk works include William Gibson’s Neuromancer novel, and movies like Blade Runner, and The Matrix.

See also

  • Outline of technology
  • History of technology
  • Philosophy of technology
  • Ethics of technology
  • Criticism of technology
  • Technology and society
  • Productivity-improving technologies
  • Technological singularity
  • Futures studies
  • Environmental technology

References

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Источник


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…

00:00:16

I want to talk about my investigations

Я хочу поговорить о моих исследованиях

into what technology means in our lives —

значения технологий в нашей жизни,

not just our immediate life, but in the cosmic sense,

не только в нашей непосредственной жизни, а в космическом смысле,

in the kind of long history of the world

на протяжении всей истории мира

and our place in the world:

и нашего места в мире,

00:00:33

What is this stuff?

что это за штука?

What is the significance?

Какова ее значимость?

And so, I want to kind of go through my

Таким образом, я хочу сделать

little story of what I found out.

небольшое изложение того, что я выяснил.

And one of the first things that I started to investigate was

Одной из первых вещей, которую я исследовал, была

00:00:43

the history of the name of technology.

история названия технологий.

And in the United States there is a State of the Union address

В Соединенных Штатах есть доклад о положении в стране,

given by every president since 1790.

представляемый каждым президентом с 1790 года.

And each one of those is really kind of

И каждый доклад — это нечто вроде

summing up the most important things

резюме самых важных событий

00:00:57

for the United States at that time.

для Соединенных Штатов в это время.

If you search for the word «technology,»

Если вы будете искать слово «технология»,

it was not used until 1952.

оно ни разу не употреблялось в послании до 1952 года.

So, technology was sort of absent

Получается, что технология вроде как не присутствовала

from everybody’s thinking until 1952, which happened to be the year of my birth.

в коллективном мышлении до 1952 года, который случайно оказался годом моего рождения.

00:01:10

And obviously, technology

Очевидно, что технология

had existed before then, but we weren’t aware of it,

существовала и до этого, но мы ее не осознавали.

and so it was sort of an awakening

Так что это было некое пробуждение

of this force in our life.

этой силы в нашей жизни.

I actually did research to find out the first

На самом деле, я отследил первое

00:01:22

use of the word «technology.»

использование слова «технология».

It was in 1829,

Это было в 1829 году,

and it was invented by a guy who was starting a curriculum —

и оно было изобретено человеком, который готовился к преподаванию

a course, bringing together all the kinds

курса, объединяющего различные виды

of arts and crafts, and industry —

искусств, ремёсел и отраслей промышленности.

00:01:34

and he called it «Technology.»

И он дал ему название «технология».

And that’s the very first use of the word.

И это самое первое использование слова.

So, what is this stuff

И что же это за вещь,

that we’re all consumed by,

которой мы все поглощены,

and bothered by?

и озабочены?

00:01:46

Alan Kay calls it, «Technology is anything

Алан Кей говорит: «Технология — это все

that was invented after you were born.»

что было изобретено после вашего рождения.»

Which is sort of the idea that we normally have about what technology is:

Что отвечает нашему нормальному представлению о том, что такое технология.

It’s all that new stuff.

Это все новые вещи.

00:01:57

It’s not roads, or penicillin,

Это не дороги, и не пенициллин,

or factory tires; it’s the new stuff.

и не заводские шины. Новые вещи.

My friend Danny Hillis says kind of a similar one,

Мой друг Дэнни Хиллис говорит нечто подобное,

he says, «Technology is anything that doesn’t work yet.»

он говорит: «Технология — это все, что пока не работает».

00:02:09

Which is, again, a sense that it’s all new.

Что, опять-таки, передает смысл, что это все новое.

But we know that it’s just not new.

Но мы знаем, что это как раз не новое.

It actually goes way back, and what I want to suggest

Все это тянется из прошлого. И я хочу предположить,

Источник

1

b

: a capability given by the practical application of knowledge

a car’s fuel-saving technology

2

: a manner of accomplishing a task especially using technical processes, methods, or knowledge

new technologies for information storage

3

: the specialized aspects of a particular field of endeavor

Example Sentences

One by one, the pieces take flight: a parachute, the stowed Martian balloon—a Montgolfiere hot-air type, named for the French brothers who pioneered the technology in 1782—and a sensor package with guidance system, radio transmitter, and video camera.


—Joe Pappalardo, Air & Space, June/July 2006


There’s no question the industry has been subjected to a great deal of competitive pressure over the past decade or so, with promises of more to come as the Internet and wireless technology transform the way Americans receive news and information.


—Wall Street Journal, 14 Mar. 2006


The rapid shift in technology over the last 10 years has created an entirely new world in which viruses can replicate. While in 1989, viruses were primarily spread by «sneakernet,» as users walked diskettes from machine to machine, modern viruses … are capable of spreading around the world in the blink of a digital eye.


—Sarah Gordon, Information Security, November 1999


… all technology and energy revving up for the greatest clash of arms in history.


—William Styron, This Quiet Dust And Other Writings, (1953) 1982



Recent advances in medical technology have saved countless lives.



The company is on the cutting edge of technology.



The government is developing innovative technologies to improve the safety of its soldiers.



How can we apply this new technology to our everyday lives?



The car has the latest in fuel-saving technology.

See More

Recent Examples on the Web

Following roles at Vogue and Google, Klausing specializes in future-facing coverage at the intersection of fashion, culture, and technology.


—Sara Klausing, Men’s Health, 8 Apr. 2023




The cold case had haunted the Sandusky, Ohio, police department until technology advanced enough to extract DNA from the body’s skeletal remains and build a familial tree to trace the identity of the woman.


—Cara Tabachnick, CBS News, 7 Apr. 2023




Beats, encompassing DJing, sampling, turntabling and technology.


—Sebastian Smee, Washington Post, 7 Apr. 2023




These installations use light, sound and technology to build an experience.


—oregonlive, 7 Apr. 2023




There is a chance the bill could lead to punishments of individual Americans for using a VPN or other technologies to access TikTok, the EFF said.


—Jon Brodkin, Ars Technica, 7 Apr. 2023




That’s why our approach is two-pronged: organic human relationships first and technology powering those relationships through quantifiable results second.


—Anthony Coppers, Rolling Stone, 7 Apr. 2023




But its technology never came close to working like Holmes and Balwani boasted, resulting in Theranos’ scandalous collapse and a criminal case that shined a bright light on Silicon Valley greed and hubris.


—Michael Liedtke, Fortune, 7 Apr. 2023




However, there are still millions of older vehicles out on the road without this technology.


—Talon Homer, Popular Mechanics, 7 Apr. 2023


See More

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word ‘technology.’ Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

Etymology

earlier, «treatise on an art, terminology, branch of knowledge dealing with the applied arts,» borrowed from New Latin technologia «systematic treatment (of grammar or rhetoric), systematic description of the arts and sciences,» borrowed from Greek technología «systematic treatment (of grammar or rhetoric),» from téchnē «art, craft, proficiency in an art or craft, systematic method of performing or engaging in an art» + -o- -o- + -logia -logy — more at technical entry 1

First Known Use

1829, in the meaning defined at sense 1a

Time Traveler

The first known use of technology was
in 1829

Dictionary Entries Near technology

Cite this Entry

“Technology.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/technology. Accessed 14 Apr. 2023.

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9 Apr 2023
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Источник

history of technology, the development over time of systematic techniques for making and doing things. The term technology, a combination of the Greek technē, “art, craft,” with logos, “word, speech,” meant in Greece a discourse on the arts, both fine and applied. When it first appeared in English in the 17th century, it was used to mean a discussion of the applied arts only, and gradually these “arts” themselves came to be the object of the designation. By the early 20th century the term embraced a growing range of means, processes, and ideas in addition to tools and machines. By mid-century technology was defined by such phrases as “the means or activity by which man seeks to change or manipulate his environment.” Even such broad definitions have been criticized by observers who point out the increasing difficulty of distinguishing between scientific inquiry and technological activity.

A highly compressed account of the history of technology such as this one must adopt a rigorous methodological pattern if it is to do justice to the subject without grossly distorting it one way or another. The plan followed in the present article is primarily chronological, tracing the development of technology through phases that succeed each other in time. Obviously, the division between phases is to a large extent arbitrary. One factor in the weighting has been the enormous acceleration of Western technological development in recent centuries; Eastern technology is considered in this article in the main only as it relates to the development of modern technology.

Within each chronological phase a standard method has been adopted for surveying the technological experience and innovations. This begins with a brief review of the general social conditions of the period under discussion, and then goes on to consider the dominant materials and sources of power of the period, and their application to food production, manufacturing industry, building construction, transport and communications, military technology, and medical technology. In a final section the sociocultural consequences of technological change in the period are examined. This framework is modified according to the particular requirements of every period— discussions of new materials, for instance, occupy a substantial place in the accounts of earlier phases when new metals were being introduced but are comparatively unimportant in descriptions of some of the later phases—but the general pattern is retained throughout. One key factor that does not fit easily into this pattern is that of the development of tools. It has seemed most convenient to relate these to the study of materials, rather than to any particular application, but it has not been possible to be completely consistent in this treatment. Further discussion of specific areas of technological development is provided in a variety of other articles: for example, seeelectronics; exploration; information processing.

General considerations

Essentially, techniques are methods of creating new tools and products of tools, and the capacity for constructing such artifacts is a determining characteristic of humanlike species. Other species make artifacts: bees build elaborate hives to deposit their honey, birds make nests, and beavers build dams. But these attributes are the result of patterns of instinctive behaviour and cannot be varied to suit rapidly changing circumstances. Human beings, in contrast to other species, do not possess highly developed instinctive reactions but do have the capacity to think systematically and creatively about techniques. Humans can thus innovate and consciously modify the environment in a way no other species has achieved. An ape may on occasion use a stick to beat bananas from a tree, but a person can fashion the stick into a cutting tool and remove a whole bunch of bananas. Somewhere in the transition between the two, the hominid, the first humanlike species, emerges. By virtue of humanity’s nature as a toolmaker, humans have therefore been technologists from the beginning, and the history of technology encompasses the whole evolution of humankind.

White male businessman works a touch screen on a digital tablet. Communication, Computer Monitor, Corporate Business, Digital Display, Liquid-Crystal Display, Touchpad, Wireless Technology, iPad

Britannica Quiz

Gadgets and Technology: Fact or Fiction?

In using rational faculties to devise techniques and modify the environment, humankind has attacked problems other than those of survival and the production of wealth with which the term technology is usually associated today. The technique of language, for example, involves the manipulation of sounds and symbols in a meaningful way, and similarly the techniques of artistic and ritual creativity represent other aspects of the technological incentive. This article does not deal with these cultural and religious techniques, but it is valuable to establish their relationship at the outset because the history of technology reveals a profound interaction between the incentives and opportunities of technological innovation on the one hand and the sociocultural conditions of the human group within which they occur on the other.

Social involvement in technological advances

An awareness of this interaction is important in surveying the development of technology through successive civilizations. To simplify the relationship as much as possible, there are three points at which there must be some social involvement in technological innovation: social need, social resources, and a sympathetic social ethos. In default of any of these factors it is unlikely that a technological innovation will be widely adopted or be successful.

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The sense of social need must be strongly felt, or people will not be prepared to devote resources to a technological innovation. The thing needed may be a more efficient cutting tool, a more powerful lifting device, a labour-saving machine, or a means of using new fuels or a new source of energy. Or, because military needs have always provided a stimulus to technological innovation, it may take the form of a requirement for better weapons. In modern societies, needs have been generated by advertising. Whatever the source of social need, it is essential that enough people be conscious of it to provide a market for an artifact or commodity that can meet the need.

Social resources are similarly an indispensable prerequisite to a successful innovation. Many inventions have foundered because the social resources vital for their realization—the capital, materials, and skilled personnel—were not available. The notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci are full of ideas for helicopters, submarines, and airplanes, but few of these reached even the model stage because resources of one sort or another were lacking. The resource of capital involves the existence of surplus productivity and an organization capable of directing the available wealth into channels in which the inventor can use it. The resource of materials involves the availability of appropriate metallurgical, ceramic, plastic, or textile substances that can perform whatever functions a new invention requires of them. The resource of skilled personnel implies the presence of technicians capable of constructing new artifacts and devising novel processes. A society, in short, has to be well primed with suitable resources in order to sustain technological innovation.

A sympathetic social ethos implies an environment receptive to new ideas, one in which the dominant social groups are prepared to consider innovation seriously. Such receptivity may be limited to specific fields of innovation—for example, improvements in weapons or in navigational techniques—or it may take the form of a more generalized attitude of inquiry, as was the case among the industrial middle classes in Britain during the 18th century, who were willing to cultivate new ideas and inventors, the breeders of such ideas. Whatever the psychological basis of inventive genius, there can be no doubt that the existence of socially important groups willing to encourage inventors and to use their ideas has been a crucial factor in the history of technology.

Social conditions are thus of the utmost importance in the development of new techniques, some of which will be considered below in more detail. It is worthwhile, however, to register another explanatory note. This concerns the rationality of technology. It has already been observed that technology involves the application of reason to techniques, and in the 20th century it came to be regarded as almost axiomatic that technology is a rational activity stemming from the traditions of modern science. Nevertheless, it should be observed that technology, in the sense in which the term is being used here, is much older than science, and also that techniques have tended to ossify over centuries of practice or to become diverted into such para-rational exercises as alchemy. Some techniques became so complex, often depending upon processes of chemical change that were not understood even when they were widely practiced, that technology sometimes became itself a “mystery” or cult into which an apprentice had to be initiated like a priest into holy orders, and in which it was more important to copy an ancient formula than to innovate. The modern philosophy of progress cannot be read back into the history of technology; for most of its long existence technology has been virtually stagnant, mysterious, and even irrational. It is not fanciful to see some lingering fragments of this powerful technological tradition in the modern world, and there is more than an element of irrationality in the contemporary dilemma of a highly technological society contemplating the likelihood that it will use its sophisticated techniques in order to accomplish its own destruction. It is thus necessary to beware of overfacile identification of technology with the “progressive” forces in contemporary civilization.

On the other hand it is impossible to deny that there is a progressive element in technology, as it is clear from the most elementary survey that the acquisition of techniques is a cumulative matter, in which each generation inherits a stock of techniques on which it can build if it chooses and if social conditions permit. Over a long period of time the history of technology inevitably highlights the moments of innovation that show this cumulative quality as some societies advance, stage by stage, from comparatively primitive to more sophisticated techniques. But although this development has occurred and is still going on, it is not intrinsic to the nature of technology that such a process of accumulation should occur, and it has certainly not been an inevitable development. The fact that many societies have remained stagnant for long periods of time, even at quite developed stages of technological evolution, and that some have actually regressed and lost the accumulated techniques passed on to them, demonstrates the ambiguous nature of technology and the critical importance of its relationship with other social factors.

Modes of technological transmission

Another aspect of the cumulative character of technology that will require further investigation is the manner of transmission of technological innovations. This is an elusive problem, and it is necessary to accept the phenomenon of simultaneous or parallel invention in cases in which there is insufficient evidence to show the transmission of ideas in one direction or another. The mechanics of their transmission have been enormously improved in recent centuries by the printing press and other means of communication and also by the increased facility with which travelers visit the sources of innovation and carry ideas back to their own homes. Traditionally, however, the major mode of transmission has been the movement of artifacts and craftsmen. Trade in artifacts has ensured their widespread distribution and encouraged imitation. Even more important, the migration of craftsmen—whether the itinerant metalworkers of early civilizations or the German rocket engineers whose expert knowledge was acquired by both the Soviet Union and the United States after World War II—has promoted the spread of new technologies.

The evidence for such processes of technological transmission is a reminder that the material for the study of the history of technology comes from a variety of sources. Much of it relies, like any historical examination, on documentary matter, although this is sparse for the early civilizations because of the general lack of interest in technology on the part of scribes and chroniclers. For these societies, therefore, and for the many millennia of earlier unrecorded history in which slow but substantial technological advances were made, it is necessary to rely heavily upon archaeological evidence. Even in connection with the recent past, the historical understanding of the processes of rapid industrialization can be made deeper and more vivid by the study of “industrial archaeology.” Much valuable material of this nature has been accumulated in museums, and even more remains in the place of its use for the observation of the field worker. The historian of technology must be prepared to use all these sources, and to call upon the skills of the archaeologist, the engineer, the architect, and other specialists as appropriate.

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