Краткая история технологий

by Thomas Kingston Derry, Trevor Illtyd Williams

Т.Дерри и Т.Уильямс представили блистательный рассказ о технологических достижениях человечества с древности до наших дней, уделив пристальное внимание влиянию технического прогресса на ход истории. Первая часть повествования включает историю технологий с древних времен до 1750 года. Рассказ начинается с общего исторического обзора древних цивилизаций, затем авторы рассматривают такие темы, как производство продуктов питания, металлообработка, строительство зданий, ранние источники энергии и начало химической промышленности. Вторая часть текста посвящена развитию парового двигателя, станков, современного транспорта, добыче угля и металлов, подъему современной химической промышленности, текстилю, двигателю внутреннего сгорания, электричеству и многим другим. Каждому разделу предшествует историческое введение, книга завершается рядом таблиц, предназначенных для отображения взаимосвязи имен и событий в тексте.
Книга богато иллюстрирована и наполнена фактологическими данными.

Genres: History, Science, Technology, Nonfiction, Engineering, Architecture

832 pages, Hardcover

First published April 1, 1985

Reviews

[Noel Ward · Rating 4 out of 5]

Broken into two sections, the period from antiquity to 1750 AD and then from 1750 to 1900, this is a great overview of technological history. Many parts are necessarily short whether due to the lack of information on the origins of ancient technologies (and a few recent ones like crop rotation) or the limited space available to throughly cover each technology but it’s broken up in a sensible way and each major section begins with an historical survey to keep each topic in perspective.

The pace of technology is such that covering 1900 to modern times would probably take an equivalent sized book so it’s good that they cut off were they did. Despite the arbitrary cutoff point there is some mention of 20th century technologies where continuity trumps limits and keeps the topics well covered without straying too far from the proper timeframe.

[Redsteve · Rating 2 out of 5]

Part of the problem with a book like this, is that the author has to cover a ridiculous amount of information (Even at almost 800 pages, this is really only scratching the surface of the subject). "Technology" also includes such seemingly basic things as language and writing. As a result, none of the topics are dealt with in any way approaching "in-depth." This is fine for a popular history of such a broad topic, but, unfortunately, it ends up being neither a fun nor comprehensive read. In addition, this book is written almost entirely from a Western perspective - the rest of the world is is only mentioned when a particular piece of technology clearly originated there. I would have also appreciated a few more diagrams (although the period woodcuts are pretty cool looking), as some of the verbal descriptions just weren't clear to me. The book is pretty much split into two -sections: 1750-1900 and everything else. Since I'm not a huge fan of the history of steam power, this made the second half of the book a bit of a slog. 2.5 stars.

[aotel · Rating 3 out of 5]

Great up to 1900. Can anyone recommend a survey of technology for the first fifty years of the 20th century?

[Mark White · Rating 2 out of 5]

There's a lot of great information in this book but unfortunately its scope is so broad that there's not enough detail, the writing so dry and stilted that it's a struggle to get through and the illustrations so poorly chosen that they are often confusing rather than clarifying. As example of the poor illustrations, the flying shuttle (p107) has a picture of the shuttle, which is effectively the same as a non-flying shuttle. They should have included a picture of the mechanism that makes it fly. Add to this the book's a product of the 1950s and thus misses a lot of the technology that affects our lives today and it's more of a curiosity than a help.

If you get any value out of this book it will be by dipping into it as questions arise, using it as a launch pad for further inquiry. Perhaps the most interesting aspect is the snippets of related information that pop up. My favourite is that during the Napoleonic wars the French smuggled in boots, great coats and regimental insignia from England. Makes you think about the effects of world trade.