[center]Technologies That Have Shaped Human History[/center]
This thread is in response to Headhunter’s thread condemning technology, found here:
http://www.T-Nation.com/tmagnum/readTopic.do?id=1782524
This is just a list of what I could come up with in a half-hour. As you can probably conclude the primary effect of technology is that it helps alleviate specific uneasiness but the secondary effect is that it leads to greater free-time which ultimately allows us to contemplate the world around us. When set about with a specific task and the correct technology there is nothing man cannot achieve.
Please comment or add others you feel necessary along with a brief explanation why.
Controlled fire -- this enabled man to consume more calories, hunt game, and enabled him to utilize time that would have otherwise been spent sleeping to develop civilization as we know it today.
Agriculture -- the ability to grow and raise ones own food allowed man to settle since he no longer needed to hunt and gather.
The Wheel -- this gave man the ability to transport goods and made it easier for him to relocate with all of his belongings. This technology also made it easier for armies to travel, giving birth to empiricism.
Written language -- this enabled man to record his ideas for posterity and to hand down historical records to his kin; formalized religion is born.
Black-powder -- this enabled man to kill his enemy from further away thus reducing the number of participants necessary to engage in war and raising the total destruction that could be committed by a single individual.
Printing-press -- enabled man's ideas to be recorded and disseminated more efficiently thus giving his ideas a further reach.
The Telegraph -- this technology gave rise to the idea of instant communication and sparked the development of hundreds of new technologies over two centuries.
The Engine -- it has a million uses and enabled the industrial revolution.
Refrigeration -- this allowed man the ability to conserve food and made it so that he did not have to use every day in the procurement of food thus freeing him for other activity; this also gave food the ability to travel which caused urban areas to grow.
The Transistor -- this single device gave rise to the information age. Nearly every modern electrical device uses a transistors for amplification or bit-logic switching.