Technology Definition & Meaning

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. 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. The ancient Sumerians in Mesopotamia used a complex system of canals and levees to divert water from the Tigris and Euphrates rivers for irrigation. Optimistic assumptions are made by proponents of ideologies such as transhumanism and singularitarianism, which view technological development as generally having beneficial effects for the society and the human condition. Some critics see these ideologies as examples of scientism and techno-utopianism and fear the notion of human enhancement and technological singularity which they support.

Technology In Depth

The discovery of fire was described by Charles Darwin as "possibly the greatest ever made by man." Archeological, dietary, and social evidence point to "continuous fire-use" at least 1.5 Mya. 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. The cooking hypothesis proposes that the ability to cook promoted an increase in hominid brain size, though some researchers find the evidence inconclusive.

How To Use Technology In A Sentence

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, including artificial intelligence and robotics. 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. Other fields of ethics have had to contend with hottimes.ru-related issues, including military ethics, media ethics, and educational ethics.

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 8000 B.C.E.). Eventually, the working of metals led to the discovery of alloys such as bronze and brass (about 4000 B.C.E.). The first uses of iron alloys such as steel dates to around 1400 B.C.E.

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. 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. The Renaissance era produced many innovations, including the printing press . Technology became increasingly influenced by science, beginning a cycle of mutual advancement. An overtly anti-technological treatise is Industrial Society and Its Future, written by Theodore Kaczynski and printed in several major newspapers as part of an effort to end his bombing campaign of the techno-industrial infrastructure. Taken to extreme, some argue that technicism is the belief that humanity will ultimately be able to control the entirety of existence using technology.

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. 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. 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; 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", which could allow us to reshape ourselves and our environment in fundamental ways. Nanobots could be used within the human body to destroy cancer cells or form new body parts, blurring the line between biology and technology.