Technology is the name-checked term for all those bits of equipment, tools and systems that make the world we live in different from the past. It’s an umbrella term that can cover everything from the gears in a car to the computer programs used by a bank. It also includes the tools that we use to communicate with each other. The first communication technologies were probably cave paintings, petroglyphs and pictograms, and the modern equivalent is email and instant messaging.
Ultimately, though, the development of technology is not like the construction of buildings or bridges. It’s more like the elaboration of ideas. It’s rarely possible to translate a scientific result or engineering design directly into a usable idea or product. It’s usually a step-by-step process in which the research reveals new information, builds on previous steps and is tested against reality. Even apparently promising early technologies frequently stall before reaching their full potential.
This cumulative quality of technological progress explains why some societies seem to advance, stage by stage, from comparatively primitive to more advanced techniques. It doesn’t explain, however, why other societies seem to remain stagnant in certain stages and even regress at times.
In many cases, the emergence of a particular technology is dependent on the existence of a sympathetic social ethos that encourages and cultivates inventors and their ideas. There is, after all, no doubt that human curiosity and foresight play an important role in the development of tools and technologies.
