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ISAT 131 Unit 2 Terms and Concepts
Covers the key people, terms, themes, and concepts discussed in unit 2
11
Science
Undergraduate 1
03/24/2013
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Term
Technology Studies
 Definition

Note the brief history of the engineering profession – prestige peaked in the early 20th Century
•Note the history of technology developers
–Guilds & craftsmen
–Independent inventors
–Modern research & development labs

Tacit Knowledge- Unwritten, unspoken, and hidden vast storehouse of knowledge held by practically every normal human being, based on his or her emotions, experiences, insight, intuitions, observations and internalized information.
Codified Knowledge- knowledge that has been articulated, codified, and stored in certain media. It can be readily transmitted to others. The information contained in encyclopedias (including Wikipedia) are good examples of explicit (codified) knowledge.
Term
Mounted Shock Combat
 Definition

•This lecture describes the extended argument by Historian Lynn White, Jr. who argues that the invention of the stirrup led to the social system of feudalism
Why the stirrup leads to feudalism:
-mounted shock combat made possible by stirrup
-goal of mounted soldiers was to rundown enemy foot soldiers
-stirrup made the rider part of the horse, could stay on easier, more secure, more mobility
-harder to knock the rider off
-rider can take advantage of mass and velocity to smash through opponents
-stirrup allowed for different style of fighting "mideaval atomic bomb"
-in order to raise mounted knights, feudalism developed
-knights protected the feudal land 
Term
Technological Determinism
 Definition
The argument that technological change drives changes in society, inevitable and autonomous
–Note that by society we particularly mean social structures and cultural values
Primary Criticisms:
•TD is a reductionist theory, it oversimplifies what is really a much more complex and nuanced relationship
•TD describes the link as inevitable, as though humans have no control
Examples: Atomic Bomb, Birth Control, Steam engine-->modern society, The invention of the stirrup
Term
Social Constructivism
 Definition

•Describes technology as primarily controlled by society, rather than society by technology
–Argues that it is primarily our social system that molds and shapes evolving technologies to be more compatible, rather than the reverse
–It is inherently a critique of technological determinism
–Examples of social institutions that shape technology
        Ex: Government regulation, The economic market
–Key Ideas:
•Interpretive flexibility – an artifact has whatever “meaning” our society ascribes to it.  Our society “scripts” the narrative that determines how we understand and use technologies.
-Malleable Meaning
-Relative power of interest groups involved in negotiating outcome of technology
-Impact on society not uniformly predictable; many possibilities
-social constructivists believe that at first there are many possibilities for a technology but they become increasingly limited and constrained as time goes on
Examples: 
-Bicycle: used to have many forms, such as The Safety Bicycle and the Pennyfarthing Bicycle, but not there is just one for the most part
-The Gun in Japan
-Google article
-electric refrigerator
-picturephone
Term
Giving Up the Gun
 Definition

This lecture describes the extended argument that guns were available for a long period of time in Japan, but Japanese society chose not to adopt them
-Japan used guns against Korea in the battle of Nagashno, but stopped using guns after they withdrew from Korea until the end of the 19th century
-Used swords instead
-Had proficient knowledge in the use of guns but chose not to use them because they upset the social structure and order of the samurai (warrior class)
-government monopolized gun industry and slowly cut back and eventually restricted them almost entirely, so guns became unimportant
-Didn't need guns because they were in a safe location
-European countries tried to do the same thing with guns but they were unsuccessful
Reasons:
-sword had powerful symbology in Japan
-Japan placed a high value on aesthetic beauty and the gun is uglier than the sword
-The samurai, warrior class, made up 10 percent of the population (larger warrior class than Europe's knight population)
-Japan had Geographical security that indivudual European countries didn't have since they bordered each other

 
Term
Success or Failure of Technologies
 Definition

Difficult to say why a technology succeeds or fails

-better technology does not always win (better for whom?)

-multiple reasons

-timing and market strategies

-needs to appeal to early adopters

-complementary reasons have an affect

 

Evaluation

-how many users?

-price?

-level of efficacy

-how well does it perform its purpose?

-longevity

-level of acceptance by society
Term
Refrigerator & Picturephone
 Definition
-These are examples of how our societal structure determined the outcome of a technology (social constructivism)

 

Electric and Gas Refrigerators

-equally as good

-Gas was possibly better but electric won out

-electricity won because because the market for electricity was more powerful than the market for gas at a critical point in the evolution of the technology

 

Picturephone

-at&t developed the product and showed it at the world fair

-had a working model 

-lots of minor problems with the product

-too expensive, technical problems, AT&T misjudged the market (thought people wanted to see each other when people really wanted privacy

-product never kicked off
Term
Politics of Artifacts
 Definition

-Technology with values imbedded in it

-Revision of social constructivism

-Society and Technology influence eachother, the relationship goes both ways

-Robert Moses, the "master builder" of New York City, Long Island and other places in the 20th century designed highway overpasses in New york (Wantaugh State Parkway) to prevent buses, and therefore lower class citizens, from being able to go under them and get to Moses Beach

-Increased class seperation

-These bridges and overpasses embodied the values of their builer, Moses

-The Coke bottle from "The Gods Must be Crazy" meant different things to the people of the Kalahari, and to people who live in the US

 
Term
Langdon Winner
 Definition

Explored the politics of artifacts

-The McCormick Reaper Plant

-Cyrus McCormick decided to replace people in factories with machines to get of labor unions

-Nuclear power requires a strong centralized form of government, wind power will work under a decentralized form of goverment

-The strong version of Winner's argument (nuclear energy) is similar to Technological determinism

-weak version (wind power)

-Tomato Harvesters in california


 
Term

Technological Systems

-Thomas Hughes

 Definition

Socio-Technical systems

-technology is a system that includes; physical components (artifacts), and knowledge about how to use the technology including processes, laws, regulations, norms, and social ideas 

-we can't/shouldn't try to seperate the physical components of a technology from the system as a whole


System Dynamics

-very complex and interconnected

-the components all interact with eachother

-if one component changes, it changes how all of the components operate


Steps (describes a pattern that large scal systems tend to follow, not necessarily sequentially):

1. Invention- new technology

2. Development- building into a system

3. Innovation- becomes a complex system, additions to tech.

4. Transfer- adapted to survival in a particular setting

5. Growth, Competition, Consolidation- expansion of technology, competition emerges and eventually consolidates


Technological Momentum

-in the early stages of a technology's development it is easily changed and can be interpretted in many ways

-as time passes, the technology becomes more entrenched

-in later stages, the momentum seems to be almost autonomous

 

Reasons for Momentum

-vexed interests, sunk costs, and fixed assets

-development of institutions that support them: Governmental bureaucracies, and businesses

 

Network Externalities

-when a user derives more pleasure from the technology as the number of users increases (example: texting)

-techs are hard to sell at first but once they catch on they are hard to change
Term
Examples of Technological Systems Hughes Mentions
 Definition

-automotive transportation systems

-driving on left vs. right (sweden changed to right)

-telephones

-Electricity

 

Electricity

-Edison favored direct current and tried to campaign against alternating current, but lost the fight and later came out saying that he was wrong about direct current

-starts with coal to fuel the electricity generators, then the consumers use it, then pollution

-billing system, overweight kids watching tv, hospital patients hooked up to machines
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