History of Technology - History of Humanity

According to sociologists and anthropologists, the history of technology is the history of the invention and use of tools, and corresponds to the history of humanity. There are theories of social and cultural evolution that credit technological progress as the primary factor driving the development of human civilization.
Some theories of the early evolution of human civilization use stages of development which are based on the tools used during each period. Some of those tools are: fire, the bow (for hunting), pottery, domestic animals, metalworking, the alphabet, and then written language.

Other theories gauge the evolution of human culture by the ability to ‘harness and control energy’. Specifically, the efficiency of the use of energy by a culture directly correlates to the level of advancement that culture achieves. Good examples of efficient use of energy in advanced cultures would be ancient Roman, Greek, and Egyptian cultures. When people are freed from the daily struggle for the basic necessities of life (clean water, food, shelter, and safety) they use their brains to advance human civilizations.

Modern sociologists and anthropologists theorize that information is the key to the advancement of society and civilizations. Gerhard Lenski is a Professor Emeritus at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and he believes that the more information and knowledge a society has, the more advanced it is, and is capable of becoming. He bases the stages of human development on the history of communication, believing that advancements in communication create advancement in economic and political systems.

Computers are the greatest leap ever in the history of human communication and are proving Lenski correct as evidenced by the huge disparities between cultures that are utilizing computers and the internet, and cultures that are not.


From the History of Technology, on Wikipedia, at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_technology