Science and Technology in World History (9 weeks)
S 2022

Description

The bestselling core book traces the relationship between science and technology from the dawn of civilization to the early twenty-first century.  The authors argue that technology as "applied science" emerged relatively recently, as industry and governments began funding scientific research that would lead directly to new or improved technologies.

McClellan and Dorn identify two great scientific traditions:  the useful sciences, which societies patronized from time immemorial, and the exploration of questions about nature itself, which the ancient Greeks originated. They examine scientific traditions that took root in China, India, and Central & South America, as well as in a series of Near Eastern empires in late antiquity and the Middle Ages.  From this comparative perspective, the authors survey the rise of the West, the Scientific Revolution of the seventeenth century, the Industrial Revolution, and the modern marriage of science and technology.  In the process they raise provocative questions about the sustainability of industrial civilization.

The core book was written as an introduction for general readers and students to provide the "big picture" that an educated person might wish to have of the history of science and technology.  A bit of math and astronomy might be helpful in a few places, but the SDG requires no technical background as a prerequisite.

Weekly Topics

  Part I:  Origins to the End of Antiquity

Week 1:     Chapter 1 - Humankind Emerges:  Tools & Toolmakers

                   Chapter 2 - The Reign of the Farmer

                   Chapter 3 - Pharaohs & Engineers

Week 2:     Chapter 4 - Greeks Bearing Gifts

                   Chapter 5 - Alexandria & After

  Part II:  Thinking and Doing Among the World's Peoples

Week 3:     Chapter 6 - The Enduring East

                   Chapter 7 - The Middle Kingdom

Week 4:     Chapter 8 - Indus, Ganges & Beyond

                   Chapter 9 - The New World

  Part III:  Europe and the Solar System

Week 5:    Chapter 10 - Plows, Stirrups, Guns & Plagues

                  Chapter 11 - Copernicus Incites a Revolution

Week 6:   Chapter 12 - The Crime & Punishment of Galileo Galilei

                 Chapter 13 - "God said, 'Let Newton Be!' "

  Part IV:  Science, Technology & Industrial Civilization

Week 7:   Chapter 14 - Textiles, Timber, Coal & Steam

                 Chapter 15 - Legacies of Revolution:  From Newton to Einstein

                 Chapter 16 - Life Itself 

Week 8:   Chapter 17 - Toolmakers Take Command

                 Chapter 18 - The New Aristotelians

Week 9:   Chapter 19 - The Bomb, the Internet & the Genome

                 Chapter 20 - Under Today's Pharaohs

Bibliography

McClellan III, James E. and Harold Dorn; Science and Technology in World History, Third Edition; John Hopkins University Press; 2015