4 books found
Are science and technology independent of one another? Is technology dependent upon science, and if so, how is it dependent? Is science dependent upon technology, and if so how is it dependent? Or, are science and technology becoming so interdependent that the line dividing them has become totally erased? This book charts the history of technoscience from the late nineteenth century to the end of the twentieth century and shows how the military–industrial–academic complex and big science combined to create new examples of technoscience in such areas as the nuclear arms race, the space race, the digital age, and the new worlds of nanotechnology and biotechnology.
The 18th and 19th centuries saw the emergence of new intermediary types of knowledge in areas such as applied mechanics, fluid mechanics and thermodynamics, which came to be labeled as engineering science, transforming technology into the scientific discipline that we know today. This book analyzes how the Scientific Revolution of the 16th and 17th centuries and the Industrial Revolution of the 18th and 19th centuries provided the intellectual, social, economic and institutional foundations for the emergence of engineering science. The book then traces the rise of engineering science from the 18th century through the 19th century and concludes by showing how it led to new technological developments in such areas as steel production, the invention of internal combustion engines, the creation of automobiles and airplanes, and the formulation of Mass Production and Scientific Management all of which brought about major transformations in the materials, power sources, transportation and production techniques that have come to shape our modern world.
by David A. N. Ussiri, Rattan Lal
2017 · Springer
This book provides an understanding of the role of human activities in accelerating change in global carbon cycling summarizes current knowledge of the contemporary carbon budget. Starting from the geological history, this volume follows a multidisciplinary approach to analyze the role of human activities in perturbing carbon cycling by quantifying changes in different reservoirs and fluxes of carbon with emphasis on the anthropogenic activities, especially after the industrial revolution. It covers the role of different mitigation options – natural ecological, engineered, and geoengineered processes as well as the emerging field of climate engineering in avoiding dangerous abrupt climate change. Although the targeted audience is the educators, students, researchers and scientific community, the simplified analysis and synthesis of current and up to date scientific literature makes the volume easier to understand and a tool policy makers can use to make an informed policy decisions.
An investigation into the assignment of moral responsibilities and rights to intelligent and autonomous machines of our own making. One of the enduring concerns of moral philosophy is deciding who or what is deserving of ethical consideration. Much recent attention has been devoted to the "animal question"—consideration of the moral status of nonhuman animals. In this book, David Gunkel takes up the "machine question": whether and to what extent intelligent and autonomous machines of our own making can be considered to have legitimate moral responsibilities and any legitimate claim to moral consideration. The machine question poses a fundamental challenge to moral thinking, questioning the traditional philosophical conceptualization of technology as a tool or instrument to be used by human agents. Gunkel begins by addressing the question of machine moral agency: whether a machine might be considered a legitimate moral agent that could be held responsible for decisions and actions. He then approaches the machine question from the other side, considering whether a machine might be a moral patient due legitimate moral consideration. Finally, Gunkel considers some recent innovations in moral philosophy and critical theory that complicate the machine question, deconstructing the binary agent–patient opposition itself. Technological advances may prompt us to wonder if the science fiction of computers and robots whose actions affect their human companions (think of HAL in 2001: A Space Odyssey) could become science fact. Gunkel's argument promises to influence future considerations of ethics, ourselves, and the other entities who inhabit this world.