标签：General History of Technology

Course Summary for “A General History of Technology” (Second Year)

Teaching & Courses2019.07.13
Course Summary for “A General History of Technology” (Second Year)
The course “A General History of Technology” was already taught once last year, and I had already written a detailed course summary at the time (see here). This semester the second run has just ended, and one could say that the course has gradually entered the right track. At the end of the first year, 29 students had enrolled; this year, after withdrawals were deducted, there were 69 students. It has finally grown somewhat larger. I hope the students will tell ten people, ten people will tell a hundred, and that next year the number of enrollments will rise again~ Final Exam Let me begin with the final exam….
history of science scholarship course General History of Technology
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2019年7月13日
Course Summary for “A General History of Technology” (Student Comments and Summaries of Each Lecture)

AI & the Future of Technology2018.07.09
Course Summary for “A General History of Technology” (Student Comments and Summaries of Each Lecture)
The grades for the course have come out, and the first round of this course is now more or less a complete success. As for grading, I gave about half the students an A- or above, far exceeding the university’s recommended standard of 20%; I added an extra note and hope the university will approve it. At the same time, the number of students who failed because of plagiarism reached five, also beyond the recommended limit. But all of this was according to my own standards: giving high grades was not to curry favor with students, and failing students was not to make things difficult for them. My course also…
philosophy technology history of science scholarship
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2018年7月9日
Final Exam Paper for General History of Technology

Teaching & Courses2018.06.12
Final Exam Paper for General History of Technology
Notes As I said before, the final exam is “completely open-book,” and you may bring electronic devices to search the internet. The “attendance questions” are also my own new idea, something I wanted to try while the class size was still small. Why set attendance questions? I think students who take a course can roughly be divided into three broad types: first, those who are habitually diligent and honest, who will keep coming no matter whether the teacher’s lectures are good or bad; second, those who are habitually coasting, who will almost never come no matter whether the teacher’s lectures are good or bad; and third, those who are free-spirited…
scholarship course paper writing
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2018年6月12日
What Kind of Assignment Does the Teacher Hope to See? — Reflections on Assigning the “General History of Technology” Assignment

History of Science & Scholarship2018.05.29
What Kind of Assignment Does the Teacher Hope to See? — Reflections on Assigning the “General History of Technology” Assignment
After this article was posted, the blog inexplicably crashed, and had to be restored several times… The course “A General History of Technology” is about to end. Next week I will write a brief summary; for now, let me talk about the homework issue. The assessment format for this course is rather innovative, consisting of 40% midterm assignments + 60% final exam. As for the midterm assignment, I do not want to see students plagiarizing, or cobbling together a lousy paper and handing it in, so I proposed a flexible either-or scheme: students who are interested in, or capable of, writing a paper may still write a short essay of…
history of science scholarship course Scientific Revolution
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2018年5月29日
At what “time” do we need to “check the time”?

AI & the Future of Technology2018.04.30
At what “time” do we need to “check the time”?
This short essay is made up of some fragments from the fifth lecture of my course “A General History of Technology.” The full handout has not yet been整理出来, but today there happens to be a filming session that will deal with the relevant topic, so I’m extracting these parts first and jotting down a few lines at will. What is a clock? It is a kind of, or rather a class of, technical artifact. As a technical object, it of course has a specific function; so what is a clock for? The answer seems very simple: a clock is for “looking at time.” But on closer thought, this act of…
technology Industrial Revolution General History of Technology time
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2018年4月30日
Undergraduate General Education Course: “A General History of Technology”

Teaching & Courses2018.02.24
Undergraduate General Education Course: “A General History of Technology”
This semester (Spring 2018), I will be offering an undergraduate elective at Tsinghua: *General History of Technology*. Basic Course Information Course number: 00691572 Time: Every Tuesday, period 4 (15:20–16:55) Note: Classes start on February 27 Location: Building 4, Room 4202 Assessment: Reading notes / short paper + open-book final exam Note: I hope every student can write a relatively complete paper (more than 6,000 Chinese characters), but past experience shows that many students still lack adequate academic training, and the papers handed in are often a miserable patchwork. So this time I am considering allowing reading notes, with a more flexible format, to substitute for the paper; but students who…
China technology history of science course
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2018年2月24日
My Course Plan for the History of Science Department

Teaching & Courses2016.12.18
My Course Plan for the History of Science Department
Wu Laoshi’s grand plan for building the department is proceeding smoothly; the formal unveiling is probably not far off, and he has already begun to contemplate questions like course design for the next stage. I myself also have many ideas about teaching, and this is precisely why I hoped to take a university post rather than go to a research institute. I would be more than happy to teach undergraduate courses, especially at top universities like Peking University and Tsinghua, where the undergraduate student pool is the strongest. Undergraduates are more malleable and more open to new knowledge, and it is more rewarding to teach them. As for graduate students…
history of science philosophy of science course Wu Guosheng
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2016年12月18日
The Definition of “Technology” — A Means to an End, or Something That Can Be Learned?

AI & the Future of Technology2015.08.28
The Definition of “Technology” — A Means to an End, or Something That Can Be Learned?
Recently I have been preparing an article on the historiographical program for a general history of technology to present at this year’s conference on phenomenology and the philosophy of technology. The article has been somewhat hard to bring to term; in fact, I am trying, through this project, to reconsider anew what the essence of “technology” actually is. Here I will first deviate from the paper’s theme and write down some of my recent thoughts. In Heidegger’s mode of approach, we always have to begin by finding an everyday definition, affirming its reasonableness, but questioning its thoroughness, and then, by following the thread, sorting out its more original meaning. Heidegger’s…
technology Heidegger phenomenology General History of Technology
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2015年8月28日
An Outline of the General History of Technology

History of Science & Scholarship2014.11.21
An Outline of the General History of Technology
Outline of a General History of Technology Hu Yilin I. A Survey of Western Studies in the History of Technology In the English-speaking world, the history of technology as an established academic discipline roughly began in the 1950s. Its landmark was the publication of the monumental Oxford History of Technology (volumes 1 through 5 were published from 1954 to 1958, the final two volumes in 1978, and the general index for volume 8 was completed in 1984). Another milestone was the founding of the American Society for the History of Technology (SHOT) in 1958 and the launch of its journal Technology and Culture in 1959. From roughly the late 1950s…
culture technology media phenomenology
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2014年11月21日
An Introduction to the Historiography of the General History of Technology

AI & the Future of Technology2014.08.01
An Introduction to the Historiography of the General History of Technology
Introduction to the Historiography of the General History of Technology //Note: this article has not yet been completed. I am only giving Wu laoshi an account in advance during the discussion… Next I will flesh out the concept of “the history of technological thought” a bit more. 1. A Survey of Western Research on the History of Technology In the English-speaking world, the history of technology as an academically institutionalized discipline roughly began in the 1950s. Its markers were the publication of the monumental Oxford edition of A History of Technology (Volumes 1 through 5 were published in 1954–1958, the last two volumes in 1978, and the general index of…
culture technology media history
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2014年8月1日