标签：history of technology

From a Snail Shell to the Metaverse—An Evolutionary Theory of Technological “Organs”

AI & the Future of Technology2022.04.26
From a Snail Shell to the Metaverse—An Evolutionary Theory of Technological “Organs”
A lecture I gave a few months ago has been posted today, and I’m also putting up the original verbatim transcript here. In name, this lecture was about The Origin of Species, but it mainly talks about technology and evolution; in this respect, another lecture from back then is actually clearer: Humans and Technology in Evolution — Technology Also Needs “Biodiversity Reserves”. This time, “the metaverse” has been added. Recently there have also been many lectures about the metaverse, but their basic viewpoints do not go much beyond the series of articles I posted here earlier, so I won’t post them separately either. The theme I’m talking about today is…
technology Web3 history of technology Introduction to Philosophy of Technology
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2022年4月26日
The Cost of Innovation: Another Kind of Lesson from the History of Technology — A Review of The Technology Trap

AI & the Future of Technology2022.01.21
The Cost of Innovation: Another Kind of Lesson from the History of Technology — A Review of The Technology Trap
This article was published in China Science Daily (2022-01-21, page 3, Reading); the title was changed to “A Different Kind of Inspiration: Seeing the Suffering of Ordinary People in the History of Technology.” It was also posted on their WeChat public account, under the title “Let’s Talk This Time About the Suffering Brought to Humanity by Technological Progress!” I’m reposting it here. I teach a general history of technology course at Tsinghua, and over the past few years I have also given quite a few public lectures on special topics in the history of technology. One question such courses or lectures often face is this: what guiding significance does the…
technology book reading history of technology book review
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2022年1月21日
The Metaverse Is Hyperreality, Not Virtual Reality: From the Agricultural Revolution and the Industrial Revolution to the Information Revolution

AI & the Future of Technology2022.01.05
The Metaverse Is Hyperreality, Not Virtual Reality: From the Agricultural Revolution and the Industrial Revolution to the Information Revolution
“Metaverse” was last year’s big buzzword. I also discussed it a great deal on Weibo, in class, and in conversation, but unfortunately no media outlet ever invited me to write about it, so I never got around to writing anything systematic. Perhaps I could consider turning it into an academic paper, but then I’m always lazy. In any case, since I have a bit of inclination these past couple of days, let me first write an essay on it. (I will still turn this article into an NFT through Opensea, but in this era when the copyright consensus around NFTs is still far from mature, I nonetheless welcome reprints by…
technology culture Web3 tradition
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2022年1月5日
The Biography of Objects: Methods and Significance in the History of Scientific Instruments

AI & the Future of Technology2021.11.03
The Biography of Objects: Methods and Significance in the History of Scientific Instruments
At today’s regular meeting we discussed the question of paradigms in the history of scientific instruments, and I offered some views. Here I’ll spell them out a bit more fully. At present, the history of scientific instruments does not seem to have formed a relatively unified and distinctive research paradigm. On this point, Teacher Wu seems inclined to think that studies of individual instruments belong to the “initial stage” of scholarship in the history of science and technology: instruments, like manuscripts, artifacts, and other primary historical sources, are the foundation of historical research. But through further study, the results we obtain from these basic materials still ultimately have to crystallize…
technology history of science scholarship history
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2021年11月3日
NFTs and Tulip Mania

Culture & Public Commentary2021.09.09
NFTs and Tulip Mania
This article was commissioned by China Business Journal; see http://www.cb.com.cn/index/show/zl/cv/cv13456431853 NFT is the full name of Non-Fungible Token. A literal translation would be “non-fungible token.” The so-called token, also translated as “coin” or “token,” refers to some kind of rights certificate: coupons, prize-redemption slips, game coins, and so on all count as tokens. Of course, in the blockchain context it generally refers to a unit of account in a digital ledger. The various digital currencies that were wildly hyped a few years ago were basically “fungible tokens.” Recently, however, NFT has exploded overnight and rapidly gone mainstream. Speculators these days do not care at all whether the object of speculation…
culture history Web3 history of technology
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2021年9月9日
An Interview Transcript about Zhang Xiaoyu’s Technics and Civilization

Culture & Public Commentary2021.08.09
An Interview Transcript about Zhang Xiaoyu’s Technics and Civilization
Earlier, China Science Daily recommended Zhang Xiaoyu’s book Technology and Civilization, and interviewed me for a few comments. Today I suddenly remembered this, looked it up, and found that the interview had already been used. See China Science Daily (2021-06-17, Section 5, Culture Weekly). The published piece was assembled from excerpts of my written interview responses, integrated with the introduction to Zhang Xiaoyu’s book. Overall it was organized fairly well, but from the standpoint of my own expression, it was chopped up too much. Below I am posting my original answers, which are much richer in content and also more complete. Zhang Xiaoyu’s book is of course a good one,…
philosophy technology China book reading
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2021年8月9日
A Course Summary on Media History and Media Philosophy (Spring 2021)

Teaching & Courses2021.07.16
A Course Summary on Media History and Media Philosophy (Spring 2021)
This is a new course, though not all of its content is actually new; some of it has “overflowed” from my two other courses, “A General History of Technology” and “Introduction to the Philosophy of Technology.” Since I keep adding content to both of those courses, I plan to transfer the sections on media technologies in “A General History of Technology” (including writing, printing, the telegraph, and so on) to this course. Of course, in the new course I will give more prominence to the relevant philosophical reflections, with both history and philosophy in view. As usual, I am writing up a course summary. I’ll make this first one a…
philosophy media course history of technology
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2021年7月16日
In the Age of Technology, What Use Is Philosophy? — On “An Introduction to Philosophy of Technology”

AI & the Future of Technology2021.06.07
In the Age of Technology, What Use Is Philosophy? — On “An Introduction to Philosophy of Technology”
My new book, An Introduction to the Philosophy of Technology (Tsinghua Series in the History and Philosophy of Science), was published by the Commercial Press in May 2021. Come to think of it, this seems to be the first original book in the Tsinghua Series in the History and Philosophy of Science over its two phases; the others are either revised reprints of books long since published, or works based on a doctoral dissertation or an English-language monograph. This Introduction to the Philosophy of Technology was written entirely during my time in the Department of the History of Science at Tsinghua. This is my sixth book, and one of the…
philosophy technology history of science history of technology
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2021年6月7日
A Few Recent Audio-Video Posts

History of Science & Scholarship2021.03.03
A Few Recent Audio-Video Posts
In general, for lectures, interviews, and the like, I’d prefer to wait until a written transcript comes out before reposting them to Suixuan. But recently some videos and audio recordings apparently won’t have written versions整理出来 by anyone, so I’m reposting them together here. 1. Reading Seminar of the General History of Science Curriculum Alliance, Mumford: A Guided Reading of Technics and Civilization (February 14, 2021) https://www.bilibili.com/video/BV12k4y1276t?p=40 This video talk is the one I most recommend. Mumford’s Technics and Civilization is extremely important, and my reading of it was also very carefully prepared. I tried to distill from Mumford’s thought a historiography of the history of technology as thought, opening up…
technology China history of technology Introduction to Philosophy of Technology
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2021年3月3日
Course Summary for A General History of Technology (Fall 2020)

Teaching & Courses2021.02.19
Course Summary for A General History of Technology (Fall 2020)
This is the fourth round of the course. This round was a little different from the previous three: the total number of class hours was about the same, but the original 16-week format of 2 class hours per week was changed to an 11-week format of 3 class hours per week. This scheduling was due to a small mistake I made when I first registered the course, but afterward I also decided to go with the flow and see what benefits this arrangement might have. There were indeed some benefits. First, the course ended off-peak, concluding a month earlier than most courses, which relatively speaking may have eased some of…
course history of technology General History of Technology machinery
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2021年2月19日