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Editors' Preface

• The history of humans and technology spans millions of years, evolving from simple stone tools.
• Ancient people used fire as a survival technique, later progressing to water management for irrigation and hydroelectric power.
• Communication Tech development brought people closer, while medical advancements increased life expectancy.
• Technology served personal functions, and enabled ambitious leaders to build states and conquer others.
• The comparatively simple weaponry of Stone Age people evolved to be more complex machinery for conquest and destruction.
• The ability of iron to cut stone and fell trees, while also being used for war, murder, and robbery resulted in people having ambivalent feelings about all sorts of technology.
• Technology receives criticism for its devastating effects on the natural world, showing the tensions produced by the universal human capacity to invent.

Stone Age Technology

• Footprints in Laetoli, Tanzania, from 3.5 million years ago, discovered by anthropologist Mary Leakey in 1978, are from Australopithecines.
• The brains were about one-third the size of modern human brains, and they scavenged meat and vegetable matter.
• Australopithecines lived in grasslands, were bipedal, and had opposable thumbs.
• Deliberately made tools found in the Omo Valley of Ethiopia are dated back 2.5 million years, which included river cobbles broken to make crude choppers.
• Walking upright, hand manipulation, and tool manufacture transformed anatomy.
• The evolution created Homo or hominid, the Latin word for "man", combining brains, tools, and other features.
• Several Homo species lived in Africa 2.5 to 1.8 million years ago, with Homo habilis ("handy man") being the best known.
• Fossils show cobbles being carried up to nine miles, for use as hammers and choppers.
• Homo erectus ("standing man"), who replaced early hominids around 1.8 million years ago, had bigger brains and smaller jaws than Homo habilis.
• Homo erectus mastered fire allowing them fend off predators, stay warm, and roast meat, and were big-game hunters working in teams.
• Homo erectus nutritional diet came from vegetable matter collected, and therefore migrated from tropical Africa to other continents over a million years ago, reaching the Caucasus, China, and Java.
• Homo sapiens, evolved in Africa and had a large brain and small teeth, with two species called Neanderthal and archaic Homo sapiens existing side by side in the Levant.
• Modern Homo sapiens technology was more sophisticated, using specialized tools to cut wood, saw bones, cut meat, and scrape antlers.
• Stone tools of Homo sapiens and Neanderthals changed slowly over tens of thousands of years.
• 70,000 years ago, an explosion of innovation happened, including various cultural factors.
• Modern humans created more things overall with more organic matter.
• Humans made tools for cutting and piercing
• 2 Million years ago Homo habilis could break a flake that leaves approximately 3 inches of cutting edge.
• 300,000 Years ago, the Homo Erectus hand axe and flakes would obtain around 8-12 inches from each tool
• 100,000 years ago, Neanderthals would obtain around 30-40 inches of cutting edge.
• 30,000 years ago, A skilled hunter could make up to 30-40ft of blades from one pound of flint
• In 1991, a perfectly preserved man from 3300 BCE called the Ice Man was found in the glaciers in the Alps between Italy and Austria.
• Humans made clothes, ropes, nets, and carved fishhooks, also hunting big game and seafood.
• Humans ventured into the cold and lived in caves, such as those in western Europe and built houses of mammoth ribs covered with hides in Russia and Ukraine.
• Modern human artifacts go beyond the the purpose of survival, creating religious and aesthetic objects.
• Some anthropologists propose that symbolism caused the sudden change in humans.
• 100,000 years ago, Homo sapiens migrated to southwestern Asia.
• 40,000 years ago, west Europe was occupied by the species.
• 5,000 / 10,000 / 15,000 years after, the oceans were recorded much lower than before, the continents of New Guinea and Australia were joined in a continent called Sahul.
• The ancestors of the New Guineans and Australian aborigines had to build boats large enough to journey towards the unknown to reach Sahul.
• Humans arrived in Americas at least 15,000 years ago, crossing the Siberia and Alaska land bridge.
• First Americans were skilled hunters who made fluted stone spearheads called Clovis points in Clovis, New Mexico.
• 10,000 years ago every continent occupied except Arctic, Antarctica and Islands of the Pacific.
• Their knowledge of natural environment and toolkit grew, but it was the shores of the Arctic Ocean offered challenges to human life requiring little imported paraphernalia.
• First inhabitants on the American side of the Arctic Ocean, the Inuit, came from Siberia 10,000 years ago to hunt caribou and fashion harpoons.
• Kayaks and umiaks were created from whale and seal skin to hunt.
• Natufians hunted with arrows, fished, and had grain. They reaped grains with bone sickles.
• Abu Hureya was a village of 300-400 lived by hunting for over 2000 years.
• In Japan, Jomon people had villages where they made pottery and had a culture that lasted 10,000 years.
• The Jomon had the highest standard of living of foragers anywhere in the world.
• The first pots from jomon were large cone-shaped earthenware cooking pots.
• Gardening became an accessible practice that could be intercepted, as seen in the burial site in Abu Hureya 9700 BCE.
• The transition from planting seeds to depending on plants fully took 2000 years or more.
• "Why should we plant when there are so many mongongo nuts in the world?" one hunter gatherer questioned to the anthropologist.
• Dogs were the first animals domesticated, then livestock animals like wild sheep and goats were followed.
• Milk and wool from the animals bred was a bonus, which coincided with animal droppings for fuel.
• After domesticating horses began the cycle of pastoral nomadism, which threatened the lives of farmers.
• In Northern China, millet and soybean was grown from around 6500 BCE, as rice was in South East Asia
• A diffusion from The Levant to Egypt and Europe was recorded around 6000 BCE.
• To obtain ash and land after harvest, farmers cut down forests and burned the trees.
• Jericho may have been the first village, dating back to 10,500 BCE that harvested wheat and grains.
• Then, after their trade for obsidian the population surrounded their towns with walls for protection.
• New Stone Age period were polished tools less prone to fracture including axes axes were used to chop down trees and stone blades to prepare the land.
• Millstones were used to grind grain.
• Their diet was less protein and their remains were smaller

Hydraulic Civilizations

• Sumerians in Mesopotamia created the first civilization by separating land from water and planting crops.
• Civilization refers to large-scale societies whose members contributed tribute to the state and homage to their leaders.
• Unlike Neolithic villages with shared food production, civilizations had professional religious, political, military leaders, artisans, etc.
• Producing a food surplus was key to transitioning from Neolithic villages to civilizations.
• Civilizations began in dry regions by rivers because of the reliable access to wate, which led to the need for control.
• A grain of barley receiving the right amount of water during the growing season could yield up to forty grains.
• To bring the water, canals and dikes had to be dug by thousands of workers
• People knew there was nowhere else to go due to the reliance on access to a source and the fear of the wrath of the gods for not working
• Mesopotamia: "land between the rivers" Tigris and Euphrates, has good soil
• Legend was that the Ark was carried by the rivers, in which low dikes which divided lands with water
• Farmers grew abundance with crops, and grew into towns after 3500 BCE with techniques used gradually spread.
• 2000 BCE farmers begin watering their fields with a shaduf alongside a seed drill, a device to drop seeds at regular intervals for growth,
• Egyptian civilizations flourished for 3,000 years, due to an abundance of wild game and reliance on periodic floods and silt waters which are salt free..
• Villagers dug canals, irrigation, and traded for metal goods, trading with Sumer and Arabian Peninsulas.
• in Mexico, the people began growing maize, beans, squash, and chili peppers.
• By, 2000 BCE villages dotted the landscape supporting the ecological zone.
• In the Valley Of Mexico, streams made shallow lakes as farmers created chinampas, rectangular islands 300’ long separated by canals.
• By 1500 CE On the eve of Spanish Invasion. More than 30000 acres were providing food for citizens.
• People in the the zone traded with one another.
• Around 1900 BCE, people living along the coastal rivers began dig- ging canals for water along 50 miles.
• The Moche state conquered coastal valleys around 200 BCE, due to active trade which had the farmers, herders, and the fishermen.
• The hydraulic engineering projects both required and supported large populations with the construction of temples and cities.
• They relied also on sun dried bricks.
• The land that was closest had disputes leading to cities needing professional warrios.
• A class of professional warriors came about as wars broke out, that demanded High walls to be surrounded with cities because of the war
• Stone temples and Palaces have survived for thousands of years from the Egyptians due to the land being bordered by Limestone with sun-dried bricks.
• The pyramids were built over 5,000 years.
• To put limestone block in its place during the 3 month water season, it required A labor force of 10,000 farmers as work progressed.
• Harappa & Mojenjo-Daro came from the Indus Valley
• there were no large rivers, and no animals could be domesticated so all work had to be done by the ancient civilization in Mexico with a large amount of Labor.
• They revealed an elaborate but tightly controlled civilization with cities.
• Some of what could be taken from Persia was later then used in Greece.
• The buildings in the Sumerica used little wood, they were temples and cities, with bricks.
• People migrated to use wheelers and the use of metal.
• Ancient civilizations were slow to develop the wheel.
• Most writing and artifacts were only left by civilized elites.
• The new series tells the histories of people that were close to big historic events.
• Why if civilization represented such an advance did it restricted and not spread to other regions of the word for centuries?
• Not until the 1st Millennium BCE did people submit to the discipline of religious and political authorities, so many farmers are resistant.
• Thus the new technologies. Represent a great amount of power over nature. Also the capability to maintain rule over ones fellows.
• The Sumerians were a community of people with a great deal of knowledge, cooperative work, and leadership all in one place.
• In the Middle East and East Asia, the creation of objects that were not immediately useful for survival began and spread rapidly.
• The history of Egyptian civilization revolves around the study of local stones, metals, and expensive imported products.
• All of this meant they had an extensive trading network.

Iron, Horses and the Empires

• Due to iron,horses, cavalry came about, with various kingdoms arising. Thanks to fire and their superior hunting skills, Homo erectus could live in temperate climates and could therefore migrate from tropical Af-rica to other continents.
• More than a million years ago, Homo erectus reached the Caucasus, northern China, and Java, and later Spain and France.
• But they could not survive in really cold cli-mates, like north-ern Eurasia, nor could they cross bodies of water; therefore, they never reached Australia, the Americas, or the islands of the Pacific.
• The Assyrian army with iron, infantrymen, and battering rams went on to create its 20000 inhabitants.
• Cities became big due to slaves artisans priests.
• Roman engineers created the water supply, aqueduct. Also new forms of communication and transporation came into play.
• Pliny wrote of his misgivings about steel being used in the wrong way.
• The Hittites used steel to make swords that destroyed the competition.
• From there, the technology spread to other countries.
• Europe was influenced because it had a great deal of ore, which led to a switch of the era.
• Blacksmith was able to produce equipment.
• Farmers used shares and carpenters had chisels and cooks have pots and pans.
• It allowed for the rise of farming communities.
• Also people took up nomadic lifestyles.
• There was irrigation around the river valley and this led to the rise of kingdoms.
• Wild horses became native grasslands in Central Asia and Southern and Russia.
• The Mesopotamian cities that are grew in a helter-skelter action two Indus cities, the construction of big statues.
• Roman stone and rock were used to build empires and roads.
• Egyptians use limestone.

The Acceleration of Change

• Roger Bacon predicted machines to be built making ships, wagons, and flying machines.
• Two events in 1869 symbolized the triumph, opening with the Suez Canal, connecting to Mediterranean Sea, and Asia.
• railroads and steamboats, were the most conspicuous of technologies which was now spread across Asia, Latin America, and Africa. - More powerful locomotives pulled longer and longer rains that that increased world trade.
• A more economical and resourceful form in steel was created as well, which resulted in ships bridges, and rail.
• People created a new scientific world in the early 1900s to learn how electricity worked. They also came to invent better forms of energy.
• Swan and Edison created a more sophisticated light. At the same time someone else created telephone.
• Also in the year 1900 cars and gasoline came into play. The first working model was built in 1859, which was by the French engineer.
• It was found that electricity could only used for particular objects that were well-suited to its capabilities.
• However for certain countries, like China, the new technological change led to defeat because in that zone military had what was needed.
• WW1 was the biggest catalyst for the technology, however, the war was very destructive.
• Since humans can use poison gas on other humans.
• All these measures actually really mitigated The worsening aspects of city life.
• Since humans could now use the atmosphere as well as The Oceans.
• During World War 2 and the depression. The government made a research of how a lot of things were going it was for military purposes.
• The Soviet and other places started the experiment with rocketry and their goal was to test for their people what was in range. Then a small number created the big one.
• Even the scientist agreed to say that we must create technology in the right kind of hands and with the right type of energy. It was so we had all made it to the next level.