How has technology advanced so rapidly in the past 200 years with only human intelligence?
September 1, 2009 by Question
Filed under Tech Answers
We go from being a species of fairly primitive beings in the 1800s to a species that has extremely advanced technology in such a short amount of time. How did we do this without any outside help?
Well, not every society developed equally, for more on this read ‘Guns, Germs and Steel’ by Jared Diamond.
The basic formula has to do with food, population, specialization and innovation made possible through recreation.
A population of people need to be fixed in one spot, with plenty of food provided by the food-specialists so some people in the village can do something other than hunting/gathering/planting. This frees up others to do art or medicine and others have time to invent. In this society, everyone knows they won’t starve, and specialization breeds experts in their given fields. A well-fed society will have more and healtheir babies, and the cycle continues.
Domesticated animals help provide labor, transportation and food. Well-fed people are going to be more energy-efficient and think more clearly than those societies who are starving or barely getting by on a poor diet.
With this cycle, there is lots of free time (or as much as possible) and those who are good at inventing are free to do it, well fed and with a fully-working brain. The innovations get learned by everyone and put in use, and more innovation and invention builds off this. The wheel precedes the cart, the cart precedes the powered coach/car.
Of course, the societies have to avoid killing themselves, and the technology they develop helps them win wars, dominate other cultures when there’s a clash, and big societies armed with technology as we’ve seen on Earth had conquered/explored much of the world early on.
Societies which develop crushingly oppressive religions tend to do badly too. The Dark Ages stifled progress for most of the world for a long time and stood directly in the path of intellectual and technological progress. Other religions get mired in pointless holy wars fighting over a tiny scrap of land, even today. Some religions disallow the eating of certain valuable proteins, and this means people go hungry more often, which means less brainpower contributing to that society.
Overcoming the cancer of religion has been key to our progress thus far, now that scientists aren’t being put under house-arrest or killed merely for discovering a fact of the Universe that theists in power don’t like.
Religion continues to stand in the way of stem-cell and genetic research as well as the teaching of evolution, in addition to trying to limit choice and birth-control options for women. Unwanted babies tend to be more neglected and can become a burden to society if they turn criminal. Some populations are overrun with people simply because most of them embrace the notion of ‘no birth control’ as handed down by the Catholic church. Furthermore, people who genuinely believe in religious ideas often directly attack those they feel are doing ‘Satan’s’ work. Look at the abortion doctor who was recently killed by a fundie. Dr. George Tiller was providing a service to women who were not ready to have a baby, but he was killed. Some women simply know they are ill-equipped to bring another child in the world, but ‘good’ Christians took it upon themselves to kill an abortion doctor, and he’s just one of many victims.
The missionary vultures who are trying to Christianize Africa are commiting a form of genocide if they tell people not to use condoms or go abstinent. Africa is a starving, AIDS-plagued population which collectively doesn’t understand birth-control well in the first place. They need technology and education, not more Jesus. This directly contributes to the sad-state of Africa today. Africa needs secularism, technology, and a stable government.
The best way to progress in a society is to not only have specialization, recreation and population, but also a secular government which keeps religion well out of the field of social and technological progress.