About 6000 to 4000 years ago, people gradually mastered the technology of improving the furnace temperature in the production practice of pottery. Later, natural red copper was found in various stones used to make labor tools, thus human beings realized the smelting of copper for the first time. The productivity brought by the use of bronze tools eventually led to the disintegration of primitive society and the emergence of slave society. In this period, the engineering technology, besides building water conservancy, also reached a high level. The pyramids built in ancient Egypt and the exquisite bronzes of Shang and Zhou Dynasties in China marked a new height of engineering technology development in this period, and accumulated rich practical experience in bronze smelting technology. Due to the invention of bellows, iron smelting technology gradually emerged and developed, and the first iron appeared. Replacing stone tools with iron is another major change in engineering technology. The invention of iron smelting technology and the extensive use of iron are the most important scientific and technological achievements in this period, which greatly improved the social labor productivity. It not only created important conditions for the transition from slave society to feudal society, but also became the main technical basis of the whole feudal society.
It can be seen that the initial development of engineering technology has experienced three historical stages: primitive society, slave society and feudal society. The basic feature of this historical period is that engineering technology is mainly in the materialized stage of experience, and production technology is basically manual. Since the emergence of class in society, engineering technology has been developing in a society with class opposition. At this time, it was slaves, farmers and craftsmen who created material wealth and accumulated production experience in production, and their practical experience was the basis of technological progress. However, the main tools of production and social wealth are occupied by slave owners and landlords. The progress of engineering technology in this period was promoted by production on the one hand and deeply influenced by social class on the other. However, the development of production and the accumulation of experience are still the fundamental driving force to promote technological progress. Generally speaking, the progress of early engineering technology is still quite slow, and the level of productivity is also low. On the one hand, it is due to the weak technical foundation; On the other hand, the slave owners and the landlord class do not care about the improvement of technology. In slave society, slaves are regarded as tools of life, and they use the destruction and destruction of labor tools to resist the cruel oppression of slave owners in production. In order to prevent the destruction of slaves, slave owners only use the roughest, heaviest and indestructible tools for slaves. The feudal landlord class only wanted to squeeze the peasants' blood and sweat through land rent and various super-economic exploitation means, and it didn't matter to them whether the agricultural production tools were improved. When the slave owners and the landlord class declined, they became more extravagant, suppressed the people by violence, destroyed production, and brought the economy to a standstill, thus seriously hindering the development of engineering technology. Marx pointed out: "The technical basis of modern industry is revolutionary, while the technical basis of all modes of production is conservative." Slavery and feudal mode of production, because of the conservatism of their technical basis, can not exist for a long time after all, and it is inevitable that the new mode of production characterized by the continuous revolution of engineering technology will overcome the old mode of production. (A) the social conditions of engineering and technological change
The industrial revolution, which began in the 1960s, was the first technological revolution after the use of iron in human history. It started with the mechanization of textile industry and was marked by the invention and widespread use of steam engine, which promoted the emergence and development of modern engineering technology.
Modern engineering technology came into being in the era of capitalist revolution, mainly based on the British industrial revolution and the French bourgeois revolution.
Go down in history In feudal society, the development of engineering technology contributed to the emergence of the bourgeoisie and made it the ruling class of the new society. After the bourgeoisie overthrew the feudal system, it also promoted the further development of engineering technology. The bourgeoisie needs the discovery and invention of science and technology, which is determined by capitalist production. Capitalist production is commodity production aimed at pursuing surplus value, and competition among capitalists is the inherent law of capitalist mode of production. If capitalists want to make money and beat each other in the competition, they must constantly expand the scale of production, constantly improve production tools and technical equipment, replace manual labor with machine production, and replace old machines with new machines. The British industrial revolution, which began in the18th century, was the beginning and preparation for the great development of productive forces under the capitalist system, thus promoting the transformation of engineering technology. The transformation of engineering technology begins with the working machine of cotton textile industry. Because of the manufacture of new working machines, the revolution of power machines has become necessary, and the transmission devices have changed accordingly.
(B) the invention and improvement of the steam engine
The invention of steam engine is mainly due to the demand of British textile and mining industry, but its technical application is much wider. The earliest steam engine was born in a prototype technology of newcomen in the18th century. Later, British craftsman Watt applied Braque's theory of "specific heat" and "latent heat" as a guide, improved the newcomen steam engine, solved the problem of air leakage in the cylinder and invented the condenser. Later, he invented the centrifugal governor and flywheel, which improved the efficiency of the steam engine in theory and practice, making the steam engine a prime Mover suitable for all industrial sectors. Since then, the working machine has been powered by the steam engine. Engels pointed out: "Steam and new machine tools have turned the workshop handicraft industry into a modern large-scale industry, which has revolutionized the whole foundation of bourgeois society."
The invention and improvement of steam engine is the decisive factor of industrial revolution, which greatly accelerated the process of industrial revolution from manual production to machine production and promoted the comprehensive transformation of industrial production technology. The steamboat (1807) and the steam locomotive (18 17) were invented one after another, and the transportation industry has undergone revolutionary changes. At the same time, metallurgical industry, especially ironmaking and steelmaking technology, has also been greatly developed. American mechanic Henry Maudslay (1771-1831) changed all the old lathes to iron in 1797, and manufactured lathes with sliding tool holders, which was a major breakthrough in the development history of machine tools. From then on, in the process of machining, people can't hold the tool directly, but only manipulate the tool rest. Lathe can automatically process cylinders or screws according to the specified size, which is an important creation in the development history of machining technology. It marks the completion of a qualitative leap in cutting, and since then, a mechanically operated metal cutting machine tool has been formed, which has made the machine tool develop rapidly and promoted the further improvement of the machine.
Although the technological inventions in this period met the needs of the development of capitalist production, the technological development of these inventions in this period was basically created by the accumulation of experience of craftsmen or engineers. Although these inventions conform to the laws of mechanics and physics, few natural scientists participate in them and consciously use scientific theories to guide them, which is similar to the nature of early engineering technology. However, the development of early engineering technology was ignored by the feudal ruling class at that time, while the bourgeoisie attached importance to technological invention. As early as 1800, British capitalists established a patent system to reward technological inventions. "The consequences of the first technological revolution marked by the widespread use of steam engines, as Marx and Engels pointed out: the productive forces created by the bourgeoisie in its class rule of less than 100 years exceeded all the productive forces created by all generations in the past." Steam engines and working machines provide a strong material and technical foundation for capitalist production and become powerful weapons for capitalism to defeat feudalism and establish capitalist production methods. The emerging bourgeoisie attached great importance to science and adopted a series of measures, which also effectively promoted the development of natural science in this period. New experiments, new materials, new laws and new theories have mushroomed, mechanics has become more mature, and molecular physics, electromagnetism, chemistry, biology and mathematics have all entered a new stage in their respective fields. The modern natural science started in the second half of the15th century and developed into the19th century. From the stage of collecting materials to the stage of sorting out materials, all the sciences are close to perfection. Theoretical natural science tends to be mature, which lays the foundation for the theorization and scientification of engineering technology. (A) the generation of motor and the application of electric energy
The 1970s was the beginning of the electric power era. The application of electric power is the second technological revolution after the steam engine. Although this technological revolution is a new requirement of big industry for power, its appearance does not directly come from production, but from scientific experiments and research results on electromagnetic phenomena. Electricity and magnetism are natural phenomena discovered more than two thousand years ago, but before the nineteenth century, people thought they were unrelated. /kloc-in the 9th century, Italian physicist Volt (1745-1827) made a practical chemical battery for the first time (1800). Oster of Denmark discovered the magnetic effect of current (18 19), and the research on electricity and magnetism developed rapidly. 183 1 year, Faraday, a scientist who was a British worker, discovered the law of electromagnetic induction, which is the theoretical basis of the generator.
1832, Pixie made a generator with permanent magnet as rotor according to the law of electromagnetic induction. Later, during the period of 1840-1865, people made an electromagnetic motor and used it for electroplating workers to improve the rotor and stator many times. 1867, Siemens of Germany first manufactured a self-excited DC generator, which used the current generated by the generator itself to drive a powerful electromagnet, and the efficiency was much higher than that of the early electromagnetic machines. Later 1870, Gram invented the ring rotor, and in 0872, Altnik of Germany invented the drum rotor. The generator entered the practical stage, and the motor with practical value was manufactured. Since then, electricity has been used instead of steam power. The problem of long-distance transmission was solved in the 1980s. From the manufacture of practical generators and motors to the technical success of distribution network and long-distance transmission, the electric power industry began to be established, opening up a new era of electrification. 1844, American Morse (179 1-1872) invented the telegraph. 1876, American Bell invented the telephone. /kloc-the radio technology that appeared at the end of 0/9 century has added more powerful communication tools after the widely used wired telegraph and telephone. In this way, modern material civilization based on electricity has appeared in human history, which is widely used in various fields of social production and social life such as electricity, lighting and communication. The application of electricity has greatly changed the whole industrial production, and the social productivity created by electricity is much higher than that of age of steam.
From the development of electromagnetism experiment and theory to the appearance of electric power era, it vividly shows that after science enters a relatively mature stage, it can not only directly promote the development of production, but also walk ahead of production and play a guiding role. Engineering technology has developed from a stage in which workers' experience and skills are the mainstay to a stage in which the application of science in industrial production is the main feature. This is a new beginning of the relationship between science and production.
(b) Invention and use of internal combustion engines
With the development of capitalist industry, steam engines can no longer meet the needs of power. The research on improving the efficiency of heat engine and thermodynamics led to the invention of internal combustion engine. /kloc-at the end of 0/9th century, after the German scientist Otto made the gas engine, he invented the gasoline engine and the heavy oil engine. Germany 1892 diesel engine made high compression auto-ignition internal combustion engine with low-grade fuel, making it a practical power machine. If the generator was beneficial to urban industry at first, the invention and application of internal combustion engine led to a major revolution in agricultural production technology. The use of tractors promotes the large-scale production of agricultural machinery and the process of agricultural mechanization. The invention of the internal combustion engine developed the automobile manufacturing industry. The wide application of automobiles and the construction of expressway network have greatly strengthened the connection between production and society. The development of large industries and cities has broken the isolation of rural areas, and cars have become an important means of transportation.
19 13 Ford motor factory in the United States uses special machine tools to produce cars, which are specialized, standardized and streamlined as transportation tools. It has greatly improved the production technology and is a pioneer of modern production. The invention and application of internal combustion engine also changed the situation of railway transportation and became a powerful driving force for all kinds of transportation. More importantly, in 1903, the first human plane was loaded with a gasoline engine and flew into the sky, and the fantasy of human beings for thousands of years was finally realized.
In a word, the rapid development of motor and internal combustion engine production technology not only caused the rise of large-scale industry, but also greatly changed the backward face of society and accelerated the process of historical development. In the forties and fifties of the 20th century, there appeared the third technological revolution with the atomic energy industry, computer and space technology as the main symbols. The content of this technological revolution is richer and more far-reaching than the previous two. It also includes automatic control, remote sensing, laser, synthetic materials and other technologies, and at the same time produces new comprehensive basic theories-cybernetics, information theory, system theory and so on.
(A) the development and utilization of atomic energy
The development and utilization of atomic energy is a rapidly developing technological frontier in recent thirty years. Since 1930s, due to the development of power industry and radio, high voltage multiplier, electrostatic accelerator and cyclotron capable of generating 600,000 volts have been invented, which has made great progress in nuclear reaction experiments. As early as 1922, Aston, a British scientist, clearly predicted that the energy contained in future atomic nuclei could be used as the power of factories or used to make nuclear bombs. 1932, the nucleus was transformed by an accelerator, and neutrons were discovered in the same year. They were immediately used as shells for nuclear reactions. 1933, Germans Hahn, Strassman and others found that bombarding uranium nucleus with neutrons can split uranium nucleus into two pieces and release energy at the same time, which is called atomic energy. Experiments have confirmed the practical possibility of using atomic energy, and estimated how much energy one gram of uranium can release in fission. The discovery of nuclear fission of uranium atom opened up a new era of atomic energy utilization.
At that time, on the eve of World War II, the urgent need of war and military stimulated countries to immediately turn to the study of the practical use of atomic energy in the military. 1945, the United States made a fast neutron chain reaction explosive device atomic bomb with uranium 235 and plutonium 239. As the energy source of industrial power, atomic energy was only in the stage of experiment and exploration in 1950s, and it was not until 1970s that the technology of atomic energy power generation was popularized and applied. In addition, in order to meet the needs of the development of space technology, the miniaturization of nuclear reactors has also made a major breakthrough.
(B) the emergence and development of electronic computers
An electronic computer usually refers to an electronic digital storage program computer. It is an electronic device that can automatically calculate data and process information at high speed. Electronic computers were originally developed for military needs. During World War II, high-speed jets and missiles appeared. Radar can find targets, but if there is no fast calculation tool to calculate trajectory and control air defense firepower, the performance of air defense radar is meaningless, and it is in this case that electronic computers came into being.
At present, electronic computers are developing in the direction of giant, miniaturization, networking and intelligent simulation. The wide application of electronic computers in automatic control has promoted the rapid automation of industrial production and engineering technology. In the early 1950s, electronic computers were used in jet planes, then in strategic weapons, such as missiles, and launching artificial satellites. With the development of computer technology, especially the appearance of a large number of microcomputers, automatic control using electronic computers is more and more extensive. In the aerospace, industrial production, transportation and commercial sectors, various automatons, automation instruments, automation factories and workshops have been established, resulting in large-scale automation systems. It not only saves manpower, improves labor productivity, and makes factories and enterprises get fundamental technological transformation, but also makes robots with certain human intelligence, which can automatically produce and collect data in places such as the seabed and mountains where human beings can't work and live. And make use of the special conditions of space to establish an automated space laboratory and space factory. Electronic computers are also widely used in economy, military affairs, transportation, scientific research, culture and education, medical care, scientific and technological information and library management. Electronic computer technology is essentially different from the previous technology, because it has brought about the liberation of human intelligence and thinking, that is, mental work. The development of modern information technology with computers as the basic means is another major technological revolution in human history, which is increasingly profoundly affecting the changes in modern production, economy, science and human social life.
(c) the birth of space science and technology
Space science and technology is an independent science and technology gradually formed in 1950s. It is a comprehensive science and technology around the development, launch and application of artificial satellites (including spacecraft). Aerospace science and technology is an important symbol to measure a country's scientific and technological development level. At present, satellite technology has reached the practical stage, and there are many kinds of applied satellites, including reconnaissance satellites, earth resources satellites, meteorological satellites, communication satellites and scientific satellites. Space science and technology have been widely used in many aspects of military, national economy and scientific research, and have entered an infinitely vast space, thus expanding people's horizons and opening up a new world for human beings to understand and transform nature.
To sum up, engineering technology has experienced three epoch-making technological revolutions since its birth. The first technological revolution marked by the wide application of steam engines played a great role in developing productive forces. The second technological revolution, marked by the wide application of electric power, has brought about profound revolutionary changes in the field of production, greatly developed social productivity, greatly improved labor productivity and promoted the progress of human material civilization. The third technological revolution, marked by the utilization of atomic energy, the emergence of electronic computers and space technology, has made socialized large-scale production more closely integrated with modern science and technology, thus making more profound changes in production scale and labor objects, and achieving faster development and greater improvement in social productivity and labor productivity. Now people are trying to realize the fourth technological revolution around 2000, which will be centered on electronics and marked by new breakthroughs in energy, materials and genetic engineering. We can predict that the ability of human beings to understand and transform nature will be greatly improved by then. The rapid development of social productive forces will have a more profound impact on all aspects of social life, and will also liberate human physical strength and intelligence.
The history of engineering technology development shows that its development is strongly influenced by production, science, production relations and superstructure. However, once a major breakthrough is made in engineering technology, it will bring prosperity to economic development. Practice tells us that only relying on technological progress is the fundamental way to promote the rapid development of social productive forces. At present, a country's scientific and technological level and its ability to use science and technology are increasingly becoming an extremely important symbol to measure its national strength (including economic strength and national defense strength). No country, regardless of its national conditions and social system, can realize the leap-forward economic development if it does not attach importance to the popularization and application of science and technology and scientific research achievements. In order to realize the four modernizations of socialism, China must also rely on science and technology, and pay special attention to the research and application of applied technology and production technology. Therefore, China must develop engineering science and technology to realize the four modernizations, because engineering science and technology is the key to develop industry, increase production, improve product quality and reduce costs. The experience of industrialized countries has proved this point, which deserves our serious reference.