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History of Science and Technology
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History of Science and Technology
History of Science and Technology
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1
Question
What is the etymological origin of the word 'science'?
Page 1
Answer
It originated from Old French, from Latin scientia, from scire, meaning 'to know'.
2
Question
How did historian John Heilbron define science?
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Answer
Science is the discovery of regularity in nature, enough for natural phenomena to be described by principles and laws; it requires invention to devise techniques, abstractions, apparatuses, and organizations.
3
Question
According to Mark Zuckerberg, what defines a technological tool historically?
Page 1
Answer
A technological tool takes a human's sense or ability and augments it, making it more powerful, like contact lenses enhancing vision.
4
Question
How did Lewis Wolpert distinguish science from technology?
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Answer
Reliable scientific knowledge is value-free and has no moral or ethical value; scientists are not responsible for technological applications because it is not possible to predict discoveries or their applications.
5
Question
What warning did Carl Sagan give about society's relationship with science and technology?
Page 1
Answer
We live in a society absolutely dependent on science and technology, yet we have arranged things so that almost no one understands science and technology — that is a prescription for disaster.
6
Question
How does Harvard's John F. Kennedy School define Science and Technology Studies (STS)?
Page 1
Answer
STS is a relatively new academic field that builds bridges between disciplines that do not ordinarily meet, such as sociology and science, law and science, anthropology and technology; it offers resources to evaluate benefits and risks of advances in science and technology.
7
Question
What is the Helix ethical dilemma identified by the John J. Reilly Center?
Page 1
Answer
Helix is a digital app store designed to help you read your genome, raising ethical concerns about genetic privacy and interpretation.
8
Question
What is 'The Robot Priest' ethical dilemma?
Page 1
Answer
BlessU-2 and Pepper are the first robot priest and monk respectively, raising ethical questions about the role of AI in religious practices.
9
Question
What ethical concerns are raised by emotion-sensing facial recognition technology?
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Answer
It is used to optimize retail experiences by assessing your reactions, raising privacy and consent issues.
10
Question
What is the ransomware ethical dilemma?
Page 1
Answer
Ransomware holds data hostage until you pay up, affecting both individuals and large corporations; it raises issues of cybersecurity, extortion, and data protection.
11
Question
What is the Textalyze tool and what ethical dilemma does it present?
Page 1
Answer
The Textalyze is a new tool that tells police if you were on your phone before an accident, raising concerns about privacy and self-incrimination in the battle against texting and driving.
12
Question
What ethical issues are associated with social credit systems like China's?
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Answer
Social credit systems assign a reputation score based on behavior, raising questions about surveillance, fairness, and whether we already live in a world where online reputation is king.
13
Question
What ethical concerns does Google Clips raise?
Page 2
Answer
Google Clips is a little camera that watches you all day and captures your most picturesque moments, raising issues of constant surveillance and consent.
14
Question
What ethical dilemma is presented by sentencing software?
Page 2
Answer
Americans are being sentenced with the help of a mysterious algorithm, raising concerns about transparency, fairness, and due process in judicial decisions.
15
Question
What ethical questions are raised by the rise of robot friendship?
Page 2
Answer
The idea of creating a chatbot out of loved ones' old texts and social media posts raises questions about grief, identity, and the nature of relationships.
16
Question
What ethical issues are associated with the Citizen App?
Page 2
Answer
The Citizen App is a live crime reporting tool that may lead to vigilante justice, raising concerns about public safety, misinformation, and mob mentality.
17
Question
What is the Bronze Age?
Page 2
Answer
The Bronze Age is a historical period characterized by the use of bronze, proto-writing, and early urban civilization; it is the second principal period of the Stone-Bronze-Iron system proposed by Christian Jürgensen Thomsen.
18
Question
Who proposed the three-age system (Stone-Bronze-Iron) for classifying ancient societies?
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Answer
Christian Jürgensen Thomsen, a Danish scholar, proposed the system in modern times.
19
Question
What is the Iron Age?
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Answer
The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of prehistory and protohistory; the concept has been mostly applied to Europe, the Ancient Near East, and other parts of the Old World by analogy.
20
Question
What is the significance of Africa in the history of technology?
Page 2
Answer
Technology in Africa stretches back to the first evidence of tool use by hominid ancestors; Africa saw some of the earliest iron working in the Air Mountains (Niger) and some of the world's oldest monuments (pyramids and towers in Egypt, Nubia, North Africa).
21
Question
What is the Stone Age?
Page 2
Answer
The Stone Age is contemporaneous with the evolution of the genus Homo, possibly including species prior to Homo who manufactured tools during the early Stone Age.
22
Question
Which early Bronze Age civilization is associated with the Indus Valley?
Page 2
Answer
The Harappan civilization of the Indus Valley is one of the earliest Bronze Age civilizations.
23
Question
What metals did the Mesopotamians use, and for what purposes?
Page 2
Answer
They were one of the first Bronze Age people; early on they used copper, bronze, and gold, and later iron. These metals were used for palace decoration, armor, and weapons such as swords, daggers, spears, and maces.
24
Question
What simple machines did the Egyptians invent and use for construction?
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Answer
They invented and used ramps to aid construction processes.
25
Question
How did the Egyptians extract gold on a large scale?
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Answer
They used fire-setting, a mining technique that involved heating rock with fire then quenching it to cause fracturing.
26
Question
What is the Turin papyrus?
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Answer
It is the first recognizable map, showing the plan of a gold mine in Nubia.
27
Question
Why was the chariot not widely used in war in historical Greece?
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Answer
The latter Greeks of the first millennium BC had a cavalry arm and the rocky terrain of the Greek mainland was unsuited for wheeled vehicles.
28
Question
What do Linear B tablets from Mycenaean palaces reveal about chariots?
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Answer
They record large inventories of chariots, sometimes with specific details about how many were assembled or stored in modular form.
29
Question
How were chariots used in later Greek history despite not being used in war?
Page 3
Answer
They were used in games and processions, notably for races at the Olympic and Panathenaic Games and other public festivals.
30
Question
What are the four great inventions of ancient China?
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Answer
The compass, gunpowder, paper making, and printing.