NATS 1775 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Indus River, Urban Revolution, Technological Determinism
2 Jan 2016
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Unit 2: technology in ancient and greco-roman civilizations: early civilizations. At least 6 different centres around the world: mesopotamia, egypt, Indus river valley, yellow river (china), mesoamerica, south america. Characteristics: highly populated area due to geographical; centralized political and economic authority going to become political/social hierarchy. Middle: varying degrees of power based on occupation, socio-economic status, family background. Bottom: most people but least amount of power. Hydraulic hypothesis a link between the rise of early civilizations and the technology of large scale water (hydraulic) system. Because the rise and use of particular technology (water system) caused the rise of a stratified society. Hydraulic system: water irrigation systems: developed on many urban civilizations, answer to feed the growing civilization, and supply water for the, solution to managing and controlling water system. Main idea of the theory: the development and use of large scale water system caused this society to socially and politically stratified over time.
