"The second edition of a comprehensive introduction to machine learning approaches used in predictive data analytics, covering both theory and practice.
The relationship of the current technosciences and the older engineering sciences, examined through the history of the ""useful"" sciences in Prussia.
Do today's technoscientific disciplines-including materials science, genetic engineering, nanotechnology, and robotics-signal a radical departure from traditional science? In Technoscience in History, Ursula Klein argues that these novel disciplines and projects are not an ""epochal break,"" but are part of a history that can be traced back to German ""useful"" sciences and beyond. Klein's account traces a deeper history of technoscience, mapping the relationship between today's cutting-edge disciplines and the development of the useful and technological sciences in Prussia from 1750 to 1850.
Klein shows that institutions that coupled natural-scientific and technological inquiry existed well before the twentieth century. Focusing on the science of mining, technical chemistry, the science of forestry, and the science of building (later known as civil engineering), she examines the emergence of practitioners who were recognized as men of science as well as inventive technologists-key figures that she calls ""scientific-technological experts.""
Klein describes the Prussian state's recruitment of experts for technical projects and manufacturing, including land surveys, the apothecary trade, and porcelain production; state-directed mining, mining science, and mining academies; the history and epistemology of useful science; and the founding of Prussian scientific institutions in the nineteenth century, including the University of Berlin, the Academy of Building, the Technical Deputation, and the Industrial Institute."
By:
Ursula Klein
Imprint: MIT Press
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions:
Height: 229mm,
Width: 152mm,
Weight: 368g
ISBN: 9780262539296
ISBN 10: 0262539292
Pages: 328
Publication Date: 17 November 2020
Audience:
Professional and scholarly
,
Undergraduate
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active
List of Illustrations Acknowledgments Introduction Part I. Technical Experts and Innovation in Prussia 1. Technical Projects of the Royal Prussian Academy of Sciences 2. Discovery and Invention: Klaproth 3. Pharmacy and Chemistry 4. Experts at the Royal Prussian Porcelain Manufactory 5. The Figure of Technical Expert Part II. The Model: Useful Science at Mining Academies 6. Silver Mining and the Freiberg Mining Academy 7. Mining and Mining Experts in Prussia: Gerhard 8. Experiments in the Laboratory of the Mining Department 9. The Lecture Series of the Mining Administration 10. Mines as Laboratories: Humboldt Part III. Useful Science and its Practitioners 11. Mining Science 12. The Science of Salt Works 13. The Figure of Scientific-Technological Expert Part IV. Towards Nineteenth-Century Technological Science 14. Useful Knowledge at the University of Berlin 15. The Academy of Civil Engineering and Architecture 16. A New Industrial Policy: The Industrial Institute 17. The Big Picture: Useful Science, Technological Science, Technoscience Notes References Index
Ursula Klein is Permanent Senior Researcher at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science in Berlin and coauthor of Materials in Eighteenth-Century Science- A Historical Ontology (MIT Press).
Reviews for Technoscience in History
The term 'technoscience' may feel futuristic, but Ursula Klein's fascinating study shows that the phenomenon extends back centuries. She demonstrates in detail that mining, among other key fields, involved the kind of 'useful knowledge' that spurred modern science. - Michael D. Gordin, Rosengarten Professor of Modern and Contemporary History, Princeton University Technoscience in History imaginatively explores the role of useful sciences in Prussia's knowledge economy. It recasts several canonical historical narratives: of industrialization, state expertise, and even Berlin University's founding. It adds incredible historical depth to Bruno Latour's Science in Action. - Kathryn Olesko, Associate Professor, George Washington University
