A Brief History of General Purpose Technologies

A Brief History of General Purpose Technologies

Abstract

This essay reviews the history of human invention with a specific focus on General Purpose Technologies (GPT). A GPT is a technology that generates other technologies and has a major long term influence on the Human Condition. Our narrative starts in prehistory with the Stone Age, control of Fire, and boating. Control of fire provided many (4–7) extra hours per day to each human, time that would otherwise have been spent chewing uncooked food. Agricultural technology allowed humans to settle in one place and largely defines the boundary between prehistory and history. Known human history saw the invention of new technologies like Writing, Metallurgy, and simple machines such as the Water Wheel. Later came Mathematics, Chemistry, and the Printing Press. Most recently the past four centuries have seen an explosion of new technologies, including the Combustion Engine, Optics, Control of Electricity and Magnetism, Radio, Atomic Power, Information Technology, Biotechnology, Nanotechnology, and Artificial Intelligence. These new technologies have unintended consequences we don’t yet understand.

Introduction

A general purpose technology is a technology that generates other technologies. Stone tools are an early example. Artificial Intelligence is a recent example.

General Technologies in Prehistory

For many hundreds of thousands of years Humans lived in hunter-gatherer bands with good Control of Fire. Humans have had ample time to evolve since discovering fire. Human control of fire provided humans with multiple benefits. One large benefit from controlling fire is probably cooked food. Cooked food drastically reduces time spent chewing, freeing up many hours each day for other purposes. Control of fire also has many other benefits, such as improved security, light, heat, improved tool building, et cetera. Cooked food gave us time to pursue activities besides chewing food. Humans have been eating cooked food for so long that our bodies have evolved to expect it.

One new technology can sometimes create whole new classes of technology. Control of fire gave our species many extra hours each day and thereby made possible boating, agriculture, metallurgy, simple machines, and writing. After thousands of years these, in turn, lead to mathematics, engineering, chemistry, steam power, electricity and magnetism, atomic power, information technology, and genetic engineering. Early GPTs came thousands, then hundreds of years apart. More recently, new general technologies have been arriving every few decades.

Boating probably qualifies as a general technology, and has certainly served humanity well. The earliest circumstantial evidence of boating is 130,000 years ago. The oldest surviving boat is about 10,000 years old. Boating enabled increased travel and trade. Boating qualifies as a Dual Use Technology, with both peaceful and warlike applications.

Agriculture came next. Agriculture probably started with forest gardening in prehistoric times. Pastoralism, the raising of livestock, probably followed. Agriculture greatly increases the human carrying capacity of a region. Farmers spend more time finding food than do hunter-gatherers, but many more farmers can inhabit a given region. Irrigation technology drastically improved the effectiveness of agriculture. Permanent villages, towns, and cities became possible.

Metallurgy literally defines the transitions between the stone age, the bronze age, and the iron age. The earliest evidence of humans smelting metal is approximately 7,000 years old. Tools of copper and bronze were routine for several thousand years. The Iron Age began about 3,000 years ago. Metalworking was seemingly never discovered in the Americas, nor in Australia. Metalworking improved the efficiency of farming and introduced the potential for large scale military conquest. Metalworking is thus a dual-use technology, suitable for both peaceful and warlike activities.

The wheel and other simple machines were developed independently in several parts of the world. The first evidence for use of the Water Wheel is about 6,000 years ago. The first definitive proof of wheeled vehicles is in 5,300+ year old pottery. Chariots and wagons have been in common use for about 4,000 years. Wheeled vehicles need roads. Wheeled vehicles allowed for trading more stuff over longer distances, improved farming efficiency, war chariots, et cetera. Wheeled vehicles were not developed in the Americas, nor in Australia, probably because of the absence of large domesticable animals like cows and horses that could pull heavy loads. Simple machines have both peaceful uses, such as grinding grain with a water wheel, and military uses, such as war chariots.

General Technologies in Early History

Written language began about 5,000 years ago. Writing was useful for recording increasingly complicated transactions that came with more cities and more trade. Early writing and counting systems often involved taxation. Writing can reliably transfer information between individuals who are far apart in space and time. Sustained scientific inquiry became possible with the advent of writing, but mathematics was still hindered by poor writing methods. Geometry was discovered and written down, pretty much as we learn it today. Engineering became a profession. Writing was discovered independently in Mesopotamia and, later, in Mesoamerica.

Humanity now passes several thousand years. About a dozen solar-powered complex civilizations emerge, grow, and collapse in Africa, Asia, Europe, and the Americas. Existing technologies are refined during this time. Agricultural humans become dominant, although some hunter-gatherer cultures hold on in marginal land. The second burning of the Library of Alexandria, 1800 years ago, was a great loss of accumulated knowledge.

Modern mathematics began about 1200 years ago a Persian mathematician and scholar named al-Khwārizmī invented what we now call the Arabic number system. He introduced the concept of zero as a useful number. The Persian empire developed and spread techniques for algebra, geometry, advanced medicine including surgery, early chemistry, and other arts and sciences. While some of these technologies certainly have military applications they were not generally thought of that way.

The practice of burning small amounts of fossil fuel deposits began thousands of years ago. Coal use became common 600 years ago in parts of europe where the forests had been cut, as a replacement for wood. People observed that coal released much more heat than wood when it was burned. Burning of fossil fuel reserves began exponential human population growth to today’s 7.4+ billion. Oil contains even more concentrated energy than does coal. There is no known replacement for the quantity and quality of how human industrial civilization currently uses oil. Human industrial civilization in 2019 is almost entirely fossil fuel powered.

General Technologies in the Industrial Age

The pace of advancement in science and technology greatly increases during the industrial age. The Industrial Age has seen a new general purpose technology invented every 50 years or so: combustion engines, electricity, radio, computer, atomic power, the Internet, genetic engineering, nanotechnology, and robotics.

The steam-driven Combustion Engine heralded the Industrial Age. The combustion engine eventually lead to planes, trains, and automobiles. Good metallurgy, the practice of burning coal, and the problem of water infiltration of underground mines resulted in the invention of the steam engine. In 1712 Thomas Newcomen built the first practical combustion engine. Humans had learned to power machines by burning Earth’s accumulated bounty of ancient sunlight. Advanced metallurgy was required, as was a steady supply of coal. The first steam engines, while inefficient, successfully pumped water out of mines to allow mining below the water table. One need only consider steam-powered warships to see that the combustion engine is clearly a dual use technology.

Electrical technology is an especially important general purpose technology. Electrical technology has spawned many other new technologies. Some aspects of electricity, such as static charge and magnets, were known in ancient times. The first careful scientific investigation of electricity began in 1600. In 1752 Benjamin Franklin discovered that lightning is an electric phenomenon. In 1831 Michael Faraday began his great experiments with electricity, leading to his experimental discovery of electromagnetic induction. In 1865 James Maxwell published a mathematical explanation for what Faraday had discovered experimentally. In 1879 a young scientist from Johns Hopkins University named Edwin Hall discovered the Hall Effect. The Hall Effect gave the first hint that electrons must exist and caused scientists to investigate subatomic theory. Some specific technologies derived from control of electricity include the light bulb, telegraph, telephone, radio, electric motor, electronics, and many others.

The 1890s saw electricity and magnetism precisely controlled over distance in the form of radio. Thomas Edison and Nikola Tesla probably deserve the most credit for radio technology. Some important technologies derived from radio are radio communication, radio astronomy, x-rays, and modern cellular and wifi communication. Radio makes it possible for a human in, say, China to instantly and directly communicate with a human in, say, Mexico. Radio technology is obviously Dual Use, with clear civilian and military applications.

Atomic power was the first new general technology to manifest during the 20th century. It began with Physicists exploring the subatomic world of electrons, protons, and neutrons. The discovery of Radioactivity was announced by Marie Curie and others in 1898. In 1904 Albert Einstein discovered his most famous equation, which gave the first hint of possible military applications for Atomic Power. Atomic Power is the classic Dual Use Technology.

Massive government investment was essential to the development of atomic power and all other 20th century General Technologies. Gone were the days when one brilliant human could develop a new GPT.

General Technologies in the Information Age

The later part of the 20th century has been called the Information Age. Computer & Information technology become very influential.

The Information Age arguably began when Lady Ada Lovelace wrote the first computer software, in 1843, to calculate tables of logarithms on Charles Babbage’s theoretical Difference Engine. Computer hardware took 100 years to catch up. Scientific investigation of biological neural networks began circa 1880 and reached its fruition more than 100 years later. Information technology was arguably invented circa 1936 by British mathematician Alan Turing, now considered the father of both Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence.

Computer Science became a thing during World War Two via the Ultra Secret. Early in WW2 British Prime Minister Winston Churchill decided to spend precious wartime resources on code breaking. British code breakers succeeded in reliably breaking critical wartime Axis military codes. They did this by building binary electric computers programmed to break codes. Wartime information gained from reading the opposition’s most secret messages was designated Ultra. Historians generally credit the Ultra Secret with shortening WWII by several years. Despite many thousands of participants, Ultra was kept secret until 1974, about 35 years after it was begun. The Ultra Secret is probably the best historical example in which thousands of people conspired to keep an important secret for several decades. After WWII computer science became the domain of private corporations, especially International Business Machines (IBM). Computer science is clearly a dual use technology, although military applications are perhaps less obvious than peaceful applications.

The invention of the Transistor heralded the Information Age and is the origin of Moore’s Law. The Transistor is probably the most influential invention of the 20th century. The transistor was invented in Bell Labs shortly after WW2. A transistor can amplify an electric signal. Before transistors, for a few decades, vacuum tubes did the same job, but they were big, clunky, and prone to failure. Nearly all electronic devices contain transistors. Modern transistors are called Metal Oxide Semiconductor Field Effect Transistors, or MOSFETs. Circa 1998 all new MOSFETS include a structure called a Two Dimensional Electron Gas, just in time to keep Moore’ Law on track. Industrial civilization has produced hundreds of billions of MOSFETs. It goes without saying that Transistor technology is a dual use technology.

The Internet is a recent GPT. A team of scientists recruited by DARPA, then named ARPA, invented the internet in 1969. DARPA stands for Defense Advanced Research Projects Administration. The Internet was originally intended for military communication in the event of apocalyptic nuclear war. Only later was the Internet deemed useful for civilian purposes. Words like “cyberwarfare” highlight how the Internet is a dual use technology.

DARPA is a US government agency specialized in scientific research for military purposes. DARPA focuses on short-term (two to four-year) projects run by small, cross-disciplinary, purpose-built teams. DARPA informally bills itself as “100 geniuses connected by a travel agency”. DARPA has a yearly budget of several billion US dollars.

Here is how DARPA describes itself in official DARPA’s publication 50 Years of Bridging the Gap:

DARPA’s original mission, established in 1958, was to prevent technological surprise like the launch of Sputnik, which signaled that the Soviets had beaten the U.S. into space. The mission statement has evolved over time. Today, DARPA’s mission is still to prevent technological surprise to the US, but also to create technological surprise for our enemies.

Since its founding DARPA has conducted many projects. Most DARPA projects remain secret and we never hear of them. Some few are declassified and become public, like the Internet. Take note that DARPA has credit for inventing one recent new GPT. DARPA is a hub for the development of new technologies and is likely associated with any major new technology breakthroughs. It’s not a stretch to imagine DARPA capable of inventing another General Purpose Technology, perhaps one not yet publicly known or understood.

Genetic engineering is a young general purpose technology. Exponential self-replication is a key distinguishing characteristic of Genetic Engineering. Numerous genetically engineered organisms have been released into the biosphere. We are still learning the benefits and potential pitfalls of Genetic Engineering.

The concept of Nanotechnology was introduced in 1959 by Richard Feinman. Some aspects of nanotechnology are just extensions of existing technologies. Other aspects of nanotechnology, particularly the ability to self reproduce, have more in common with Genetic Engineering. Nanotechnology is still in its infancy. It’s possible that more advanced forms of nanotechnology have been invented but are not yet public knowledge.

Robotics, also known as Artificial Intelligence or AI, is a relatively new GPT. Alan Turing is known as “the father of artificial intelligence” but died before AI became a thing. AI is sometimes divided into “Narrow AI” and “General AI”. As recently as 1995 most scientists believed general AI was still many decades or centuries away. AI can now outperform humans in a wide variety of fields and General AI may have already arrived. By 2019 many humans understand that there has been a major revolution in AI. The origins of this AI revolution are shrouded in mystery and complexity, although it’s a safe bet that DARPA is somehow involved.

Unintended Consequences of General Purpose Technology

Many of these technologies are quite new and we are still learning what will be their consequences, intended or otherwise. It seems likely that any new GPT will pose risks in proportion to its potential. This will be the topic of a future article.