Knowing Machines: Essays on Technical Change

Front Cover
MIT Press, 1998 - Science - 338 pages

Ranging from broad inquiries into the roles of economics and sociology in the explanation of technological change to an argument for the possibility of "uninventing" nuclear weapons, this selection of Donald MacKenzie's essays provides a solid introduction to the style and the substance of the sociology of technology.

The essays are tied together by their explorations of connections (primarily among technology, society, and knowledge) and by their general focus on modern "high" technology. They also share an emphasis on the complexity of technological formation and fixation and on the role of belief (especially self-validating belief) in technological change.

Two of the articles won major prizes on their original journal publication, and all but one date from 1991 or later. A substantial new introduction outlines the common themes underlying this body of work and places it in the context of recent debates in technology studies. Two conceptual essays are followed by seven empirical essays focusing on the laser gyroscopes that are central to modern aircraft navigation technology, supercomputers (with a particular emphasis on their use in the design of nuclear weapons), the application of mathematical proof in the design of computer systems, computer-related accidental deaths, and the nature of the knowledge that is needed to design a nuclear bomb.

 

Contents

Marx and the Machine
23
Economic and Sociological Explanations of Technological Change
49
From the Luminiferous Ether to the Boeing 757
67
Nuclear Weapons Laboratories and the Development of Supercomputing
99
99
116
The Charismatic Engineer with Boelie Elzen
131
The Fangs of the VIPER
159
Tacit Knowledge and the Uninvention of Nuclear Weapons with Graham
215
Notes
261
Index
333
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About the author (1998)

Donald MacKenzie is Professor of Sociology (Personal Chair) at the University of Edinburgh. His books include Inventing Accuracy (1990), Knowing Machines (1996), and Mechanizing Proof (2001), all published by the MIT Press. Portions of An Engine, not a Camera won the Viviana A. Zelizer Prize in economic sociology from the American Sociological Association.

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