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Technics and Civilization

Mumford, Lewis
Publisher:  Harbinger Books
Year Published:  1963   First Published:  1934
Pages:  495pp  
Resource Type:  Book

A history of the machine and a critical study of its effects on civilization.

Abstract: 
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Table of Contents

Preface
Objectives

Chapter I: Cultural Preparation
1.) Machines, Utilities, and "The Machine"
2.) The Monastery and the Clock
3.) Space, Distance, Movement
4.) The Influence of Capitalism
5.) From Fable to Fact
6.) The Obstacle of Animism
7.) The Road Through Magic
8.) Social Regimentation
9.) The Mechanical Universe
10.) The Duty to Invent
11.) Practical Anticipations

Chapter II: Agents of Mechanization
1.) The Profile of Technics
2.) De Re Metallica
3.) Mining and Modern Capitalism
4.) The Primitive Engineer
5.) From Game-Hunt to Man-Hunt
6.) Warfare and Invention
7.) Military Mass-Production
8.) Drill and Deterioration
9.) Mars and Venus
10.) Consumptive Pull and Productive Drive

Chapter III: The Eotechnic Phase
1.) Technical Syncretism
2.) The Technological Complex
3.) New Sources of Power
4.) Trunk, Plank, and Spar
5.) Through a Glass, Brightly
6.) Glass and the Ego
7.) The Primary Inventions
8.) Weakness and Strength

Chapter IV: The Paleotechnic Phase
1.) England's Belated Leadership
2.) The New Barbarism
3.) Carboniferous Capitalism
4.) The Steam Engine
5.) Blood and Iron
6.) The Destruction of Environment
7.) The Degradation of the Worker
8.) The Starvation of Life
9.) The Doctrine of Progress
10.) The Struggle for Existence
11.) Class and Nation
12.) The Empire of Muddle
13.) Power and Time
14.) The Esthetic Compensation
15.) Mechanical Triumphs
16.) The Paleotechnic Passage

Chapter V: The Neotechnic Phase
1.) The Beginnings of Neotechnics
2.) The Importance of Science
3.) New Sources of Energy
4.) The Displacement of the Proletariat
5.) Neotechnic Materials
6.) Power and Mobility
7.) The Paradox of Communication
8.) The New Permanent Record
9.) Light and Life
10.) The Influence of Biology
11.) From Destruction to Conservation
12.) The Planning of Population
13.) The Present Pseudomorph

Chapter VI: Compensations and Reversions
1.) Summary of Social Reactions
2.) The Mechanical Routine
3.) Purposeless Materialism: Superfluous Power
4.) Co-operation versus Slavery
5.) Direct Attack on the Machine
6.) Romantic and Utilitarian
7.) The Cult of the Past
8.) The Return to Nature
9.) Organic and Mechanical Polarities
10.) Sport and the "Bitch-goddess"
11.) The Cult of Death
12.) The Minor Shock-Absorbers
13.) Resistance and Adjustment

Chapter VII: Assimilation of the Machine
1.) New Cultural Values
2.) The Neutrality of Order
3.) The Esthetic Experience of the Machine
4.) Photography as Means and Symbol
5.) The Growth of Functionalism
6.) The Simplification of the Environment
7.) The Objective Personality

Chapter VIII: Orientation
1.) The Dissolution of "The Machine"
2.) Toward an Organic Ideology
3.) The Elements of Social Energetics
4.) Increase Conversion!
5.) Economize Production!
6.) Normalize Consumption!
7.) Basic Communism
8.) Socialize Creation!
9.) Work for Automaton and Amateur
10.) Political Control
11.) The Diminution of the Machine
12.) Toward a Dynamic Equilibrium
13.) Summary and Prospect

Inventions

Bibliography
Acknowledgments
Index

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