ABSTRACT
In most industrialized countries life is today very different from just two or three hundred years ago. The activities we perform and the artefacts we use and that surround us, form a landscape entirely different from that of our predecessors. The changes which have created the physical and organizational features of the society we live in have been true qualitative changes, giving rise to something which was not in existence before. Clearly, technological change has played a dominant part in the generation and diffusion of these developments. The new forms of transport, the new materials, the new drugs, the communication technologies which have become part of our everyday lives, owe their origin to changes in technology.
