ABSTRACT
Man, alone of all animals, is capable of purposeful nonorganic evolution; he makes tools. This observation by Alfred Russell Wallace, co-discoverer with Darwin of the theory of evolution, may seem obvious if not trite. Language, too, is a tool, and so are all abstract concepts. According to the technologist's definition of 'tool', the abacus and the geometer's compass are normally considered technology, but the multiplication table or table of logarithms is not. Systematic attempts to study and to improve work only began some seventy-five years ago with Frederick W. Taylor. Scientific Management and its descendants study work as operation; human engineering and its allied disciplines are concerned with the relationship between technology and human anatomy, human perception, human nervous system, and human emotion. The political historian or the art historian, still dominated by the prejudices of Hellenism, usually dismisses work as beneath his notice; the historian of technology is 'thing-focused'.
