内容简介
· · · · · ·
Engineers are empire-builders. James Watt, Isambard Kingdom Brunel, Robert Stephenson and a host of lesser known figures worked to build and expand personal and business empires of material technology founded on and sustained by durable networks of trust and expertise. In so doing these engineers and their heirs also became active agents of political and economic empire. Indeed, steamships, railways and electric telegraph systems increasingly complemented one another to form what one early twentieth-century telegraph engineer aptly termed ‘our most powerful weapon in the cause of Inter-Imperial Commerce’. This book provides a fascinating exploration of the cultural construction of the large-scale technologies of empire. The book begins with an analysis of collective adventures in exploration, mapping and measurement. Subsequent chapters take the reader through technologies of power (especially steam), the refinement of these powers in steamships and in railways, and the mechanisms of communication (especially electrical telegraphy) by which those powers were promoted and controlled. In following these paths, the reader will encounter many manifestos of promise – often visionary, sometimes extravagant, occasionally sober – issued by engineers throughout the long nineteenth century in their efforts to command authority among their peers, to win the confidence and trust of their prospective investors, and to excite the enthusiasm of wider publics for often-spectacular engineering projects adapted to the service of nation and empire.
作者简介
· · · · · ·
本·马斯登（Ben Marsden），英国阿伯丁大学科学史系主任，研究方向技术史、科学史。肯特大学科学史博士，并在利兹大学获得英国科学院奖学金。在担任现职之前，他曾获得英国科学院/皇家学会科学史研究奖学金。他为学术期刊撰写了大量文章，并出版了《瓦特的完美引擎：蒸汽和发明时代》（Icon Books，2002）。待出版著作《苏格兰学术工程师W. J. M. 兰金传记》。
克罗斯比·史密斯（Crosbie Smith），英国肯特大学科学历史和文化研究中心主任。他是《能源与帝国：开尔文勋爵传记研究》（剑桥大学出版社，1989年）的合著者，《能源科学》（阿斯隆出版社和芝加哥大学出版社，1998年）的作者。这两本书分别在1990年和2000年获得了著名的科学史协会辉瑞奖。1999—2004年，他担任《英国科学史杂志》的编委。
目录
· · · · · ·
List of Figures
Preface
Introduction: Technology, Science and Culture in the Long Nineteenth Century
1 ‘Objects of national importance’: Exploration, Mapping and Measurement
2 Powever and Wealth: Reputations and Rivalries in Stream Culture
3 Belief in Steamers: Making Trustworthy the Iron Steamship
4 Building Railway Empires: Promises in Space and Times
5 ‘The most gigantic electrical experiment’: The Trials of Telegraphy
Conclusion: Cultures of Technological Expertise
Notes
Bibliography
Index
· · · · · ·