Technology

Do you ever stare at that I pod in your lap or the computer screen wondering,” How in the heck was this thing made anyways? Where does it originate from?” Technology has evolved over the centuries into what we have today.

Skimming our old 6th grade history book, it states,”Scientists have found the oldest tools in Tanzania, a country in East Africa. These sharpened stones, about the size of an adult’s fist, are about 2.6 million years old. Each stone had been struck with another rock to create a sharp, jagged edge along one side. This process left one unsharpened side that could be used as a handle. Scientists think that these first tools were mostly used to process food. The sharp edge could be used to cut, chop, or scrape roots, bones, or meat. Tools like these, called choppers, were used for about 2 million years.” What does this sound like to you? It seems to be the first concrete makings of the knife, going from stone to flint, eventually into metals and all the other fancy gadgets and types.

Diving into the 7th grade history book and exploring the Scientific Revolution, I found some things we use at least once in our lifetime. ” The microscope, the thermometer, the telescope, and the barometer—are very common today. In fact, you have probably used at least one of them yourself. But when they were invented, they were dramatic advances in technology. They gave scientists the tools they needed to make more accurate observations of the world and to conduct experiments. They were the tools of the Scientific Revolution.” As you see, the thermometers that we have now are more complex and our telescopes have been innovated and remodeled. Now let’s talk about another example of technology.

Ipods.

“Apple’s iPod, a 6.5-ounce MP3 player the size of a deck of cards, is one of the most exciting products to come from Apple in years.Powered by FireWire, the iPod can hold as much as 5GB of data, providing a compelling balance of size and capacity.” reports CNN.com But all of you are wondering,” How does it work?!?!?!” Well CNN has the answer. ”

Sandwiched between the iPod’s stainless-steel back and Lucite front is a hard drive large enough to hold roughly 1,000 songs encoded in MP3 format at 160 Kbps. The drive’s enormous cache — 32MB of solid-state RAM — virtually eliminates skipping; shaking the iPod vigorously and even banging it against things didn’t interrupt smooth play. (However, we don’t recommend this- – shaking and banging can damage the hard disk.) The large cache also allows the hard disk to spin down, extending battery life.” Well there you have it folks. Sooner or later we’ll be on hover boards and have all these other amazing gadgets.

As you can see, technology has turned our world into what it is today, making us the ” technology babies”  of the century.   Now go ahead and return to playing Angry Birds on your IPad or finish downloading that one song, because technology isn’t going anywhere but forward.

6th Grade History Book

7th Grade History Book

CNN.com First look at Apple’s Ipod, published October 31, 2001 at 9:05 am