Technology News
For engineers, particularly American engineers , ‘applied science’, together with its greater standing, could be claimed as their own autonomous body of knowledge. For scientists, such as John Tyndall and Henry Rowland, ‘applied science’ was the applying of pure science, a transfer that reserved the autonomy of their own science whereas additionally claiming ‘credit for modern wonders of the commercial age’ (p. 64). As Schatzberg notes, after 1850 the frequency of use of the time period ‘mechanical arts’ dropped as ‘applied science’ elevated. The mechanical arts remained subordinated, at the equal time as their status was considerably revised. Francis Bacon’s works, such as The New Organon and New Atlantis, exemplified the turn by students to ‘reject the explicit separation of science and materials practice [ … ] with out rejecting the present hierarchy of head over hand’ (pp. 48, 50). Technicians, as we know from the arguments of Steven Shapin, have been written out of visibility.