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Alvin Toffler writes about the fact that technology is advancing much faster today than ever before in history. The symbols of technology are no longer the factory smokestacks or assembly lines. As we headed into the future, the pace will quicken still further.
阿尔文·托夫勒写道，今天技术的发展比历史上任何时候都快得多。技术的象征已不再是工厂的大烟囱抑或流水装配线了。在我们奔向未来时，发展的速度将会更快。
The Fantastic Spurt in Technology
工艺技术上不可思议的突飞猛进
A.Toffler
A.托夫勒
To most people the term technology conjures up images of smoky steel mills or noisy machines. Perhaps the classic representation of technology is still the assembly line created by Henry Ford half a century ago and made into a social symbol by Charlie Chaplin in Modern Times. Thissymbol, however, has always been inadequate and misleading, for technology has always been more than factories and machines. The invention of the horse collar in the middle ages led to major changes in agricultural methods and was as much a technological advance as the invention of the Bessemer furnace centuries later. Moreover, technology includes techniques, or ways to do things, as well as the machines that may or may not be necessary to apply them. It includes ways to make chemical reactions occur, ways to breed fish, plant forests, light theaters, count votes or teach history.
对大多数人来说，“技术”这个词往往使人联想到浓烟滚滚的钢铁厂或是轰隆作响的机器。或许，技术的经典代表仍然是半个世纪之前亨利·福特首创的流水装配线。在电影《摩登时代》里，查理·卓别林则将流水装配线变成现代社会的象征。然而，这一象征并不完善，且易引起误解，因为技术从来就不仅仅是工厂和机器。中世纪发明的马轭导致了耕种方法的重大变革，它与几世纪后发明的贝西默鼓风炉一样是重大的技术进步。再者，除机器外，技术还包括技艺，即制作方法，而这些技艺、方法的运用并不一定都要机器。技术包括促成化学反应的方法，包括养鱼、造林、剧院照明、选票统计以及历史教学的方法等等。
