Every-day Science: Volume 7. The Conquest of Time and Space

Every-day Science: Volume 7. The Conquest of Time and Space

THE preceding volume dealt with the general principles of application and transformation of the powers of Nature through which the world's work is carried on. In the present volume we are chiefly concerned with man's application of the same principles in his efforts to set at defiance, so far as may be, the limitations of time and space. Something has already been said as to the contrast between the material civilization of to-day and that of the generations prior to the nineteenth century. The transformation in methods of agriculture and manufacture has been referred to somewhat in detail. Now we have to do with contrasts that are perhaps even more vivid, since they concern conditions that come within the daily observation of everyone. Steamships, locomotives, electric cars, and automobiles, are such commonplaces of every-day life that it is difficult to conceive a world in which they have no part. Yet everyone is aware that all these mechanisms are inventions of the nineteenth century. Meantime the aeroplane, which bids fair to rival those other means of2 transportation in the near future, is a creation of the twentieth century. In order to visualize the contrast between the practical civilization of to-day and that of our grandparents, it suffices to recall that the first steam locomotive that carried passengers over a railway was put in operation in the year 1829; and that the first ship propelled by steam power alone did not cross the ocean until 1838. Not until well towards the middle of the nineteenth century, then, were the conditions of transportation altered materially from what they had been since the very dawn of civilization,conditions under which one hundred miles constituted about the maximum extent of a hard day's land journey. ......Buy Now (To Read More)

Product details

Ebook Number: 43819
Author: Williams, Edward Huntington
Release Date: Sep 27, 2013
Format: eBook
Language: English

Contributors

Contributor (Author): Williams, Henry Smith, 1863-1943