I recommend Connections or The Day the Universe Changed (out of print, I think?), both by James Burke. These aren't comprehensive histories of science, but they show how science, technology, and society are intimately connected. They are incredibly well written with lots of carefully selected images. In addition, there accompanying videos were also made (with very high production value) which are also a great deal of fun to watch.
Academic and some nonacademic books have citations and/or footnotes. Those can be followed, though with somewhat more effort than simply clicking a link. As a positive, however, proper citations rarely suffer linkrot, though some references are obscure, and if you're looking at ancient works, there may well be entirely lost works. What I've found over the past decade or so as more books are available online (with varying levels of copyright compliance), it's possible to hit a reference and trace it often within a minute or so of searching. That's both delightful and something of a tarpit,…
I found that the 1978 BBC documentary series "Connections" by James Burke really spoke to that as well as the interrelatedness of inventions. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Connections_(TV_series)
He's not produced another TV series so far as I know. He has been pursuing his knowledge-web concept for the past couple of decades, though I also get the feeling his game's slipped a bit. The first Connections and The Day the Universe Changed are really his best work. Both remain quite relevant to this day. The Knowledge Web concept is ... interesting, but of itself I don't find it quite so fundamental or useful as the concepts of Connections & TDTUC. On the other hand, you remind me that sinks and unintended consequences seem to be particularly potent late-stage factors in…
I find it interesting that James Burke, in an interview some years after his Connections series, discussing how he'd continue the series, said of the jet airline that he'd explore its role as a vector of international disease transmission. https://archive.org/details/JamesBurkeReConnections_0
Sri Lanka's various crises are not a result of degrowth policies, but because the country simply has no money to pay for imports. Including of fertilisers. The arrow of causality is fiscal collapse -> agricultural collapse. It's possible to look at historical crop yields worldwide, including in advanced / wealthy nations, and see where economic recession or high energy (especially natural gas, the primary feedstock in nitrogen fertiliser) results in lower applications of fertiliser as well as of reduced cultivation, and consequent reduced crop yields. Again, that's a simple market…
Pretty much everything by James Burke, including the Connections series and The Day the Universe Changed. Both were turned into TV miniseries by the BBC (plus a successor to Connections that I haven't seen).
Actually there is a book version as well: http://www.amazon.com/Connections-James-Burke/dp/0743299558 I loved this series as a kid. It was my favorite TV show. Now that I know more about the history of technology, the connections sometimes seem a bit strained, but even so I know of no better introduction to the topic.
It is. I've been covering some histories of the period. There's James Burke's Connections and The Day the Universe Changed, which cover technology and philosophy generally, but focus a great deal on the Enlightenment and Industrial Revolution. More recently, there is Vaclav Smil's Energy in World History (1994), and Manfred Weissenbacher's Sources of Power (2009). Both look at history through the lens of energy sources. Weissenbacher divides history into five eras: 1) Hunter-gatherers, 2) Agriculture, 3) Coal, 4) Oil, and 5) Post-oil. The first three comprise one volume, the 4th is…
Thank you, this was a wonderfully thought-provoking response (also, the first season of Connections is probably my favourite documentary of all time!). One thing I will offer is that in my household growing up, television was positive because it was an experience that we shared as a family. We would watch TV shows together, talk about them together, laugh at them together, etc. In that sense, television brought outside viewpoints into our household and spurred conversation. I think that is one of the key factors that may differentiate between TV having good effects and TV having bad…