Paperclips
I was reading Gooday's article linked from the Essay 2 assignment page (http://courses.ncsu.edu/sts302h/lec/002/gooday.pdf), and in the course of his argument, he mentioned the development of paperclips. Now paperclips are one of those things that you just don't ever really think about; you use them, you lose them, you move on. But, my curiosity was piqued, so I google the list of kinds of paperclips that Gooday gives: Gem, Gothic, Niagara, and Rinklip to see if I could find out some more about them, and I pulled up this page: http://www.officemuseum.com/paper_clips.htm. Wow, there used to be at least 43 kinds of paper clips! I've only ever used about 2 or 3 kinds, and it just tickled me that something so banal as a paperclip has so much history.
Learning about paperclips reminded me that engineering has really gone into everything we use, and much that we take for granted hasn't always been around. When we imagine going back in time, we usually think of being deprived of telephone, weather forecasts, computers, washing machines, etc. What we often fail to remember is that there use to not be indoor plumbing, readable lighting after dark, no advanced math or physics (some of you might not care!), no plastic (think of everything plastic you'd have to do without), no discardable eating ware, no liquid soap, no indoor plants (many fewer species, at least), no way to record sound, no well-cut clothing, no good mirrors, no artificial cooling (refrigeration or AC), ... , the list goes on. Modern society has so many new things that earlier civilizations couldn't have even imagined. Just imagine (or try) all things that are yet to come!
Posted at 10:35AM Nov 03, 2008 by advargas in General | Comments[0]