Industrial Revolution: Difference between revisions
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The '''Industrial Revolution''' was a period from about 1776 to 1914 which was a major game changer for humanity. Many periods of history are laid out arbitrarily by Historians for book-keeping purposes. A peasant born at the transition at the tail end of the [[High Middle Ages]] in 1340 and lived to see the [[Renaissance]] over some 80 years would not think the world he was born in to be too different to the one he died, even if he was glad that the whole "everybody's dropping dead of plague" spell did not come back. But the same could not be said if said fellow was born in England in 1780. In that time the majority of people had moved from the countryside to cities, factories were making everything, you could cross the country in a train in a day and send a message to Canada at the speed of light. | |||
The big thing of note here is Energy. For most of the history of Civilization if humans wanted to get something done like move thing from point A to Point B, dig a hole, grind grain, work iron or whatever they had to do it with muscle power, either their own, other peoples' or by those of some cows or horses. A human can produce about 100 watts (joules per second) of motive power continuously, a horse can provide about 750 watts. Latter they worked out how to put wind and flowing water to use with sails, watermills and windmills. Both of which were useful in their own right and by the 1700s they were used in a wide variety of operations but both had serious limitations. There are only so many rivers where you can build watermills and even in windy places there are calm places. | |||
One of the key advances of the industrial revolution was the assembly line which allowed rapid construction of goods by giving each worker a single task to be repeated instead of requiring they have specialized knowledge of the whole process. While this idea goes back to at least the Venetian Arsenal in 1320, it became the standard during this era. One side effect of making things on an assembly line is that items were broken into individual parts that were replaceable if they broke, where before repairs were specialized work if they could be accomplished at all. | One of the key advances of the industrial revolution was the assembly line which allowed rapid construction of goods by giving each worker a single task to be repeated instead of requiring they have specialized knowledge of the whole process. While this idea goes back to at least the Venetian Arsenal in 1320, it became the standard during this era. One side effect of making things on an assembly line is that items were broken into individual parts that were replaceable if they broke, where before repairs were specialized work if they could be accomplished at all. | ||
Revision as of 21:19, 8 January 2019
The Industrial Revolution was a period from about 1776 to 1914 which was a major game changer for humanity. Many periods of history are laid out arbitrarily by Historians for book-keeping purposes. A peasant born at the transition at the tail end of the High Middle Ages in 1340 and lived to see the Renaissance over some 80 years would not think the world he was born in to be too different to the one he died, even if he was glad that the whole "everybody's dropping dead of plague" spell did not come back. But the same could not be said if said fellow was born in England in 1780. In that time the majority of people had moved from the countryside to cities, factories were making everything, you could cross the country in a train in a day and send a message to Canada at the speed of light.
The big thing of note here is Energy. For most of the history of Civilization if humans wanted to get something done like move thing from point A to Point B, dig a hole, grind grain, work iron or whatever they had to do it with muscle power, either their own, other peoples' or by those of some cows or horses. A human can produce about 100 watts (joules per second) of motive power continuously, a horse can provide about 750 watts. Latter they worked out how to put wind and flowing water to use with sails, watermills and windmills. Both of which were useful in their own right and by the 1700s they were used in a wide variety of operations but both had serious limitations. There are only so many rivers where you can build watermills and even in windy places there are calm places.
One of the key advances of the industrial revolution was the assembly line which allowed rapid construction of goods by giving each worker a single task to be repeated instead of requiring they have specialized knowledge of the whole process. While this idea goes back to at least the Venetian Arsenal in 1320, it became the standard during this era. One side effect of making things on an assembly line is that items were broken into individual parts that were replaceable if they broke, where before repairs were specialized work if they could be accomplished at all.
The agricultural revolution, where machines and other modern technology were applies to farming, accompanied the industrial revolution. Indeed, this fed it by allowing enough food to be produced that the majority of workers could take factory jobs instead of agricultural work.
The invention of air conditioning was also a major innovation of this era. This allowed for much denser and heavily mechanized industrial centers, as well greater population in warmer areas.
Notes
The appeal of the Industrial Revolution
Industrial Revolution inspired Games, Factions and Settings
- Steampunk
- Much of Discworld
fill me
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| Historical Time Periods | |
|---|---|
| Deep Time: | Prehistory |
| Premodern: | Stone Age - Bronze Age - Classical Period - Dark Age - High Middle Ages - Renaissance |
| Modern: | Age of Enlightenment - Industrial Revolution - The World Wars - The Cold War - Post-Cold War |