This is a slight variant of the first half of the midsemester
examination I gave the last time I taught this course. Our readings
and topics have changed a bit, and I'm likely to ask a few other kinds
of questions, but it should be relatively representative of the kind of
examination that I will give.
Summary: In this examination, you will have the opportunity to
demonstrate some of the important issues you learned in the first half of the
semester. The emphasis of this part of the examination is that you understand
the basic themes of the course as represented in the presentations and
readings.
There are ten problems on this exam. Each is worth five points.
However, each may not take you the same amount of time.
Write your name at the top of each page.
Do your best to spell and apply rules of grammar correctly.
This exam is primarily closed-book. However, you may use one sheet of
notes that you have prepared in advance.
Please write your name on those notes and turn them in with the exam.
I will not be available during the exam to answer questions. If you have
questions on an examination problem, choose an answer you deem best,
document your difficulty and how you have resolved that difficulty, and
answer the revised question.
Please write and sign the following statement on the cover page of the
exam. If you are unable to sign the statement, please talk to me at
your earliest convenience.
I did not cheat on this exam. I am unaware of any classmates who cheated
on this exam.
Two of the authors we've read have made democracy the focus of their
essays. In a sentence or two each, explain how each author suggests that
democracry relates to technology. For two points of extra credit, give the
name of each author and the title of his or her article.
Article 1:
Article 2:
In his article, Why I am not going to buy a computer
, Wendell Berry suggests
that there are a wide variety of criteria we should apply when deciding whether or
not to adopt a new technology. List three of them.
1.
2.
3.
What is the central thesis of Alvin M. Weinberg's Can Technology Replace Social
Engineering?
Dr. Lalonde suggested that one of the changes in writing systems was
significantly more significant than the rest. What change was that?
In the second of his guest lectures, John Whittaker from Anthropology suggested
a number of theses perspectives on technology that he hoped we would take from
his lectures. Give two of them (only a sentence or two each).
1.
2.
In The Evolution of Everyday Things, Henry Petroski states a number of
important (and, perhaps, not-so-important) theses about the evolution
of everyday technologies.
What is his central theses?
Give two of Petroski's subsidiary theses.
1.
2.
In How society shapes technology
, Robert Pool suggests that technology
has as much of an influence in how technology evolves as technology has an
influence on how society involves. He is, of course, reacting to a view that
technology does, in fact, greatly influence society. Pick a technology other
than stone tools, writing, and the computer, and suggest, in three or four
sentences how it has significantly changed society.
What, according to Vice President Swartz, are the primary markets in
which photovoltaics currently enjoy significant advantage?
What was your favorite reading this semester? Explain why in one or
two sentences.
;
