What Is Technology?
Technology is the totality of any processes, skills, systems, techniques, or procedures utilized in the achievement of specific objectives, including scientific research, in the development of new products or services or in the performance of operations. Technological change is also associated with processes that enhance the productivity of a given activity. Technological change is the result of advances in information and communication technology and has significant effects on various industries. A key element in economic growth is technology transfer.
Technological change can be divided into two broad categories: technical and socio-technical change. Technological change can be the outcome of scientific knowledge. Scientific knowledge can be considered to create technological innovations or to advance scientific methods. Examples include the development of new ways of doing things such as communication, scientific and technological research and experiment, and manufacturing. Technological change can also result from changes in society and culture, for example, changes in how people think about and use things like transportation, information technology, computer systems, and so forth.
Technological change can be understood in terms of socio-technological change. Schatzberg’s twelve-step methodology is a key feature of this analytical category. The twelve steps come from the assumption that technology has both internal and external factors and that the internal factors determine the external factors.
As part of the study of technological change, Schatzberg distinguished between four broad categories of technological systems. These are associated with different levels of complexity, as he believed that there was a distinct order in which technologies develop and change over time. These categories include ancient systems, medieval systems, classical systems, twentieth century systems, and twenty-first century systems. He further suggested that there was a distinction between technological systems which were necessary and which were advantageous to the state.
As already noted, the analysis of technological change is based on the assumption that technological systems have both internal and external factors in common. Within the analytical category of schatzberg, however, there are three broad categories of technological systems: physical technologies, social technologies, and informational technologies. Both the physical and social technologies can be identified as human-made, whereas the informational technologies are those which are unmade or self-made. The last category includes artificial intelligence, machine learning, and genetic technologies.
In order to avoid confusions, it may be useful to refer to all four categories of technological systems as IT technology. As Schatzberg used the word technology in his vocabulary, he may have meant “informational technology” as well, but this is less likely. The meaning of the word is “the application of techniques in specific situations.” Thus, in this instance, we find an explanation for the term technology in terms of information technology, as it applies to the field of information technology. The other ways in which the term technology appears in modern research and in business is when it refers to new products or processes, or to a particular product that has been developed elsewhere.