The Shock of the Old Quotes

“Ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia and China depended on constant vigilance over, and maintenance and repair of, complex irrigation systems. It was argued that this required a huge all-powerful state: these ancient ‘hydraulic societies’ were necessarily not democratic.”
― David Edgerton, The Shock Of The Old: Technology and Global History since 1900

“The history of invention is not the history of a necessary future to which we must adapt or die, but rather of failed futures, and of futures firmly fixed in the past.”
― David Edgerton, The Shock of the Old: Technology and Global History since 1900

“in almost no
instance can artificial-rational systems be built and left alone. They require continued attention, rebuilding, and repair. Eternal vigilance is the price of artificial complexity." He noted too, that in a technological age we should ask not who governs, but what governs: `government becomes the business of recognising what is necessary and efficient for the continued functioning and elaboration of large-scale systems and the rational implementation of their manifest requirements.”
― David Edgerton, The Shock of the Old: Technology and Global History since 1900