THE SIGNIFICANCE OF ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY IN HISTORY

Human society, nature and technology

From a Western philosophical point of view, until the 19th century the word 'human' was understood to apply to everything related to mankind and human society, including languages and history. Humans were distinguished from machines through their empathy and fallibility; from lower animals by reasoning and morality, and from a divine entity of infinite intelligence by being mortal and earthly. Nature was the physical world, including all living creatures and natural phenomena. Nature was an order, a disposition, and an essence of all entities composing the physical universe. In the past, nature was understood as a gift, something obtained easily, without any compensation. Nature was a subject of natural sciences, which study the physical world and its phenomena. As a consequence of these two categories (human and nature) the curriculum of the European classical universities was divided into humanistic studies and natural sciences.

After the industrial revolution at the beginning of 19th century a new concept of the world came into being as a result of technical development and infrastructure, which were the material consequences of human design, very different from gifts of nature. One principle manifestation of the new civilisation was railroads and trains, mainly after 1840. As a result of this advance the environment was divided a new into nature and civilisation (or products of engineering design). During the 19th century the world was thus divided into human society, nature, and the built environment (a product of engineering design). A new domain of learning emerged in university education: technical sciences taught in the faculties of engineering, in independent universities of technology, or in technical universities.

Our civilisation is a condition of human society marked by an advanced stage of development in the arts and sciences and by a corresponding social, political and cultural complexity. Its infrastructure refers to the basic facilities, equipment, services, and installations needed for the growth and functioning of an organisation, a community or a country. This infrastructure is termed a substratum that supports attributes of reality and the meaning of civilisation, for which reason the development is called substratal here. Technologies refer to any industrial and mechanical process that is developed by technical sciences, whereby technical means something pertaining to (or providing) knowledge of any of various subjects that involve practical, applied, mechanical or industrial skills. In a similar way engineering means designing, constructing and managing the technical infrastructure.

Engineering

Engineering involves the application of scientific principles in the design, construction and operation of efficient and economical structures, equipment, and systems. An engineer is a person who is trained in, skilled at, or professionally engaged in a branch of engineering. Engineer originates from Old French engineor and Latin ingeniator (to be able to plan or device with cleverness or ingenuity, to invent or fabricate, especially by improvisation) and from Latin ingenium (the faculty of the mind to combine things in a new way). In the 18th century France engineering was regarded as skill in constructing military citadels, fortresses, bulwarks and fortifications. This concept was changed in the 19th century, when engineering was divided into military engineering and civil engineering (new developments). Recently civil engineering is considered to be related to knowledge and skills relating to the construction of all kind of structures (edifices) except conventional housing designed by architects.

Civil engineering includes the knowledge and skills of constructing roads, streets, railways, airports, bridges, tunnels. Water engineering or hydraulic engineering provides solutions to the problems of constructing weirs, dams, water channels, irrigation systems, drainage, river training, flood control. Maritime or coastal engineering is related to the construction of harbours, landing areas and coastal protections. Sanitary and forest engineering are recent developments. Sanitary engineering concentrates on water supply systems, sewer systems and district heating systems. Forest engineering is related to transport of timber by roads, rails, cable railways and water channels, as well as to erosion control on the slopes. In many countries maritime engineering, water engineering and sanitary engineering are treated as an integral part of civil engineering, but sometimes they are independent. Recently a new academic discipline was created under the name 'environmental engineering', oriented towards both the human environment, as well as to all kinds of natural (biological, chemical, physical, geological) and built environments.

Technical sciences

Classification of sciences is difficult and subjective. One example is an approach introduced by A.M. Ampere in 1834 and 1843. Ampere, a teacher of physics, was instrumental in naming and describing scientific disciplines. He introduced many new terms, such as kinematics and cybernetics, that are still in use today. This helped his students and his son to understand what to study as part of a university education. These were the suggestions of a teacher and a father, but despite their subjectivity they remained quite popular long after the author's death (Kotarbinski 1961). Many proposals were introduced later on by different authors, such as idiographic or nomothetic sciences, natural or social sciences, basic or applied sciences, research or development activity.

In engineering and technology some classifications refer to the environment involved, such as coastal engineering, geotechnics, river engineering, maritime engineering, space technology etc. Another approach is goal-oriented, such as food technology, heat and power technology, clean coal technology, textile industry, transport technology, housing construction, civil engineering etc. A popular approach is to divide engineering according to the main resource, such as wood technology, stone technology, iron technology, steam technology, electrical technology, nuclear energy technology, computer technology, etc.

In most classifications engineering, techniques and technology are defined in terms of resources shared by nature and human society. But techniques may be defined as functional activities instead of substratal products. According to the functional definition a 'technique' is an activity oriented to fulfil the human needs by transformation of natural resources (Wasiutynski, 1962). This activity includes: (a) knowledge of natural resources, production methods based on human needs and on the priority of these needs, and environmental impact of the solutions; (b) production or work oriented toward the creation of needed products or services and toward changes in the natural environment and renewable and non-renewable resources. As a consequence, technology may be divided into two branches: research and production, the latter of which is applied science.

From a psychological point of view, research and application (production) differ considerably from each other, and the education of students may concentrate either on knowledge (research) or on skills (technologies). Knowledge (research) refers to technical sciences which derive from natural sciences (mathematics, chemistry, physics, biology, geology) and from human studies (philosophy, psychology, sociology, political science, history, law, languages, arts, economy). Natural sciences help to understand how to change the natural, technical and cultural environment, and human studies give insights to understand past, present and future human desires, needs and fears.

Integrated design and production technology in an industrial society

Engineering activity may be divided into a sequence of steps: (a) recognition of needs, resources and conditions; (b) design of production and industrial work to produce goods; (c) supply of goods according to expressed needs, creation of new needs, resources and new environmental conditions (Wasiutynski, 1962; Kowalik, 1975). After the last step, a new process will start and be repeated ad infinitum, because there are no limits for human needs and there is no way to stop the activity of producing and reproducing of goods. A good engineer is never unemployed. Simple examples are the university buildings around us, upgraded every few years according to changing needs, resources and conditions (light, heat, ventilation, security, communication, etc.).

Integrated design, production and reproduction (engineering activities) may contain four steps: 1) knowledge, 2) decision, 3) production and 4) assessment. Stated in more detail these include: 1) knowledge of needs, conditions and resources: (a) needs, desires or fears ; (b) resources: energy, materials, climate, terrain, food, human resources, etc.; (c) restrictions: capital, social acceptance, etc. These matters pertain to what is called a prefeasibility study. 2) The decision-making stage includes: (a) imagination, CAD (computer aided design), CAM (computer-aided management); (b) invention or intuition, DSS or ES (decision support system or expert system). 3) Production includes: (a) feasibility studies, dimensioning and instructions; (b) technology (instructions and work). Finally, 4) assessment of products includes: (a) technical (physical) parameters, (b) economic results, (c) aesthetic evaluation, and (d) environmental impact assessment (EIA) and life cycle assessment (LCA).

Industrial production also has side-effects: pollution of water, air and soil. Tiberg (1992) has indicated the general trend of the character and development of environmental problems during the period 1950-1990. According to him, until 1950 "the awareness of environmental problems was limited. However, waste water and smoke from chimneys and exhaust pipes started to create problems locally which could not be neglected. The handling of waste was mainly governed by aspects of hygiene and cleanliness. Flue gases and sewage were still let out directly into air and water." The sanitary standards were related to diluting the waste. The strategy was defined as: "the best solution of pollution is dilution". Concepts introduced before 1950 are still in use today, for example in the case of radioactive pollution.

Water supply and sewer systems in 19th-century-Europe

"Early use of sewers had the purpose of removing rainfall without causing inconvenience of flooding. (...) In London it was illegal to discharge human excreta into sewers before 1815."

In London a separate sewer collection system was in use: human wastes were carried by sewers to a wastewater treatment plant or point of outfall, while surface water was carried away by a number of local systems discharging at various points into natural water courses. Before 1815 the only legal possibility was to construct a separate sewer system containing only storm water with no sanitary wastes. According to Hultman (1992) the first legal regulations related to sewer systems and wastewater were introduced in England. Afterwards, the law was changed to permit all wastewaster to be drained into sewers. By 1847 this became compulsory in the urban areas of Great Britain. In a combined sewer system, the sanitary wastes and storm water (from rain and snow) are collected and discharged into one system of sewers which leads to a wastewater treatment plant or to one or more points of discharge.

The first design of a modern sewer system on the continent was completed for Hamburg in 1843. Because of the pollution of the rivers and the sea, England issued the "Public Health Act" in 1848, which made it obligatory to use water closets and sewers to transport wastes from houses into surface waters. This Act also provided for mandatory wastewater treatment. This was a consequence of the great English sanitary movement during the 1830s, when it was postulated that everybody has the right of free access to fresh air, clean water, light and beauty (simplified into the concept of a 'green' environment full of trees, flowers and green areas). This movement advocated the removal of any dirt and uncleanness from the human environment as a duty of individuals and of the society (Dubos, 1959).

In the 1840s the City of Berlin was first to construct a wastewater treatment plant. It was an experimental pilot solution of gravel filters irrigated by wastewater. British legislation on sewer systems (1847) and the Hamburg concept of wastewater outflow from the city (1843) were motivated by aesthetic arguments, not by the health risk. According to Hultman (1992) "a systematic and scientific evaluation of wastewater handling started in England around the 1850's and was followed up by other countries in Europe, the USA and South Africa".

The linkage between water pollution and waterborne diseases could be seen from death registers as early as the mid-19th century. In 1854 the English physician John Snow clearly traced the outbreak of cholera epidemics in London back to the Thames, which was grossly polluted with raw sewage (Hultman 1992). The memorial plate created in London gives the text: "The red granite kerbstone marks the site of the historic Broad Street Pump associated with Dr John Snow's discovery in 1854 that cholera is conveyed by water." Only the people using the water from Broad Street Pump were infected with cholera. Dr Snow simply restricted the removal water from the public well. Dr Snow's success generated great optimism, and Dubos (1959) refers to the English hygienist, Southwood Smith, who stated during a public lecture in 1855 that "we are able at last to control efficiently the problem of epidemics".

The experience of England was not followed on the continent for many years. The first publication of Pasteur on bacteria, illnesses and epidemics was published in 1857. The findings of Pasteur and the English solutions for drinking water supply and sewer systems brought real progress in sanitary engineering. One well-known, often cited sanitary engineer is Max von Pettenkofer, who worked in Munich (Germany). He implemented a plan to supply drinking water from the surrounding mountains and dump the wastewater into the Isar River. The completion of the system resulted in a drop in typhoid fever mortality by 80% from 1880 to 1898 (Dubos 1959). Similar examples are described in the monograph on the history of sewer systems by Steiner and Ruoff (1987).

The Gdansk case

The population of Gdansk was 64 000 in 1849, 87 700 in 1861, and almost 100 000 by 1875. The city was administered as a military harbour of the Prussian Kingdom, and every fifth male inhabitant was a soldier. The death rate was high: more people died than were born until the 1870s. In 1851-1855 death rate was 47 per thousand, but it decreased to 20 per thousand in 1906. Water supply and sewerage systems were very inefficient (Suligowski, 1995a; 1995b).

The water supply system was constructed in 1348-1354. A channel, called the New Radunia River, was dug across the town at an elevation of 5-8 m above sea level. The water level of a small channel (Siedlicki Stream) was regulated in order to increase the flow in the New Radunia River. Underground wooden pipes were laid, joined by special metallic connectors, which supplied water from the river to about 600 municipal wells in the form of shallow cylindrical cisterns. Local residents carried drinking water home from these wells in buckets. The wells were located on the streets, in yards or even in the cellars of premises. Household wastewater was collected in dirt buckets and emptied into the small open ditches constructed along the main streets. Wastewater flowed by gravity to the lowest point of the city Open ditches were later covered by special wooden decks that simultaneously served as pavements for pedestrians. This system operated for more than 500 years until the 19th century.

In the mid-19th century the inhabitants of Gdansk realised that the quality of water in the rivers was bad and that the water supply pipes and local wells were in bad condition. The mortality rate was high, mainly due to contamination by typhus. Only wealthy inhabitants could obtain fresh spring water transported in barrels. At that time economic conditions in the city were very good because of the flourishing trade. Railway lines linked Gdansk with the transit routes to Germany, Poland and Ukraine. The importance of the port created new investments. The need to invest in the sanitary infrastructure became obvious and the city council decided to start the investment in 1863.

The process of developing the infrastructure was launched by the newly elected mayor von Winter. He decided to employ a few experts to prepare a design for a water supply system and a sewerage system. A group of expert was hired, headed by a civil engineer, E. Wiebe, who had proven his skills in railroad construction during the period 1836-1860. He was joined in this project by the German civil engineers F.L. Horbrecht and Veitmayer and by an English sanitary engineer, B. Latham. First they made a trip to England and France to obtain up-to-date information on water and sanitary technology. They looked for the best solutions for the problems in Gdansk. Design of the system started in 1863 with a land survey. All documents were published in 1865 in two volumes under the title "Water supply and sewer system of the city of Gdansk". The first volume contained a description of the investment with all costs, while the second volume contained all sketches and plans (Wiebe, 1865). After a long public discussion, the final decision was taken in 1869.

The design proposed that the water intake be built in the high moraine hills, 110 m above sea level and 20 km from the city. Drinking water was supplied by gravity through the main pipe (414 mm in diameter). The water was not treated. All wastewater was to be collected by gravity at the lowest point of the system and pumped to the irrigation fields using the biofilm treatment method (Kowalik, 1995). The wastewater treatment plant was located on the sand dunes close to the shore (Kowalik et al., 1995a; 1995b). After treatment, the wastewater was discharged into the Vistula River. The quality of waste water and river water was checked by the local apothecary O. Helm (Helm, 1875, 1884).

To implement the design it was necessary to employ the J. and A. Aird Company, which completed all facilities. The Pregowo water intake was completed in 1869, the main pipes for water supply and sewer system were laid by 1871, and the wastewater treatment plant began to operate in 1872. The water supply system was designed for 100 000 persons with a daily water use of 100 litres per person. In the beginning, 3887 houses were connected to the sewerage system. The system was described in many publications and implemented in many other cities. The wastewater treatment plant of Gdansk (320 ha), completed in 1872, was duplicated in Bremen in 1877 (400 ha), in Breslau (Wroclaw) (1778 ha) in 1881, in Berlin (12300 ha) in 1884 and in Koenigsberg (Kaliningrad) (800 ha) in 1899 (Brix et al., 1934). Several elements of the system were repeated later on in many other towns. The quality of research, development, implementation, information dissemination, and replication was quite high in the case of Gdansk solution. Both systems have been durable: the wastewater treatment plant was closed in the 1990s and the water intake is still in use.

References

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