Our Own Devices: The Past and Future of Body Technology [Hardcover]

Edward Tenner (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0375407227 | ISBN-13: 978-0375407222 | Publication Date: June 3, 2003 | Edition: 1ST

From the author of Why Things Bite Back– which introduced us to the revenge antics of technology–Our Own Devices is a wonderfully revealing look at the inventions of everyday things that protect us, position us, or enhance our performance.

In helping and hurting us, these body technologies have produced consequences that their makers never intended:
• In postwar Japan traditional sandals gave way to Western-style shoes because they were considered marks of a higher standard of living, but they seriously increased the rate of fungal foot ailments.
• Reclining chairs, originally promoted for healthful brief relaxation, became symbols of the sedentary life and obesity.
• A keyboard that made the piano easier to learn failed in the marketplace mainly because professional pianists believed difficult passages needed to stay difficult.
• Helmets, reintroduced during the carnage of World War I, saved the lives of countless civilian miners, construction workers, and, more recently, bicyclists.

Once we step on the treadmill of progress, it’s hard to step off. Yet Edward Tenner shows that human ingenuity can be applied in self-preservation as well, and he sheds light on the ways in which the users of commonplace technology surprise designers and engineers, as when early typists developed the touch method still employed on today’s keyboards. And he offers concrete advice for reaping benefits from the devices that we no longer seem able to live without. Although dependent on these objects, we can also use them to liberate ourselves. This delightful and instructive history of invention shows why National Public Radio dubbed Tenner “the philosopher of everyday technology.”

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Marshall McLuhan once described media as an extension of the central nervous system. Tenner, a Princeton scholar and author (Why Things Bite Back), whose work might best be described as an anthropological history of science, extends the metaphor to even the simplest technologies-any "human modification of the natural world," as he puts it-and examines the impact that technology has had on human technique: the routine ways in which people perform everyday tasks. In-depth chapters track key moments in the development of baby bottles, sandals, athletic shoes, chairs for home and office, music keyboards, typing keyboards, eyeglasses and helmets. If you've ever wondered how QWERTY became the standard layout for typewriters and computer keyboards, or how touch typing became formalized, this is the book for you. It's especially effective in identifying the ways technology shapes the human body; the footwear different societies favor, for example, affects people's stride, while regular use of rubber bottle nipples causes infants to forget how to use their jaws and tongues to breastfeed. The latter is an excellent example of one of the book's persistent themes, the "machine for producing dependency on itself," changing our lives so radically that it becomes difficult, if not impossible, to go back to the way things used to be. (Consider the discomfort Westerners accustomed to a lifetime in chairs experience when they try to sit lotus-style.) Tenner's erudite yet approachable style and his way with telling details keep his potentially obscure subject from becoming dry and boring, and those in search of a quirky but cerebral read will be delighted.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From School Library Journal

Adult/High School-From the effect of shoes, and the reasons for wearing them, to the design of keyboards, Tenner traces the interaction between the human body and technology, and how the tools we make change and affect us. The first chapter provides numerous examples in brief, from speed skates to Glock pistols. After that, the author gets into cases, devoting one chapter, for instance, to thong sandals, or zoris, in different cultures, and another to the faddishly popular athletic shoe. Surprisingly, for a work that covers such a broad topic, this book is a page-turner, largely due to its clear prose and the author's approach to the material. While not lavishly illustrated, there seems to be a picture every time one is needed to illustrate the technology being discussed. There is a good annotated list of books for suggested reading at the end.
Paul Brink, Fairfax County Public Library, VA
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 336 pages
• Publisher: Knopf; 1ST edition (June 3, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0375407227
• ISBN-13: 978-0375407222
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 6.6 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,680,551 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars How Technology Transforms Us, June 26, 2003

By 

R. Hardy "Rob Hardy" (Columbus, Mississippi USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Our Own Devices: The Past and Future of Body Technology (Hardcover)

We live with technology all around us, and we ignore it most of the time, unless it goes wrong. Most of the time, our gadgets go fairly close to right, and we don't have to think much about tending them, and we almost never think about how they are tending, and changing, us. Technologies created by people create different sorts of people. In _Our Own Devices: The Past and Future of Body Technology_ (Knopf), Edward Tenner has considered simple technologies, some so simple and ungadgety that we might not even think of them as technologies: bottle feeding of infants, footwear, chairs, keyboards, eyeglasses and helmets. His book is full of fun; Tenner has a host of obscure yet relevant facts that he has obvious pleasure in presenting. He writes, "This book is about the changes we have made in ourselves: how everyday things affect how we use our bodies." He has examples drawn from many disciplines in addition to the main ones, like the importance of styles of lacing of shoes or the effect of Taiwanese bowlers taking advantage of light bowling balls with lots of spin on them. There is a huge range of information within these pages.

One of the themes of the book is that the technique of use is an essential complement to the technology involved. Baby bottles, for instance, involve a technique that must be successfully learned by mother and infant. They also allow fathers a nurturing role denied by nature. Tenner does not get into polemics about the bottle versus nursing controversy (nor does he do so for any of the controversial technologies he explores). We are physically affected by our technologies. There are millions of people who live literally on the Earth, doing without shoes; of course we evolved to get around without shoes originally. There is a movement to promote barefoot hiking, but there is always a self-fulfilling problem to overcome: shoes cause our feet to be so sensitive and vulnerable that we need shoes to protect them. In Japan, many grow up wearing _geta_ (two-piece clogs), which means that their gaits are measurably different from those who wear, say, ordinary sandals, and may be the reason Japan has very few world-class runners. It was in 1853 that an inventor set up a chair with movable parts and a system of springs that would allow rocking, although the chair rested on a pedestal supported by casters. The chair was no longer static; "This was the beginning of a new technique of sitting." Extensive studies have been done in the water to show exactly what position a body in complete rest takes (although previous evaluation of sleeping positions gave the same information), with chairs engineered to ensure that position. Piano innards have changed because of insistence of composers, especially Beethoven, on more complicated and louder performances, but although there have been improvements in the keyboard itself, no superstar has promoted them and none caught on.

The examples come thick and fast throughout the book's chapters. The technologies of writing and printing and the technique of reading have actually increased myopia in literate societies, though the explanations of the physiology behind the change are not yet satisfactory. Eyeglasses that correct the myopia may cause children's eyes to grow differently, increasing the myopia. The hard helmet of football changed the way the game is played; coaches used to instruct players to wrap their arms around the ball carrier to bring him down, but the helmet made them into human battering rams. The fans' appetite for aggressive and violent plays increased. People who sit in chairs that have a backrest suffer from weakening of the back muscles so that they more acutely need a backrest: "The chair is a machine for producing dependency on itself." Again and again, Tenner's surprising examples show that technology is often quite wonderful, and of course indispensable, but we only understand what it does to us after close examination of its effects, and the effects themselves often could never have been anticipated.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A fascinating book that is both timely and significant, August 25, 2003

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Bookreporter (New York, New York) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Our Own Devices: The Past and Future of Body Technology (Hardcover)

The Blackout of 2003 has already left us awash in observations of our dependence on technology. Some 50 million people (including this writer) found themselves suddenly forced to adjust, however temporary, to life without the conveniences provided by electricity. There is no question that, had the outage lasted longer than a few hours, as was the case in most areas, the effects would have been even more profound, if not catastrophic. But electronic technology is the new kid in town, a relatively recent arrival on the human scene, and as such gets far more attention than the more mundane technologies that have become so integrated into the human condition as to be nearly invisible. These "everyday" technologies are the subject of Edward Tenner's fascinating new book, OUR OWN DEVICES.

Tenner's exhaustively researched histories of the evolution of the baby bottle and baby formulas, eyeglasses, footwear, chairs, helmets and keyboards (of the musical and typewriter varieties) describe technologies that have affected the human body as much as, if not more than, they affected civilization. Tenner's focus on these body technologies is a welcome and appealing shift from the persistent focus on today's cutting-edge electronic technology.

There is no question that advances in computer technology over the last dozen years in particular have had a profound effect on society, culture, and business. But with the notable exception of certain medical advances, technology at that level is only just beginning to affect the human body at the same level as the devices Tenner describes. Within the context of human evolution, the technologies illustrated in OUR OWN DEVICES, though taken for granted for decades (or longer), are no less revolutionary than the body enhancements described in William Gibson's NEUROMANCER and other cyberpunk novels.

While eyeglasses may not seem as sexy or as exciting as the implants and body enhancements one finds in cyberpunk, they make it possible for me, a profoundly nearsighted, trifocal-wearing reader, to function in the world, let alone read anything I want, whether it's cyberpunk speculation of the future or a detailed history of the eyeglasses that today similarly empower millions. As a card-carrying techno-geek, I love new gadgets, but as body enhancements go, I can't think of anything more necessary and therefore more interesting than my glasses. Edward Tenner's highly informative book is important because he puts that issue into very sharp focus.

While life without electricity is as attractive a proposition as a do-it-yourself root canal, life without the familiar technologies described in OUR OWN DEVICES would truly reduce mankind to a state uncomfortably close to that of our knuckle-dragging ancestors. Chance --- and the apparent inadequacies of our electrical infrastructure --- has made Tenner's book a timely and significant one. Read it now, while the lights are still on.

--- Reviewed by Bob Rhubart

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Technology and Technique Evolve Together, August 21, 2004

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Thomas M. Loarie (Danville, CA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Our Own Devices: The Past and Future of Body Technology (Hardcover)

My passion for the past thirty years has been the development and introduction of innovative medical technologies that improve the quality of life and/or save lives. I have been involved with innovations in cardiovascular surgery, neurosurgery, gastrointestinal surgery, ophthalmology, plastic surgery, Ob/Gyn, urology, and hearing. Edward Tanner in "Our Own Devices" articulates and provides structure for what I have observed with new medical technologies, their adoption, and evolution. This book will be of interest and important to those who are participants in and/or students of technological innovation.

Oftentimes, those involved in the development of technology work in a vacuum without consideration of the user, trends, cultural barriers, and trade-offs - between performance, symbolism, and behavior changes. Tanner goes into great detail with examples showing the development and evolution of everyday items like shoes, sofas, and eyeglasses to highlight how things really went with these "machines," as they were put to use.

"Our Own Devices" is an exploration not only of inventive genius but also of user ingenuity. New devices are intended to change behavior, but not always as we imagined. And changes in behavior inspire new improvements and/or new devices, which in turn leads to more innovations. A good example of this in medical technology is the Swan-Ganz catheter. It was introduced in the late 1960s for use as a diagnostic tool for cardiologists. It had limited success until the mid-1970s when anesthesiologists adopted it for use to manage critical care patients in surgery. Until its use, many critical care patients were too high risk for surgery. About the same time, other innovators adopted some of its features to create the angioplasty catheter to treat vascular occlusions. This catheter has now become the primary tool in treating clogged arteries, and has further evolved to deliver a stent, and, more recently, a drug coated stent. This product category due to its safety and efficacy has become one of the most important therapies in history, and the profits of companies like Boston Scientific, Guidant, Medtronic, and J&J ride on its continued evolution. The interaction of inventors with participants allowed the technology and their technique to produce striking results envisioned by neither inventors nor users.

This book explores why we experience so many positive as well as negative unintended consequences; why technology,often considered the prime mover of change, is also a response to long-standing trends; and why, when we are constantly reminded of how everything has become much easier to use, how life has grown more complex and requires more education.

This is not a book for everyone, but is a "must" for those who are actively involved in or are students of innovation.