General Purpose Technology
General purpose technologies (GPTs) are technologies that can affect an entire economy (usually at a national or global level). GPTs have the potential to drastically alter societies through their impact on pre-existing economic and social structures. Examples include the steam engine, railroad, interchangeable parts, electricity, electronics, material handling, mechanization, control theory (automation), the automobile, the computer, and the Internet.
Read more about General Purpose Technology: Lag, Government Investment Necessary To Develop New General Purpose Technologies, New General Purpose Technologies in Energy Systems Transformation
Famous quotes containing the words general, purpose and/or technology:
“That sort of half sigh, which, accompanied by two or three slight nods of the head, is pity’s small change in general society.”
—Charles Dickens (1812–1870)
“Of what significance the light of day, if it is not the reflection of an inward dawn?—to what purpose is the veil of night withdrawn, if the morning reveals nothing to the soul? It is merely garish and glaring.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“The successor to politics will be propaganda. Propaganda, not in the sense of a message or ideology, but as the impact of the whole technology of the times.”
—Marshall McLuhan (1911–1980)