Although we are all familiar with "technology," how many of us would try to define it and describe the principles that govern its workings? In The Nature of Technology, W. Brian Arthur does that and more: Besides offering a coherent depiction of technology's underlying attributes and inner structure, he seeks to demonstrate that its historical development is a form of (non-Darwinian) evolution, describe how engineering and invention function, and elucidate the ways by which technology prompts change in economic structures. His account is almost always enlightening, stimulating, and thought-provoking.

Arthur (an economist, complexity theorist, and mathematician at the Santa Fe Institute and Palo Alto Research Center) provides a highly structured analysis that proceeds from three "fundamental principles." First, all technologies are combinations. This may seem self-evident to readers of Science, especially those who employ instruments in their own work. Spectrometers, for example, are composed of parts that are technology products (lenses, mirrors, gratings, actuators, etc.). But on reflection, one realizes that the parts are themselves miniature technologies; so are their subparts, sub-subparts, and so on (Arthur's second principle). Moreover, each "technology is a phenomenon captured and put to use" (his third principle).