Printing and Unintended Consequences

Contrary to popular belief, the printing press was developed in China more than 400 years before Gutenberg's famous press in Germany. Why do we associate printing with Gutenberg and Germany instead? The main reason is the difference in language. The Chinese language consisted of thousands of complex symbols called ideograms. There were so many different symbols that arranging them in molds to print different books was impractical, even after the development of movable type. When Gutenberg developed his printing press in 1450, he relied on the Latin alphabet, which only had about two dozen different characters. This alphabet made it much easier to manage the fonts and rearrange letters to print new books. This comparison demonstrates how the same technology will develop differently under different cultural circumstances.

Printing also provides a good example of how new communication technologies have unintended consequences. Printing made books much cheaper to produce and therefore more affordable for consumers. As the cost of books declined, more people learned how to read. One of the first books to be printed was the Bible. Initially, printers and the Catholic Church thought that making more Bibles available would increase religious devotion and strengthen the power of the Church.

Ultimately, as more people owned and were able to read their own Bibles, they began to question the teachings of the Church. Whereas before people had to rely on priests to explain what the Bible meant, now people could read it on their own and develop their own interpretation. The printing press was also used to publish pamphlets that questioned the authority of the Church leaders. Eventually, the Reformation led to a major split in Christianity. While it was not the only factor, the development of the printing press played a large role in this split. This consequence was definitely not intended by Gutenberg when he printed his first Bible!

Video 2.1 provides some more insightful and thought-provoking ideas about the impact of printing: