高中二年级英语(人教版)下册 Unit 11 Integrating Skills 2

　　THE AGES OF MAN

　　Human achievements come in all shapes and sizes. Knocking two rocks together can be just as important as sending a man to the moon. When ancient humans learnt to use stone tools and make fire, it meant the beginning of modern society. Later discoveries -- bronze, iron, steam, electricity, to name a few -- continued the development of society and shaped history. So important were these achievements that we often divide human history into time periods named after the latest technology of the time: the Stone Age, the Bronze Age, the Iron Age and so on.

　　In modem times, scientific achievements have continued to drive the development of society. The eighteenth and nineteenth centuries saw the widespread use of electricity and the birth of the steam engine, leading to factories andcities as we know them today. It was also the beginning of public education and the modern branches of science. The twentieth century brought us cars, nuclear power and space exploration, and is sometimes called the "Atomic Age" or the "Space Age". Recently, the effect of computers and the Internet has given rise to the idea that we are living in the "Information Age".

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