Machines Are Frozen Spirit: The Scientification of Refrigeration and Brewing in the 19th Century—a Weberian Interpretation by Mikael Hård

Abstract

1036 Book Reviews TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE dent. So conservatives saw the rifle as an encouragement of an indi­ vidualism that could be dangerous in stolid, uneducated soldiers. The breechloader, with its rapid fire, was also distrusted by officers who thought that soldiers would shoot off all their ammunition prema­ turely. But in the reforming 1860s it was not considered outrageous to argue that better education for the masses would produce recruits who could be trusted to handle the new technology. In the 1904—5 Russo-Japanese War, however, the 18th-century reliance on cold steel and mass formations was still the philosophy of many officers, with dire consequences. As with the new industrial technology imposed on the Russian armories, so it was with the new tactics introduced in the 1860s—diffusion of new ideas was never as fast as anticipated. Books on this kind of offbeat subject tend to uncover all kinds of interesting details, some of which have significant implications for mainstream topics, and this valuable volume is no exception. J. N. Westwood Dr. Westwood is an Honorary Research Fellow at the Centre for Russian and East European Studies at the University of Birmingham. He is the author of Soviet Locomo­ tive Technology (London, 1982) and Russian Naval Construction 1905-1945 (London, 1994). Machines Are Frozen Spirit: The Scientification ofRefrigeration and Brew­ ing in the 19th Century—a Weberian Interpretation. By Mikael Hard. Frankfurt am Main: Campus Verlag; Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1994. Pp. 275; illustrations, references, bibliography, index. DM 58.00 (paper). In this study of the transformation of German beer making, Mikael Hard embraces Max Weber’s interpretation of historical development as the appearance of a modern, occidental, rationalized world—one that promotes abstraction, quantification, systematization, control, and prediction. Hard finds that rationalization in the increasingly scientific approach to technology, and the mechanization of industry. One of the strengths of this book is Hard’s decision to chart both the push of new technical development as well as the pull of the marketplace, by focusing on the refrigeration industry and its most important customers, the large German breweries. And to plot out this story he has divided the book into three parts: refrigeration tech­ nology before 1870, the scientification of refrigeration technology 1870—93, and the rationalization of the brewing industry. In charting the intertwining rationalities of science, technology, and business, the author deploys the concept of “social carriers”—individuals, groups, companies, or institutions that have the knowledge, power, and interest to promote new technologies. Hard has chosen his categories of analysis carefully, for by focusing TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE Book Reviews 1037 on social carriers rather than the more diffuse actor networks, he deliberately emphasizes that “power and persistence are essential fac­ tors in the promotion of technical change” (p. 70). Central to these overlapping groups is Carl von Linde, who de­ signed a vapor compression ice machine in 1870. Linde tapped the thermodynamic theory taught by Gustav Zeuner at the Swiss Poly­ technic to posit an ideal machine that would embody the reversed Carnot cycle. His use of scientific theory proved a powerful tool not only in building a more efficient machine but in establishing vapor compression as an archetype that quickly dominated the industry. Yet Linde’s contribution as an interpreter of scientific theory to engi­ neering design was soon surpassed by his role in the commercializa­ tion of his design. The Linde Company applied the same scientification to the marketplace by urging the establishment of the Munich Refrigeration Testing Station in 1888, which adjudicated rivals’ unsci­ entific claims and tutored consumers in the proper standards of per­ formance. Machines Are Frozen Spirit provides a compelling look at how the prestige of science was used for both the establishment and maintenance of an archetypal design. Here is a study that skillfully deploys historical theory and yet is written with the conviction that technological design really matters. Of special interest is the role of August Deiglmayr of the Dreher breweries and Gabriel Sedlmayr of the Spaten brewery in promoting the development of mechanical refrigeration to replace natural ice. Hard argues that the data on the infant technology provided consum­ ers with no clear economic choice. Thus...