Máquinas térmicas desde la Antigüedad al siglo XVII: análisis histórico desde la Filosofía de la Técnica

Abstract

In the present article we present a historical analysis, supported by the framework proposed by Miguel Ángel Quintanilla in his philosophy of technique, of a genealogy of thermal machines from antiquity to 17th century. We intend to draw a historical line that allow us to show a relevant continuity between such artifacts and contemporaneous thermal machines, whose history, we argue, do not start with the steam machine but much earlier. Quintanilla’s systemic philosophy of technique allows to enlighten the structures of the technical systems in which the artifacts to analyze are embedded, in order to argue that they are necessary antecedents to contemporary thermal machines. In that sense, we affirm that histo-rical analysis about contemporary thermal machines and about thermodynamics would be enriched by the inclusion of the genealogic line of artifacts here presented.