Evolution of technology. Computer artwork showing the evolution of human technology from flint tools (lower left) through cogs (blue) and calipers (red) to computers (right). The history of stone tools goes back over 2 million years to before modern humans evolved. It is thought that intelligence evolved alongside early technology and the use of handheld tools. It is only in the last few thousand years that the wheel (on which cogs are based) was developed. The calipers are Vernier calipers, devised in 1631. Modern computers, using integrated circuits, were first built in the 1970s.