Perhaps the biggest cause of problems in the modern world is the failure of society to keep pace with, and control of, science and technology. Discuss this assertion.

STAS: Science, Technology & Society Semester 2, 2002

Science, Technology & Society

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Since the beginning of human life, science and technology was, is and will be side by side with man and mankind. Even from the simplest discoveries that helped mankind, anyone could see that mankind depends so much on science and technology that these days are almost impossible to know a fold of life that has nothing to do with them. However in this relationship, as in all relationships and kinds of them, there are some advantages and disadvantages. One major disadvantage is the failure of society to keep pace with, and control of, science and technology. Mankind has been evolved so much that people do not know what to expect next. What will be the next great discovery or innovation of science and technology that will amaze us?

However all these discoveries and innovations have a price which grows bigger day by day. The price is the constant remotion of the ordinary people from all these technologies, which is used by an ‘elite’ which can understand the functions of technology or they have the knowledge to use all these technologies. As we can all see nowadays, the gap between the ‘technological elite’ and the information poor, which characterizes the majority of the mankind, is growing bigger. This is happening because science and technology, have grow to such degree, that it is very difficult even for those who are dealing with it every day to follow up with anything new on this field. Therefore it is even more difficult for the everyday man, to cope with technology and science since it is not part of his reality and everyday life.

Although there are many reasons for the failure of society to keep pace with science and technology, the most important of them are political and social values. Therefore political and social values define the relationship between technology, science and society. In society there is a claim that as long as technology develops is due to the fulfilment of human needs, such as food, water and shelter. However society sees this fulfilment from a different angle than politics. This is happening because society and politics influence and form each other. So every political decision related to science and technology is due to have an impact on society. For example “For Lenin, what mattered was who used the technology, not what shape it took. In itself, the technology was apolitical; it was simply the most sophisticated method of industrial production” (Street, J, p.37). It was Lenin who adopted a pattern for mass production by taking a political decision. So he gave a political aspect to technology which was related to his social aspect. Technology for Lenin was unacquainted; the only thing that cared him was the owner of it and whose interests it suited. In Lenin’s particular political system, the state directed science and technology so society might have felt alienated from them because it could not have any control on them. Moreover, political interest can affect technology, so technology cannot be either independent or autonomic. So society is estranged from science because of the interference of politics. For example, science and technology take orders from the capitalist interests, because their main funding and existence is how they can reduce the costs of industry and the surveillance of the workers during their work. “As Albury and Schwartz summarize the general argument: ’the shape of particular disciplines and specialities in science and technology has been moulded by the determination of the capitalist class to mobilize all resources in their attempt to maintain ownership, power, and control(Albury and Schwartz, 1982, p.67)”(Street, J, p.39).

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On the other hand, society and its needs can dictate the political interests and decisions, which are imposed by the means that politics possess, on science and technology. But political choices fail down to unravel how a larger political interest can be of any help to the implementation of scientific method. Science sometimes feels repressed because it cannot serve its own needs for knowledge and research. As a direct result science cannot fulfil its own needs and goals. For example political interests specify the whole production and where to use this production and for what reasons. Technology has just to cope with it and manage to carry out the instructions of the political realm. So science cannot keep pace with society because society represses it and furthermore they have different goals. Politics make riddle the political morphology, as they want to be in control and ready to preclude the changes that will happen. This kind of politics has as a result the less allowance for the catastrophic implications of the technology in various folds of human life. As a conclusion, politics and society count on technology and especially in their capability to manage the development of technology, for their survival. Politics interfere straightforward in the funding, organisation and priorities of science and technology, as the scientific knowledge is linked to the values and judgements of the politics. As a conclusion society and science cannot keep pace with each other for two main reasons related to politics. When politics give directions to science and technology which do not serve any social needs, science and society look in different directions. Moreover when society tries to have absolute control on science through politics, science is oppressed and therefore it draws away from society in order to be able to serve its own needs.

Society and science appear to be doomed to be alienated because of their different nature. Society expresses the human conditions and technology serves scientific purposes. As long as science and technology fulfil their aims, which are the lust for knowledge by research, they are satisfied. However at a certain point, this knowledge must have applications useful to society. A problem is that the research done by science and technology does not have a clear application of social value. As John Street observes “Social usefulness has to feature in the justification of support. This inevitably creates a pressure on science to produce work which can be claimed to serve a recognised social function” (Street, J, p.79). For example when the Curies tried to isolate the radium, they did not know what practical uses could have the results of their research. Society cannot understand the way science and technology work and it demands instant and practical results from which it can benefit. “The hypothetico-inductive method of science requires some degree of autonomy. Discovery cannot be dictated.”(Street, J, p.91). Therefore science tries to draw away from society, because it needs to serve its own causes. So society feels threatened because it wants to have control on science and technology. In its need for independence, science is alienated from society and it cannot keep pace with it. Moreover the results of science are appreciated according to social needs. For example any scientific result about cancer is more likely to have a greater social effect than a scientific result concerning other diseases, because cancer is the current concern of society.

In addition society tries to interfere in the internal procedures of science. This is another reason why science feels threatened by social demands and it cannot keep step with society. For example there are several ecological organisations, such as Greenpeace, which prevent science from using methods which are not accepted by social values, like animal testing. If Greenpeace expresses society’s values, and animal testing in laboratories, stands for the internal procedures of science, the interference of Greenpeace in animal testing shows the society’s wish to interfere in the internal procedure of science. In conclusion, society does not only interfere in the use and form of the final result of scientific research, but it also interferes in the internal procedure of the research. So science and technology is once more in need to alienate itself from society and to avoid society’s control, in order to preserve its right to knowledge, research and to a certain extent of independence.

To sum up all of the above, science and technology is an inevitable part of the society and society is an evitable part of science and technology. They co-exist and confront each other, because they want something from each other. There is an exchange of resources and operations. However they both are necessary parts of their proper function. For example society may demand useful things that science cannot provide or can but they have no proper use in society’s needs. On the other hand, science and technology can provide society rather useful innovations with applications at many aspects of life. Although both of them have different goals and demands from each other, the key for their successful co-existence is somewhere in the middle. So science and technology have to provide society with something useful and practical, under their field of research, and society has to stop to demand the results of the scientific research in a very limited time, because science has to be sure before giving something new to the society. In conclusion, society cannot keep pace with science and technology because of many different reasons. Each one of these reasons contributes to the alienation of society and science and technology.

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