Part 1 of a series on rethinking science and technology for the 21st century
We live in a crowded, science and technology-dependent word. And things aren’t getting any better! The global population is currently around 6.8 billion. Over the next four years it’s projected to grow to over 7 billion. And by 2050, the US Census Bureau estimates there will be over 9.5 billion men women and children on the planet; all of them expecting food, water, shelter, and a first world standard of living. The only way such demands can be met—if indeed they can be (and it’s a big “if”)—is through the increasingly sophisticated and strategic use of science and technology.
The level of scientific knowledge and technological ability that exists now underpins modern society. Remove it, and things collapse. But what is less obvious is that science and technology need to continually develop in a changing world. As new challenges, needs and wants arise, we need a steady stream of new knowledge and new technology innovation. Without science progress and technology innovation, our ability to sustain a healthy global society will not keep pace with the challenges to achieving this.
Of course, this is nothing new. Science, technology and society have been intertwined for tens of thousands of years. Homo sapiens are tool-makers and tool users—technology is in our blood. Our history is one of progression through technology innovation—from early tools, to husbandry, to the industrial revolution and on to synthetic chemicals manufacture, nuclear power, semiconductor fabrication, and so on.
Some would say we’ve done pretty well out of this fascination with science and technology. And by all accounts we have. On a global scale, life expectancies are longer and quality of life is higher than ever before.
But this isn’t necessarily a sustainable trend. With a growing population, dwindling resources and increasing demands on them, the pressures on science and technology to deliver the good are mounting. At the same time, the world is changing in ways that could well stretch established approaches to ensuring adequate science and technology innovation to breaking point.
Take for instance the rate at which knowledge and ideas are now spreading, crossing boundaries, and influencing people. Or the increasingly strong links between human actions and environmental re-actions. And how about the ability of scientists to bend the material world to their every whim, even down to the scale of atoms and molecules? In each of these cases, we are achieving more now than ever before in human history. And the rate of progress is accelerating. Separately, they challenge the effectiveness of conventional approaches to using science and technology in the service of society. Together, they could well shake things up so much that established ways of doing things are no longer responsive to society’s needs.
These are the three “C’s:” Communication, Coupling and Control. Communication: the flow and influence of information and ideas between people and institutions. Coupling: the ever-closer relationship between society and the Earth. And Control: our rapidly developing ability to control our surroundings from the atomic level through to the planetary scale. Over the next few blogs in this series I will be talking about each “C” in more depth, and how together they potentially change the game when it comes to science and technology.
Next up: Coupling: Actions and consequences in a shrinking world
Notes
“Rethinking science and technology for the 21st century” is a series of blogs drawing on a recent lecture given at the James Martin School in Oxford. This is a bit of an experiment—the serialization of a lecture, and a prelude to a more formal academic paper. But hopefully it will be both interesting and useful. I’ll be posting a “rethinking science and technology” blog every week or so, interspersed with the usual eclectic mix of stuff you’ve come to expect from 2020science.
Previously: Rethinking science and technology for the 21st century
Next: Coupling: Actions and consequences in a shrinking world
[3/19/09 correction – when the page was initially posted, it listed the third blog in this series – on communication – as being next]