Science, Technology, and the Federal Government National Goals for a New Era (1993) / Chapter Skim
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CHAPTER 2 SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY IN MODERN SOCIETY
CHAPTER 2 SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY IN MODERN SOCIETY
Pages 9-16
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From page 9... ...
Electric lighting supplanted the dim glow of candles, kerosene, and gas lights. By the beginning of the twentieth century, the notion of progress was closely linked with technological development, and that linkage intensified in the following decades.
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From page 10... ...
Each of the four areas discussed in this chapter -- industrial performance, health care, national security, and environmental protection -- uses these products in different ways. Progress is more likely if we understand these differences.
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From page 11... ...
In a more mature stage, a science-based industry may still be growing quickly, but it depends ess on the progress of academic scientists. The semiconductor industry, for example, moves at a fast technical pace and requires increasingly detailed knowledge of its materials and, as the individual transistors buried in its chips become ever smaller, even of new quantum phenomena.
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From page 12... ...
In these areas, productivity gains and product leadership can be attained by a number of strategies largely separate from scientific research but highly dependent on engineering, such as developing new technology in corporate laboratories, improving the development cycle to hasten the marketing of improved products, better coordination of design and manufacture, maximizing the creative capabilities of employees, and responding quickly to changes in consumer preferences. Additional university research can help, but it will be of peripheral importance to such industries.
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From page 13... ...
The most visible public policy issue in health care today is cost.2 Many of the medical products generated by research and development, such as vaccines, actually reduce total health care costs. Other new products derived from research and development, such as complex imaging devices and expensive surgical procedures, raise costs in the short term while enhancing overall care.
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From page 14... ...
For example, technological superiority in the hands of a well-trained military contributed greatly to the success of the Persian Gulf War. The United States will continue to rely on this strategy to retain military advantage, but the sources of new military technology are shifting.3 In the past, the segment of industry that has supplied both hardware and software to the U.S.
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From page 15... ...
At the same time, science and technology have exposed new issues of great complexity and uncertain consequences, such as global warming, acid precipitation, the destruction of the stratospheric ozone layer, and the contamination of water supplies. By the middle of the twenty-first century, the human population is projected to double to around 11 billion people, and, to meet their basic needs, the global economy will need to be several times larger than it is now.4 Many industrial and agricultural practices and products used today in energy and food production, transportation, and manufacturing will need to be restructured to prevent pollution if sustainable economic growth is to be achieved.
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From page 16... ...
Similarly, many new technologies are increasingly reliant on science -- whether the new science emerging from research laboratories or the well-established science available to everyone with the necessary training. Engineering, increasingly science-based, could not have achieved its present level of sophistication without its base of scientific knowledge.
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