SIX1015

Science, Technology and Society

Semester 1 2022/2023

LECTURE 1: INTRODUCTION TO SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY & SOCIETY

Group 1: Dr. Maisarah Hasbullah

Group 2: Dr. Suzana Ariff Azizan
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 Lecture outline

DEFINITION BRIEF HISTORY OF SCIENCE WHY STUDY SCIENCE,

TECHNOLOGY AND SOCIETY?

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Definition

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 Science
• Science comes from the Latin "scio" meaning “I know." Scio
derives from the Latin infinitive "scire" meaning "to know.“
“Scientia” in Latin means “knowledge”.
• Human activity that creates and accumulates knowledge by
directly confronting the natural world.
• How?

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• Science is concerned with evidence and
with theory.
• Scientific evidence often comes from
experiments, though some sciences, such
as astronomy and geology, do not do
experiments.
• To explain the evidence, theories are put
forward, and further evidence is often
sought, to see whether the theory accords
with additional observations.

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When did modern science begin?

Translations and
Science in transformation Early modern
earlier science in
civilizations Western Europe

What made it possible for science to acquire prestige and power in Western
Europe by the 17th century?
• Changes that created conducive environment to the birth of science
- Translation of Greco-Arabic science and natural philosophy into Latin
- Establishment of medieval universities
- Emergence of a class of theologian-natural philosophers that encouraged
the use of Aristotelian natural philosophy in the curriculum of universities
- Medieval natural philosophers produced hundreds of questions about
nature, the answers to which included a vast amount of scientific
information.
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The scientific revolution and the new tool of induction

• Most of the questions had multiple answers, with no genuine

way of choosing between them.
• In 16th and 17th century, new answers were proposed by
scholars who found Aristotelian answers unacceptable or
inadequate.
• From philosophical point of view, the most important
development during the Scientific Revolution was the
increasingly widespread break with the theories of Aristotle.

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• Copernican revolution- a shift in beliefs about the solar
system and the wider cosmos, from geocentrism to
heliocentrism

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• In 1542, the astronomer Nicolas Copernicus (1473-1543)
published a book attacking the geocentric model of
universe, which placed the stationary earth at the centre of
the universe with the planets and the sun in orbit around it.
• Geocentric astronomy, also known as Ptolemaic astronomy
after the ancient Greek astronomer Ptolemy, lay at the heart
of the Aristotelian world-view, and had gone largely
unchallenged for 1,800 years.

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• The heliocentrism conflicted not only with the Aristotelian
picture of the universe, it also conflicted with the traditional
understanding of the Book of Genesis and other Christianity
doctrines.
• Need to replace with a set of beliefs, propagate new ways of
thinking.

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• Among the propagandists was Francis
Bacon (1561-1626) who proposed a new
method for the sciences to replace that of
Aristotle.
• He published Novum Organum to replace
Aristotle’s Organon.

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• The French philosopher, mathematician and scientist
Rene Descartes (1596-1650) developed a radical new
mechanical philosophy, according to which the physical
world consists simply of inert particles of matter
interacting and colliding with one another.

An automaton of a duck, inspired by the mechanical

philosophy, created by Jacques de Vaucanson in 1739.
René Descartes had written, “I have described this earth,
and indeed this whole visible world, as a machine,” and
under the spell of the mechanistic philosophy, even
animals and the human body came to be pictured as
machines rather than living organisms. (source)
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Isaac Newton’s (1643-1727) masterpiece was his Mathematical Principles
of Natural Philosophy, published in 1687, improved Descartes’ laws of
motion and rules of collision. Newton’s three laws of motion and principle
of universal gravitation.
 Newtonian physics provided the framework for science for the next 200 years. The 18 th and 19th centuries both saw notable scientific
advances, particularly in the study of chemistry, optics, energy, thermodynamics, and electromagnetism.

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 Technology
• Greek word “techne” = "craft, art, skill or the way a thing is
gained/ tool“; “logos”= “word, thought”
• Application of knowledge for practical purposes, to make
things and achieve humanly useful results.
• In a broad sense, technology includes the use of fire and stone
axes and thus antedates science.
• Unlike science, moreover, technology is common in some form
to every human culture that has ever existed.

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• Technology is not necessarily an application of science. It
can be based on craft rather than science, with knowledge
being slowly accumulated and applied (often through trial
and error) and passed on from one generation to the next.
E.g irrigation systems
• More and more, technology is being influenced by scientific
knowledge, with spectacular results.-R&D. They are all
carried out in social, political and economic contexts.

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 Society

Some definitions of society:

• an organized group of people associated as members of
a community
• an organized group of persons associated together for
religious, cultural, scientific, political, patriotic, or other
purposes.
• a highly structured system of human organization for
large-scale community living that normally furnishes
protection, continuity, security, and a national identity
for its members. Such a system characterized by its
dominant economic class or form: middle-class society;
industrial society.
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• Society can be applied to science and technology. Scientists
and technologists do not work in isolation. They work in
universities, firms or research groups.
• Questions about ethics and conduct within these groupings,
how they should be financed and how they are best
organised, are also matters which researchers in Science,
Technology and Society can ask about.

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WHY STUDY SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY AND SOCIETY?

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The Relationship between Science, Technology and Society

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• The science understanding of how the world functions alters
how we behave. Technology alters how we can behave.
• Society drives technological innovations and scientific inquiry.
• Science gives us insight into what kind of technologies we
could potentially create and how to create them, while
technology allows us to conduct further scientific research.

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• The fact that science is always the product of human activity.
• We are all familiar with terms such as the 'progress of science'
or the 'onward march of technology', and we tend to forget
that all scientific knowledge has been produced by people
thinking, believing, arguing, and sometimes making mistakes.

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• Human beings can always decide what research is done, and
what is done with the results
• Science and technology are not the product of some
unstoppable force, but are human products which both shape,
and are shaped by, the society from which they emerge.

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• Science and technology has brought lots of benefits and
opportunities to humankind, but there are increasing concerns
over science and technology due to many reasons such as the
use of S&T in WWII and Vietnam war.

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• Issues in science and technology
- Threats to human survival
- Ethical dilemmas
- Disparities
- Social conflict
…etc.

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 • To explore science and technology
from different perspectives
• To gain more understanding about
So..why influence of science and technology
on society and vice versa
should YOU • To learn issues in science and
learn STS? technology
• Towards becoming a well-rounded,
socially responsible professional in
science or nonscience

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Main references

Bridgstock, M., Burch, D., Forge, J., Laurent, J., & Lowe, I. (1998). Science, technology
and society: an introduction. Cambridge University Press.
Bucchi, M. (2004). Science in society: An introduction to social studies of science.
Routledge.
Grant, E. (1997). HISTORY OF SCIENCE: When Did Modern Science Begin?. The
American Scholar, 66(1), 105-113.
McGinn, R. E. (1991). Science, Technology and Society. New Jersey: Prentice Hall.
Sismondo, S. (2004). An introduction to science and technology studies. Chichester:
Wiley-Blackwell.- Chapter 1

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