Do you think technology/science is going too far?

Originally posted by warpboost
sardion2000, I understand the point that we need more scientists just fine. My point is that not everyone or even 15% of the population can be a scientist.

I do not believe that to be true. Why would you think that? Tuition cost for undergraduate schools is at about $5k per year, plus books and other material. I think Coolidge (was it?) said it best: "The business of the American people has always been business." I don't know, maybe we have become a loan society. Hand out loan, spend, bankrupt, repeat.

I also wonder if that statistic factors in other fields like engineering, or industrial design??? Even in a commercial company the scientists doing research makes up a small portion of it because they need people directing the scientists on what to research next, people to engineer products around their breakthroughs, sales and marketing people to bring it to market, HR to make sure the scientists get paid etc..

Do we have enough engineers? I do not know. Japanese businesses said during the 1980's our engineers were inept to take lab advances and turn them into products. Only 50k engineer graduates a year in the US compared to 200k in Japan. I also hate hearing people whine in my math classes saying "math is too hard' or 'the instructor might as well be speaking french'. I just have a lot to gripe about.

Science isn't going too far, it's just not on the right heading.

I believe that technology can never go too far, it can only go in the wrong direction.

Technology is no different from any other creation of mankind- it is what you make it. The quality of the people who create something will directly affect the beneficial or detrimental nature of the technology.

We can build new weapons to fight over oil, or we can find better sources of energy. We can make seeds that are only good once, to keep the price of crops high, or we can make seeds that survive better and yield more food.

It's not science and technology that have gone too far. It's economics and government that have gone too far. If we can reform the latter, technology is far less likely to go in the wrong directions.

Originally posted by Frosty
Do we have enough engineers? I do not know. Japanese businesses said during the 1980's our engineers were inept to take lab advances and turn them into products. Only 50k engineer graduates a year in the US compared to 200k in Japan. I also hate hearing people whine in my math classes saying "math is too hard' or 'the instructor might as well be speaking french'. I just have a lot to gripe about.

You may find this article of interest. I refers to a Duke study that shows the actual numbers of US engineers graduating is undercounted (by about 3 times!!!) and other countries like Inida and China's numbers may be inflated!

www.redherring.com...

Originally posted by warpboost

Originally posted by Frosty
Do we have enough engineers? I do not know. Japanese businesses said during the 1980's our engineers were inept to take lab advances and turn them into products. Only 50k engineer graduates a year in the US compared to 200k in Japan. I also hate hearing people whine in my math classes saying "math is too hard' or 'the instructor might as well be speaking french'. I just have a lot to gripe about.

You may find this article of interest. I refers to a Duke study that shows the actual numbers of US engineers graduating is undercounted (by about 3 times!!!) and other countries like Inida and China's numbers may be inflated!

www.redherring.com...

That is China and India. I made no mention of China and India. so now I am to assume that the article who's study stated 50k now claimed to be 4 too low to also mean that Japan's 200k is 4 too low. Either way, they are ahead of use. The article also made mention of these numbers being one man's 'guesstimate', which is a number I have not heard since the 7th grade. I'd really like to see the original article before making any claims. But I still have a lot to gripe about.

After searching around for the orginal study done by Duke researchers all I could really find is this. I searched for "engineers undercounted" on duke.edu and found this.

www.philly.com...


[edit on 14-1-2006 by warpboost]

I seriously don't think that tech is going too far and neither is science, I don't think science/tech will ever go that far because it's an improvement in the human life so why on earth would you try to stop it if it's improving the lives of others and making life easier than it has to be I mean yes we can't just invent something so that people never have to walk again because that causes obesity levels to go shooting up but most tech/sci is for the greater good, therefore we should try to be happy for what scientists have learned at created for us instead of protesting! Atleast, in my opinion...And if we tell scientists to just quit then they're out of jobs too and it becomes harder to get decent pay/jobs and from the info we already have we can discover a lot about the planet earth, solar system, mother nature, animals, human, health, dieseases e.t.c then we ever have before and again it does not make sense for us to try to stop that from happening so in conclusion, people stop trying to create issues! We're fine!

technology is nowhere near where it needs to be, and won't be for some time. Until we can develop advanced AI and robots to perform most functions we will continue to be slaves to our own cause. So many humans with so much potential are tied up in dead end jobs that do nothing to further the advancement of the species. With AI and robotics doing all or most o fthe labour intensive jobs, humans can be freed up to work on the problems facing mankind. We have so much untapped knowledge trapped in people who given the oppurtunity could bring about real change, but instead spend thier time laying brick or pushing paper.