Why should I be interested in science and technology?

Answer 1

You cannot run very fast or for a long period of time. By capturing and domesticating a horse, you can harness its speed and power for short gain. A saddle, stirrups, and harness are technologies that improve your ability to perform other activities on horseback, such as throwing a spear or lassoing a calf.

The ox is much stronger than you are. You can furrow a field for agriculture with a stick, but you can turn a lot more earth with a team of oxen hitched by a yoke to a plow. This technology permits you to grow more food for yourself and your family, and to increase your status, your social standing, among friends and neighbors.

You can pummel enemies with your fists, or strangle them one by one with your hands. But to kill more effectively you might interdict hostile populations with explosive missiles guided by inertialless systems or targeted with lasers. Imagine the firepower of an F15 Strike Eagle. Air to air sidewinder missiles which you can fire and forget in aerial dogfights. 50 millimeter cannon great for strafing enemy columns and formations on the ground. If Napoleon Bonaparte had a couple of F15s (and the support systems they require), his outcome at Waterloo would have been vastly different. The Japanese Zero was a fiercesome weapon during World War II, causing the United States much anguish, grief, and hardship. We finally responded with the P-38 Lightning, and the P-51 Mustang, which helped turn the tide of war in our favor. Then, of course, there was the technology of nuclear fission, which brought about the sudden end of those hostilities and has helped maintain the peace ever since.

Today we face the situation where radical zealots armed with box cutters have defeated our nuclear arsenals. Would it be morally acceptable to incinerate a few hundred thousand people in response? We decided no--at least not with our nuclear technology.

Technology has produced many benefits for our species. We have probed the most distant edges of our universe, and have peeked back in time to its birth 13.7 billion years ago. We have answered many questions as to our origins, through biological evolution, and the science of genetics, Paleontology, and nuclear physics (used in that case in the absolute dating of fossils through the clever measurement of isotope ratios). Science and technology have improved the standard of living for billions of people on our planet, so the reasons for interest in these fields are of enormous consequence.