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Introduction: Probable Technologies and Possible Destinies
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20217 |
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Section : |
SPECIAL SECTION
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| Issue
Date : |
1 / 1992 |
2,640 Words |
| Author
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Marcelo Alonso
Marcelo Alonso has retired from his position as principal
research scientist at the Florida Institute of Technology in
Melbourne, Florida. |
Predicting the future has always fascinated and interested mankind. The interest is beyond wanting to know the future, to wanting to be able to influence it in one way or another. This almost universal concern can be summarized in a single question: Can mankind choose its future? This question actually implies three questions: (1) Is it possible to predict a most probable future of mankind? (2) How does mankind, deliberate or not, shape its future? (3) Is it possible for mankind to avoid an undesirable future?
Predicting or influencing the future evolution of a physical system is, in principle, possible. In the simple deterministic world of the French mathematician, Pierre Simon de Laplace (1749-1827), the future of a physical system can be predicted with certainty if we know precisely the initial conditions and the laws regulating the evolution of the system. This is exemplified by the motions of the planets and other bodies in the solar system. However, many physical systems found on earth and all over the universe are much more complex than those known to Laplace. Their future is either unpredictable or, at best, can only be estimated probabilistically. This is the case, for example, with long-term weather forecasting, due to the extreme complexity of atmospheric dynamics.
Predicating the future of mankind in general, or of a social group in particular, is a much more difficult, almost impossible, task. Social evolution is critically affected by ideological, political, religious, and military leaders, whose appearance and subsequent actions are impossible to predict. The "human factors" affecting the development of society are so unpredictable that a comprehensive forecast of the human future must be intrinsically flawed. At best we can guess some possible scenarios.
An unpredictable, irreversible force
Beyond ideology, politics, and religion, one other human factor exerts an enormous influence on social evolution in a profound, practically irreversible, and often unpredictable way. This is the human ability to acquire "knowledge" about the physical world, and to apply this knowledge to create new things that profoundly affect human life. When this unique feature of human beings is carried out in an organized and methodical way it is called "science and technology." Thus understanding the process of science and technology development provides a clue to one of the most important ways by which mankind, either deliberately or not, affects its future, as well as its present.
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