Definitions
As in previous postings, in the following I consider "science" to refer to modern science, with its prototypical institutions of professional societies, laboratories, and higher education, and with professional scientists supported by cadres of technicians and other helpers. I am especially interested in the applied sciences, such as applied agricultural research, meteorology for weather and climate forecasting, hydrology for aquifer management, and epidemiology for public health. If I switch to "folk science" or knowledge of the natural or social world found in traditional cultures and cultural institutions, I will try to add a descriptor to make the distinction clear.
Similarly, I consider "technology" to refer to modern technology, with its prototypical institutions of engineering and other professional societies, industrial laboratories, and higher education; members of the science-based professions such as engineers, physicians and agronomists are its prototypical practitioners with their associated paraprofessionals and support personnel. If I switch the discussion to "traditional technology", I will again try to add a descriptor for clarification.
Science includes the natural sciences, the social sciences, and if you wish to have them in a separate category, the behavioral sciences. Thus scientific knowledge includes knowledge of the natural environment of man, or the social environment of man, and of human behavior. Technological knowledge includes knowledge of the man-built environment. Now, with mankind's footprint so heavy on the environment, scientific knowledge increasingly includes knowledge of the interaction of man and the environment.
The Importance of Scientific and Technological Knowledge
Science can be seen as an institution for the creation and validation of knowledge. It is a process in which information is based on observation, and especially replicated observation. The testing and retesting of hypotheses, and the vigor of peer review and professional discourse on the veracity of assertions gives scientific consensus a high level of epistemological validity. So too does the insistence on conformity of theory and observation.
Technological information is tested. Does it work in practice? Indeed, the standards of validation of technological knowledge have left much to be desired in the past, but are improving. Thus blinded case-control studies are increasingly the gold standard for the validation of new medical techniques and pharmaceuticals. Not only do crop scientists test their new crops extensively in the laboratory and the field station, increasingly they are testing them in farmers fields. Modern markets, with their improving information systems including regulatory agencies and consumer groups, provide another means of validation of the quality of technologies embodied in products and manufacturing processes.
Simply, I suggest that modern scientific and technological knowledge systems can produce more accurate and valid information than alternative knowledge systems. Of course, not all nations have scientific and technological knowledge systems of equal quality. The biological information produced in Russia in the Lysenko era was not as good as that produced elsewhere in Europe or North America. Currently, non-scientists in the U.S. government are accused of rewriting the conclusions of scientific deliberations on environmental issues. Some Chinese manufactured goods appear suspect in terms of quality control -- and thus in terms of the technology they embody or the way that technology is used. Indeed, the safeguarding of the integrity of modern scientific and technological knowledge systems within their borders would appear to be a responsibility for every nation, as is the safeguarding of the international scientific and technological knowledge systems a responsibility of the community of nations.
Investment in Scientific and Technological Knowledge Creation
As nations have developed economically, they have tended to spend more on science and technology, and more specifically on research and development -- the creation of scientific and technological knowledge. The following figure suggests that the most developed nations have already saturated the portion of GDP allocated to R&D, spending two or more percent of GDP on R&D. Those nations will spend more on research and development as their GDP's continue to rise, and may spend a greater portion of GDP on R&D if R&D productivity increases or if better means of translating scientific and technological knowledge into profits are institutionalized.
Less developed nations, however, are not only increasing GDP, but increasing the portion of GDP spent on R&D as they progress economically. The BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China) are expected to enter the list of the most powerful economies of the world by 2050, and with other developing nations invest much more in research and development.While, as the figure below shows, North America and Europe currently account for almost two thirds of global research and development expenditures now, Asia is already accounting for almost one third, and is likely to have a larger share in the future. Of course, lower costs in poor countries can result in more knowledge produced per dollar spent on research and development.
It seems likely, given the rapid pace of globalization, that firms will increasingly invest in R&D in new labs and new countries, taking advantage of lower costs and other incentives for doing so.
Thus I suggest that investment in scientific and technological knowledge creation will continue at an even faster pace in the 21st century than in the 20th. Moreover, I expect the global pattern of investment in technological knowledge creation also to shift to include new centers.
The Production of Scientific and Technological Knowledge
Publication of scientific and technological journal articles expanded greatly in the 20th century, and seems likely to continue to expand. It also seems that the rate of technological invention increased, as industrial research laboratories were institutionalized, and as institutions were improved linking research in government and academia with industry.
The geographic pattern of scientific and technological knowledge creation is also changing. As the following chart shows, Europe has recovered from the S&T destruction of the first half of the 20th century, and has surpassed North America in annual scientific and technological publications; Asia is likely to do so soon.
Source: "Scientific Publication Trends and the Developing World,"The American Scientist, Volume: 88 Number: 6 Page: 526
Scientific and technological fields go through stages of development. The 20th century saw the rise of technological systems based on the internal combustion engine, electricity, and new information and communications technologies. I would suggest that the information and communications technologies are still in a growth stage, and that materials technology will be reinvigorated by advances in nanotechnology. I expect to see biotechnology yield very important economic returns in the 21st century, and space technologies and cognitive and brain science based technologies offer grand promise.
It seems clear that there will have to be a major shift in energy technology in the 21st century, since the growth in petroleum based technological systems can not be maintained. One expects nuclear and renewable energy technological knowledge to be generated, with important economic consequences. So too, advancing environmental degradation will put a premium on the scientific and technological knowledge that can be used for sustainable development and for restoration of degraded lands and environments. Indeed, we may see a large scale substitution of communications systems for transportation systems, or of decentralized production systems based on robotics technology.
The Dissemination of Scientific and Technological Knowledge
Scientific information tends to be published, and made freely available. Technological information is often held as proprietary property by the individuals and firms that generate new knowledge, at least for a period of decades.
Schooling has been expanding hugely over time, and as GapMinder's education tool reminds us, while schooling is a far scarcer service in poor countries than in rich, it is expanding everywhere. The expansion of university education is especially noteworthy, and reached some 70 percent of the age cohort in the most schooled countries. The joint trends, of increasing income and increasing schooling at all income levels for developing nations, suggest that education conveying scientific and technological knowledge will be much more common in the 21st than the 20th century.
Schools can be an important place for the transfer of scientific and technological information, and for science and technology knowledge acquisition. In developed nations, there have been decades of effort to improve the science and technology teaching. On the other hand, many school systems in developing nations, handicapped by inadequately prepared teachers and lack of resources, do a poor job, even for those students who attend school for extended periods. Indeed, some schools controlled by those who would reject modernizing influences, indoctrinate students against scientific and technological information and thinking.
Worldwide, people are living longer, healthier lives. The demographic transition that has occurred in rich countries has seen the numbers of children decreasing in the latter part of the 20th century. Those trends suggest that the importance of adult education and lifelong learning is increasing relative to that of childhood education, but also that investment in longer and better childhood education is justified. Still, the communication of scientific and technological information in adult education should be of increasing concern in the 21st century, as people will have longer working lives, face greater technological change, and be confronted with a growing body of scientific and technological knowledge.
The media also provide an important source for non-formal scientific and technological information dissemination. Popular science journalism in print and broadcast media are important in developed nations already.
Digital is replacing print on paper. The Global Information Infrastructure development (see the graphs below) is allowing faster transmission of scientific and technological information, and online publications seem likely to replace print on paper journals for much of the dissemination of scientific and technological information.
Source: World Telecommunication/ICT Development Report 2006:Measuring ICT for social and economic development
One of the results of these trends is that people in developing nations are more connected to sources of scientific and technological information than ever in the past, and are likely to be much more connected in the foreseeable future.
The Stock of Scientific and Technological Knowledge
The global stock of scientific and technological knowledge has been growing throughout the 19th and 20th centuries, and as investments in research and development and scientific and technological knowledge creation are further enhanced in the coming century, the stock should grow faster still.
Scientific and technological information storage is being revolutionized in response to the Information Revolution. Not only are vast amounts of information increasingly available via the Internet and World Wide Web, but knowledge is increasingly embodied in machines.
Scientific and technological knowledge depreciates with time, and it seems likely that it will depreciate more rapidly in the next century than it did in previous centuries, at least for many societies. Technological knowledge depreciates as new technologies are invented that are more efficient than the old. Social science knowledge depreciates as social conditions change and the results of the scientists become outdated. Natural science knowledge depreciates as natural conditions change, or as new and better knowledge outdates that which exists.
An issue is whether the appropriate scientific and technological knowledge is accessible. The appropriate technological knowledge depends on the factor endowments of the specific location where productive activity is to take place; labor intensive, capital saving technologies are needed for poor nations, and labor saving, capital intensive technologies for rich nations. So too, knowledge from the natural sciences on tropical systems is needed in the tropics and on temperate systems in temperate climates. All too often, knowledge stocks in the past have been centralized in rich countries, and inappropriate knowledge has been transmitted to those in poor nations.
Globalization suggests that the global patterns of industrial production will continue to change over the next century, and indeed may change even more rapidly than in the past. Thus newly industrializing countries may well be seeking not only larger stocks of locally available scientific and technological knowledge, but more rapidly changing local stocks.
Institutions
It has been suggested that large scale organizations grew in the 19th and 20th centuries because they were successful, and that they were successful because they institutionalized more successful knowledge systems than alternatives such as markets and traditional institutions of production and governance. It has also been noted that many organizations are outsourcing functions, using inter-organizational market information processes rather than intra-organizational bureaucratic information processes, because the new technologies redress the balance making markets more efficient than bureaucracies for some functions. The trends in changes in relative institutional efficiencies for dealing with scientific and technological knowledge seem likely to have profound implications for the 21st century.
In developed nations, scientific and technological knowledge systems have become profoundly interlinked with a wide range of institutions. The industrial research laboratory is a prototypical example of a element of both the technological knowledge system and the bureaucratic, organizational knowledge system. Other examples abound: forensic science in the criminal justice system, biomedical science in the medical system, agricultural science in the farming system. Indeed, in developed nations, scientific and technological knowledge have largely replaced traditional knowledge systems in many ways -- "old wives tales" are seen as archaic rather than as a legitimate, authoritative source of information.
On the other hand, the "culture wars" are significantly rooted in social conflict as to the more or less legitimacy and authority of scientific and technological knowledge systems versus religious and other traditional knowledge systems. Just think about the controversies over evolution, stem cell research, birth control, etc. The conflict between the Bush administration and the scientific community over the use and misuse of scientific information in government can be seen as an example of a clash between political and scientific knowledge systems.
It might be worth emphasizing the degree to which knowledge from the social sciences has been integrated into modern life in developed nations. Organization theory and research informs organizational design and management. Economics has become a key tool of government. Educational systems have been informed by learning theory and other advances in psychology.
In developing nations, the penetration of scientific and technological knowledge systems into other social systems is often far less advanced than in the United States, Japan or Western Europe. People often still look to traditional authorities for information, and still use technologies passed from generation to generation through traditional channels. The traditional practitioner is often the source of advice on health problems, not the doctor; the neighbor is often the source of advice on farming, not the extension worker; people often learn crafts by apprenticing to experienced craftsmen, rather than perusing instruction manuals for new machinery.
Development and modernization will involve legitimizing institutions that deliver better scientific and technological information as authoritative sources in place of traditional institutions. Thus, it will be important to further legitimize modern investment by international industrial firms in developing nations, as those firms internalize important channels for the transfer of appropriate manufacturing and related technologies.
Schools can be an important vehicle for changing the attitudes of their students relating to alternative knowledge systems. The schools can often inculcate students with a preference for religious or scientific sources of information, towards traditional cultural or external cultural sources. Increasingly, as it increasing penetration and quality of services, the media can play a comparable role.
Final Remarks
It seems clear that the 21st century will see poor nations follow the path already taken by the richer nations, substituting scientific and technological knowledge for traditional knowledge in many of their institutions. Indeed, I expect the process to continue in developed nations, and to lead to the obsolescence of traditional knowledge systems in some developing nations.
The process will not be without dispute. People will fight to maintain their authority; institutions have not survived for millennia without means of self protection, promotion and defense. Indeed, the revolutionary expansion of the global communications will place traditional and modern societies in new and uncomfortable proximity, and perhaps exacerbate the inter-society cultural wars.
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