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Example research essay topic: Science And Religion Science And Technology - 2,800 words

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Why Technology is considered virtually as sacred to modern man as religion We live in the world of high technology, surrounded by numerous products of mans creativity. Within all the way of developing the technology, the results of mans work were intended to help people rationalize and improve work efficiency. Basically, technology was supposed to make human life comfortable. In this paper, we will look at all the advantages as well as disadvantages that the existing technology brings. We will also discuss negative impact of the technology which is responsible for the alienation and frustration of growing number of people. We will try to look at technology as a product of science and as a cornerstone of capitalism, discussed by Marcuse.

It is also important to underline significant influence of the technology on the development of human society and great reliance of people on this product of our civilization. Marcuse considers technology as a product of human development that changes nature. The technology became the basis for the economic structure of our society. Marcuse describes technology as an end in itself. It appears to exist by itself as a living thing with its own demands and goals. Technology, as the foundation of capitalism, creates the world of its own sets of values.

From this point, life as a purpose is not important. Life becomes some type of means. Life is subordinated to labor, making the progress of technology proceed. Productivity is an end in itself and leads to self-destruction.

This is the main idea of Marcuse in his work. According to Marcuse, the machine process generates a mechanics of conformity, where individuals are stripped of their individuality, not by external influence, but by the rationality under which they live. (Marcuse 1961: 44 - 49). This mechanics of conformity directs performance not only in the plants and factories, but also in the schools and offices. Human well-being is subordinate to the demands of efficiency and profits.

What happens to the individuality, if it is of no impotence to the technology? Technology itself became of much interest as the means of gaining capital for the people. But, in the same way, modern men become the product of the technology being led by its value and goals. This is the source of frustration of growing number of people, who live not according to their own values, but to the values of technological progress. The development of industrial capitalism created economic and social relations, in the form in which they appear now. It brought hope that science and technology would help build a better life.

It promised to eliminate many problems in medicine, communication, and transportation and in other directions of industrial development. Technology were to transform society and reduce suffering. But, together with progress, associated problems come. Technology influenced the development of the society. Capitalistic rules substituted moral commandments. Separation occurred between the individual and society, when society no longer facilitated individuality.

According to Marcuse, this change was brought about by the rise of the factory system and the alienation of labor which lifts the goal of gaining capital over everything else. Commodity production was aimed to efficiency, simplification and synchronization of work. Technology destroys, or, it is better to say, substitutes individuality. It changes rationality into technological rationality.

In this sense, technology became sacred to modern man. In my opinion, it leads to confusion you do not know what the purpose of your life is, when you lose your individuality and live like a machine. The support of my opinion is the words of Marcuse. He says that the technologies of production change consciousness of people making them slaves of industrial progress. How is a person called, when his individuality is substituted by the algorithms of technological rationality? The capitalist employment of technology can be summarized by the formula: technological progress = more wealth of society = more slavery (Marcuse 1972: 13).

Marcuse says that living labor transforms itself into dead labor. There is also a dialectical position in Marcuse's view. Society and technology are related dialectically. There are interrelationships and mutual dependencies.

Technology can be seen as a part of society system. Society influences technology in such a way that it can design technologies and decide how they should be applied. In its turn, technology influences society. Social changes emerge. On the one level, we have the emergence of social consequences, on the other, the emergence of new technologies. The consequences can not be fully foreseen.

Therefore, unwanted effects appear. The application of technology causes social problems like alienation and frustration of people. Their capitalistic values lead them to praise technology as god. The technology becomes as sacred to modern man as religion. Lets return to the reasons that drive technological progress.

Marcuse considers technological society to be a system of domination. At some points in Marcuse's works one could get the imagination that he sees technology itself as domination. He says that not only the usage of technology is domination, but also that technology is domination over nature and humans. (Marcuse 1965 b: 179). Sometimes, Marcuse was put in line with technological determinists such as Ellul, Heidegger and Mumford, to whose view we will come later.

But in fact, Marcuse criticized the technological pessimists many times. He said that all programs with anti-technological character serve those who see human needs as a side-product of the development of technology. (Marcuse 1941: 315 f). Marcuse, at the same time, points out that certain developments are a necessary foundation for the historical level of mankind. It is necessary to make use of technology in order to establish a world of freedom, a world without misery and fear.

But it is also possible, Marcuse argues, that technological developments lead to standardization of thinking and acting. It leads to the consequences that we have already discussed. There is no longer any intellectual growth because people are only given tasks which they can perform. It leads to subjective thinking. Standardization reduces the individual to a state of self-preservation.

Standardization also leads to a denial of all things which cannot be touched, used or observed. In a word, it leads to the exception of all tangible and denial of all intangible. As the religion is an intangible thing and is based on belief, such position denies faith. But the sacred place still remains and has to be filled.

The technology, which tangible and productive, takes its place. Consequently, this attitude spreads throughout the entire social sphere to the extent that relationships between people are "mediated by the machine process. (Mitcham 1984: 48 - 50). What is the real and moral purpose of technology? It only lets us hope that the technological processes of mechanization might release individual energy into a realm of freedom.

The individual would be set free from the load that world is putting upon him. And the will not be guided by alien needs and alien possibilities. Complete automation in the realm of necessity would open the dimension of free. This would be the historical transcendence toward a new civilization. (Marcuse 1964: 37).

Marcuse finally states that, in order to escape the discussed problem in the society, technology, in the basis of its concept, always has to be changed. Another technology in another society would mean technology as art that adds value to the beautiful. This would be the opposite of the technology that dominates todays repressive society. Heidegger presents a vision of technology as an a priori mode of the Real presenting itself. It is not humans inventing technology and then subordinating themselves to it, the author says. This view states that people invented an idol, in the form of technology, and subordinated themselves to it.

It appeared in the mind of a man, and through him it became real. It sounds a little confusing, but the author underlines the ultimate nature of the technology. And it is up to man to perceive technology as sacred. Science is effective, Bryan Appleyard writes, but what does it tell us about ourselves, how we must live in our world? The brief answer to this is: nothing. (Appleyard 1992: 43). If science were merely a methodology, subordination to technology would not be a serious problem.

But today technology has become the dominant way of understanding the world and our place in it. It shapes our political lives, our economics, our health, and even our understanding of ourselves. The power of science also spells trouble for liberal democracy, Appleyard insists, for it advances the idea that for every problem there is a technical solution. It puts aside questions of ultimate value and purpose as mere opinions. Since these opinions are subjective, they carry no weight in the public life. And yet, he says, "People have values, convictions, preferences and loyalties by which they order the world and make it work.

How can they be free?" Science, writes Appleyard, "makes it difficult to sustain either a morality or a spiritual conviction. A scientific man finds that he cannot even defend his ultimate position, probably, because he does not see a reason for it. One of science's most stunning achievements, in Appleyard's view, is the defeat of religion. The energy, power, and effectiveness of science has today weakened the spiritual beliefs.

While religion may answer questions that science does not, the source of its answers are no longer believed, and therefore neither are its answers. Instead, religion uses scientific approach to sustain its credibility. Scientific proofs of the divine nature of the Bible, for instance. Attempts have been made to reconcile religion and science.

But according to Appleyard, it is "idle to pretend, as many do, that there is no contradiction between them. Science contradicts religion as surely as Judaism contradicts Islam -- they are absolutely and conflicting views. " (Appleyard 1992: 108 - 120). Technology, as the product of science, and religion are two major forces shaping our world. How do they relate to each other and what differences do they have in they coexistence? Even in this dimension of our thinking and discussing our topic, it becomes easy to confuse technology and religion. This way, it is not surprising that technology leads men to frustration.

People seek to develop technology and do not seek to reveal themselves. Some people think of science and religion as separate domains. Other people think of science and religion as overlapping domains. In the result, warfare arises from such conflicting claims, or harmony appears from the similar claims. Science and religion appear to be the duality.

One important and often neglected similarity is the human face of science and religion. They both define the human experience, seeking to reach beyond, specific historical, political, and ideological contexts. (Grote 1984: 98). Jacques Ellul says that today we are overwhelmed by the Myth of Work and overcome by the of technological accomplishment, that the humanity is so proud of. Church begins to justify it, and to justify technique. Because technique is a great human achievement, we have to legitimize it.

Why did we come to the question of Church? It helps us understand how technology can be as sacred for people as religion. This way, we will be able see the picture in a different perspective. It looks like Ellul with his works helps us to do it.

Technology is the creation of men God created man man created technology. When man created technology, he implemented his divine nature of ability to create. Technology, based on universal duality like 0 and 1, represents a mirror of divine nature of man. Technology is the proof of man divine nature. Man created an idol, whom he loved so much that he stood in restless service to him. Technology, as any creature, can bring good the same as bad.

Ellul went in the way beginning of human Biblical existence. He take Adam in Eden to explain the essence of technology and its ability to bring good as well as bad to the world. It was necessary to have a tool for cultivation land in Even. But, as Ellul states, the text of the Bible does not say only "to cultivate" but it says to cultivate and to guard. Therefore, we have to conclude that if Adam needed tools for cultivation, then he also needed weapons for guarding.

The two things are identical. If Adam's work was the point of departure, the beginning and the justification of technique, then his mission to guard was the point of departure, the beginning and the justification for police and armies. Is this not unlikely? It could not be more so. And if we reject weapons then we have to reject tools as well.

Nevertheless, those who argue for technique in Eden still maintain that Adam was charged with ruling over creation and, in the present world, it is precisely technique that is the route to this dominion. (Barbour 1980: 132). Since then, the desire for domination and possessing power, for protection or any other reasons, becomes the main motive for technology development. Technology appear to be false god for modern man, leading away from the morality and individuality. It gives power and independence in decision making. A crime can be committed on the basis of technological values. In this case, psychological justification can be found, as moral principles do not have much value.

Lewis Mumford, in his book, puts the problems of the misuse of technology into the widest possible historical context: the modern "religion" of technology is based upon a misconception of human origins and human nature. Furthermore, our modern doctrine of progress appears to be merely a "scientific justification" for practices the ruling classes. He concerns on the analysis of the anatomy of technological origins and inner workings as well as their historic consequences. This way, he emphasizes the importance of history as to the technology phenomenon. In developing his theory of the mega machine, he was not very concerned with writing objective history than with writing usable history, that serves as a guide to life. (Munford 1982: 46). Historically, the development of science and technology obtained more and more value in human lives.

Within time, science explained more and more things that the church could not. It gave a strong motive for the development of the technology. Finally, it crept into the sacred part of the human heart, leaving almost no space for the faith. And there was a justification for that: faith did not satisfied all human needs. After discussing the present and the past of the technology, lets look at the perspective that the future brings.

The pick of technology is cloning. It perfectly ads everything that was said about the divinity of technology for modern people. We also referred to the responsibility of technology for malaise, that is connected with human perception of values. It is another justification as well as confusion. If we just look at what people already know about themselves, we will see how it is easy to consider technology virtually as sacred to modern man as religion, at the time when the first not only explains more, but already creates. The concept of cloning now appears to be simple.

At fertilization, an egg and a sperm unite to form a cell containing all the information needed to make a complete individual. That cell will then divide numerous times, faithfully duplicating and passing on to all cells, all of the genetic information in the original fertilized egg. In a human adult, this comes to some 60 trillion cells, each one of which carries the entire genetic blueprints that were in the sperm and egg. Thus, in principle, every cell in our bodies contains all the genes needed to turn it into a full human being.

Where will the technology lead humanity? This is a very difficult question. The answer lies on a very sensitive scale of human chose between power and morality. The heart of the first is on the earth in the appearance of technological progress, and the heart of the second is on the heaven. The interdependence and coexistence of these two leaves us hope for the future. Words: 2 665 Bibliography: Adams, Robert M.

Paths of Fire: An Anthropologist's Inquiry into Technology in the Making of the Modern West. Princeton University Press, 1996. Appleyard, Bryan. Science and the soul of modern man. New York: Doubleday, 1992. Barbour, I.

G. Technology, environment, and human values. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1980. Lewis Mumford. Mega machine in Practice.

New York: Praeger Publishers, 1982. Mitcham, C. & Grote, J. Theology and technology: Essays in Christian analysis and exegesis: University Press of America, 1984. Marcuse. Some Social Implications of Modern Technology.

The Institute for Social Research Publication, 1984. Vote, Rudi. Society and Technological Change, third edition. New York: St.

Martin's Press, 1995. web web


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Research essay sample on Science And Religion Science And Technology

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