The Big Question: Has Science Improved Humanity?

[dsm]

While watching the movie Contact this morning, I heard one of the people ask (essentially) this question:

Has science been a benefit to humanity?

Thinking about it, I realized that a case could probably be made for both a yes or no answer.

Positives

• Medical science improves lifespan.
• Technology increases productivity.
• Transportation improvements extend our range.

Negatives

• Population increases cause greater living stresses.
• Productivity increases the speed of our lives.
• Greater range adds to medical stresses.

In essense, while science could be said to have (on the whole) improved our individual lives, when looked at across the whole of humanity, has it benefitted humanity or merely made things more complicated?

What do you think?

 

[Chaos]

On the whole, yes, science did make things easier. I´d hate to be sitting in front of my cave, passing smoke signals to my fellow JREF´lers.

Well, seriously...
That´s hard to say. What science has given us is a lot of things with huge potential either to help us or harm us. I can think of very few things that can either only be harmful (the A-bomb comes to my mind) or only helpful (no idea, right now).
Now is it really science´s fault which way we use these things?

 

[LucyR]

I can think of very few things that can either only be harmful (the A-bomb comes to my mind)...

Even that's not necessarily true. Perhaps we would already have had a third world war but for the bomb. So that’s some sort of benefit, presumably. Admittedly, it's probably a Faustian bargain.

I think before trying to answer the question of the thread title, you’ve got to find a way to quantify human happiness. I really have no idea if we're more or less happy than our forbears.

 

[Stimpson J. Cat]

dsm,

In essense, while science could be said to have (on the whole) improved our individual lives, when looked at across the whole of humanity, has it benefitted humanity or merely made things more complicated?

What do you think?

I think your list of negatives is based on some serious misconceptions about what life actually was like for our ancestors.

Let's look at them one by one:

Population increases cause greater living stresses.

Really? What could be more stressful than struggling for survival every single day of your life? Never knowing if you are going to be torn to pieces by a predator, or murdered by another person, or succumb to some mysterious disease which nobody understands? How stressful is losing a child? Imagine a world where only a small fraction of children survive to their 5th year. Sounds pretty stressful to me.

Productivity increases the speed of our lives.

In what sense? Modern people have quite a bit more free time than primitive man did. The idea of a 10 hour workday, followed by 4 hours or so of family time, and 8 hours of uninterrupted sleep, with no worry of being attacked while you sleep, would have seemed like heaven to a primitive human.

Greater range adds to medical stresses.

Which is more than offset by our ability to deal with such medical stresses.


I can honestly not imagine any single way that I am not better off that any human being that lived 10,000 years ago. And every way that I am better off is a result of scientific knowledge and technology.


Dr. Stupid

 

[LucyR]

dsm,



I think your list of negatives is based on some serious misconceptions about what life actually was like for our ancestors.

Let's look at them one by one:

Again, I think you should consider my earlier point. Wasn't it Bertrand Russell who said something like "the aristocratic rebel, because he's not hungry, must find other causes of discontent?"

If you imagine yourself uprooted from where you are and teleported a few thousand years into the pre-technological past certainly you'd be unhappy. Does it follow however, that people who have known nothing but such an environment are necessarily less happy than we are? Are we "happier" than the primitive societies that exist today? It's not obvious to me, one way or another.

 

[Stimpson J. Cat]

LucyR,

Again, I think you should consider my earlier point. Wasn't it Bertrand Russell who said something like "the aristocratic rebel, because he's not hungry, must find other causes of discontent?"

I have considered that point. As I said, I think that to attempt to draw a comparison between the "causes of discontent" in you or I, and the brutal conditions of pre-science man, is to vastly underestimate just how hard life was for them.

If you imagine yourself uprooted from where you are and teleported a few thousand years into the pre-technological past certainly you'd be unhappy. Does it follow however, that people who have known nothing but such an environment are necessarily less happy than we are?

Of course not. What I can say is that we are far more comfortable and healthy than they were. There was far more misery in the average person's life back then, than you or I are likely to ever experience. It is very difficult to be happy when you are burying your children, or starving, or suffering from some horribly debilitating disease. Those were all standard parts of everyday life back then.

Are we "happier" than the primitive societies that exist today? It's not obvious to me, one way or another.

We are much less miserable. If you are not happier than they were, you should be.

I am curious, do you know what it is like to live in misery? I do. I spent a couple of months fighting an illness that nearly killed me. I know what it is like to go for a prolonged period of time during which you are so miserable that only your basic animal instinct for survival keeps you from killing yourself to end the pain.

Try to imagine a world where that is the rule, rather than the exception. A world where most of the people are miserable most of the time. Where most people will die of disease before they reach maturity.

I am sure that there were moments of happiness in the lives of many of those people, but the idea that they were happier than the typical modern person is, in my opinion, completely ridiculous.


Dr. Stupid

 

[hammegk]

I'd say that at the individual/family/friends level, science is very very positive.

The down side is it has also provided means to either destroy all human life on the planet, or at best set it back a few thousand years, with the survivors if any faced with many natural resources badly depleted.

 

[LucyR]

Stimpson, thanks for your reply.

Originally posted by Stimpson J. Cat
Of course not. What I can say is that we are far more comfortable and healthy than they were. There was far more misery in the average person's life back then, than you or I are likely to ever experience. It is very difficult to be happy when you are burying your children, or starving, or suffering from some horribly debilitating disease. Those were all standard parts of everyday life back then.

Perhaps, but in pre-science days you did not suffer from debilitating disease for very long. Also, if such things were standard parts of everyday life, their effect on the mental health of the general population was presumably less severe than what it would be for us. The things you describe also make me think of some aspects of the industrial revolution, btw.

I am curious, do you know what it is like to live in misery? I do. I spent a couple of months fighting an illness that nearly killed me. I know what it is like to go for a prolonged period of time during which you are so miserable that only your basic animal instinct for survival keeps you from killing yourself to end the pain.

Well, I’ve considered suicide a number of times (just how honestly is a good question) for reasons that may seem rather pathetic to other people. I’ve certainly never been faced with an ordeal such as you describe. Also, as I suggested earlier, a person with your illness would have presumably suffered a lot less in pre-science days. They’d probably be dead too, of course.

Try to imagine a world where that is the rule, rather than the exception. A world where most of the people are miserable most of the time. Where most people will die of disease before they reach maturity.

I am sure that there were moments of happiness in the lives of many of those people, but the idea that they were happier than the typical modern person is, in my opinion, completely ridiculous.

Well, I’m not for one moment suggesting that they were. I am just saying, with respect, that the comparison is more difficult to make than you might think.

 

[dsm]

I think your list of negatives is based on some serious misconceptions about what life actually was like for our ancestors.

Possibly. I'm not sure I believe the premise of the thread, but it seemed like such an interesting topic.

What could be more stressful than struggling for survival every single day of your life?

This was not meant to be looked at from the individual perspective, but rather the species as a whole. As the population has increased, the stresses on civilization go up because there is more and more frequent interactions between members of the species. Today, we have to manage not only local, but also global issues. That is different than our caveman ancestors.

Modern people have quite a bit more free time than primitive man did.

I'm not sure I expressed this one well. I was thinking of how, because we can do so much more now than ever before, we are also doing so much more than ever before. It's kind of a globalization effect in that, as our sphere of influence grows, so too does the variety of problems that we are bombarded with.

Which is more than offset by our ability to deal with such medical stresses.

Then why are so many people "stressed out"?

(that includes the stresses of new and deadly diseases that are transported around the world by our greater technology)

I can honestly not imagine any single way that I am not better off that any human being that lived 10,000 years ago. And every way that I am better off is a result of scientific knowledge and technology.

Sure, you have the potential to do things like go to the moon that you never would have had the opportunity to do in the past. However, consider the costs that have been paid in order to provide you with that opportunity (for instance, the V2 rocket that bombed England in WWII).

 

[LucyR]

...for instance, the V2 rocket that bombed England in WWII.

A great many more were fired at Antwerp, but that's neither here nor there.

 

[Tormac]

I don't think that science has improved "humanity", at least in the sense that we are ethically superior, smarter, happier, or better on some emotional level than our ancestors were before the methods of science created our current technological society.

But science has certainly improved the lifestyle and life span of the average human.

I have more safety, security, and wealth than any of my ancestors did two generations ago. The main reason is the wealth that our culture has accumulated, mainly thanks to science and technology.

Materially I have more than my father did when he was my age. Many of my favorite things did not even exist when he was my age. I doubt I am any happier than my father was, or that he was happier than his father was, if happiness is the criteria. Science is good at developing technology, neat new stuff; new vaccines, taller buildings, more powerful telescopes, faster cars. But in and of its self, better stuff should not be the basis of a healthy human's happiness.

 

[dsm]

I have more safety, security, and wealth than any of my ancestors did two generations ago.

I wonder if this is true for the average human being (when factored across 6+ billion)...?

 

[Prospero]

Science Improves Humanity as a Whole

My view on science isn't necessarily its effects on the individual, but on the species as a whole. Consider humanity's ability to combat Nature in general. Diseases, arguably the biggest threat to mankind, can now be quarantined and relatively well understood within months of outbreak, using SARS as an example. I would use HIV in the homosexual population, too. A better knowledge of the virus has led to drastically lower numbers of infected individuals. However, compared to Africa where the knowledge and technology (condoms in this case) are not as prevalent, we are looking at a mass population die-off within the next decade or two.

Or, drawing on my SciFi roots, consider the possibility of expanding to other terrestrial bodies. Multiple populations would result in wider genetic diversity and act as insurance against a mass die-off in the unlikely possibility of a catastrophic meteor, for example. To the species as a whole, science represents what could be considered a new form of evolution. The environment certainly holds little, if any, sway over humanity, thereby significantly reducing evolutionary potential to react and compensate to the environment. While human genetics stagnate due to lack of environmental stresses, science will act as the means of compensating for what biology no longer is capable of doing.

 

[Nyarlathotep]

The easiest way to answer that question, I think, is to ask another question: If you could go back in time 1000 years (well before science had much of an impact on anyones day-to-day life) and stay there, but you had to live like a common person of that era with NO modern conveniences, not so much as a roll of toilet paper, would you want to stay? If not why? Thinking about it in these terms really forces you to think about how much science has impacted human life and in which direction

I can only speak for myself but for me the answer would be a resounding no and most of the reasons would have to do with science. No sanitation, no good medical care, the people being ignorant of things I take for granted. I think science ahs vastly improved human life. Sure it has opened up several cans of worms that need to be adressed, but on the whole I think science is a positive thing.

 

[sorgoth]

I think we morally and ethically superior to the average citizen 2000 years ago.Slavery, dictatorship and torture is BAD.

 

[Dancing David]

Really?

Go to Africa or Central America and ask them which is better.

Crapping in a hole in the ground and giving your self water borne illness vs. modern sanitation

Driving an expensive car vs. riding an expensive horse or donkey

Having intestinal parasites and flukes vs. moderne medicine

Having tooth pain for years on end vs. dentistry(bronze age)

Having food poisoning vs. modern refrigeration

Starving on a seasonal basis vs. modern stoarge systems

Loosing a limb from a minor injury vs. antibiotics

Watching your wife die in childbirth vs. modern obstetrics

Just a few of the wonders od science, not to mention modern furnace and hot showers.

 

[neutrino_cannon]

I would say that science is moraly neutral, so there can be no condemning any scientific advances as bad. Any inappropriate actions we have taken with them are a result of our immaturity, it's like suing a handgun company for shooting yourself in the foot.

While science is moraly neutral, many consider knowlege to be an end unto itself, that is, knowlege has value because it is knowlege. With that in mind, science could be considered a vessel for the procurement of an end.

I would say that aside from any long-standing genetic differences in the species that have resulted from science (ulikely, give our lack of eugenics program), were just the same buch of monkeys with different toys and games.

Sure we live better, and science is solely responsible for any advancements in our standard of living, but whether or not you consider improvent in living conditions an improvement in the species or improvement in our environment is up to debate.

 

[dsm]

The easiest way to answer that question, I think, is to ask another question: If you could go back in time 1000 years (well before science had much of an impact on anyones day-to-day life) and stay there, but you had to live like a common person of that era with NO modern conveniences, not so much as a roll of toilet paper, would you want to stay? If not why? Thinking about it in these terms really forces you to think about how much science has impacted human life and in which direction

I can only speak for myself but for me the answer would be a resounding no and most of the reasons would have to do with science. No sanitation, no good medical care, the people being ignorant of things I take for granted. I think science ahs vastly improved human life. Sure it has opened up several cans of worms that need to be adressed, but on the whole I think science is a positive thing.

I think it was Star Trek that showed that the reverse of your question would also be answered with "no". That is, take someone from 1000 years ago, bring them into the present, and then ask them if they would want to stay. Point is that this way of looking at the question is very subjective.