Science and Technology is our time:
Today we live on "Faith in Science" (Ortega and G.), i.e. it is taken as a measure of truth. She has made possible the "miracles" of television, computer... And behind them there is a mysterious "God" (beneficent or evil?).
Science-Technique and man of today go United: Our way of being, thinking and living, are not explained without it: We are the "Homo tecnicus".
Living "accelerated" is explained by the technology reigning: The engine is innovation, the internal demands of development and expansion of the technological system. One lives in the face of the future that is made present instantly, it is almost a "future-present" that quickly becomes "passed". There is no "tranquillity," but we live in a constant "expectation of the future."
The man of today lives in a continual "to adapt": in the Antiquity to know a million data was to know "everything"; Today it represents only 0.01% of the knowledge.
But Science and Technology ARE NOT NEUTRAL. Behind them there are a series of values and knowledge: ways of seeing and valuing reality, which impose concrete forms of culture.
The principles of efficiency and economic rationality.
Rationally acceptable morality.
Drawbacks and Advantages:
Disadvantages: The Uncontrolled ecialist power of science and technology:
Which entails dehumanization, as it restricted the framework of human freedom, dilutes moral responsibility in decision-making, prevents man from owning his social destiny.
Advantages
The domination of nature: possible to eliminate poverty and misery (material and intellectual); Overcoming the disease, premature death.
The hope of the man of today is in the science and technique:
But it should not fall into the naivety of the modern age, when it was thought that science "by itself" sufficed to liberate man, and achieve infinite prosperity and wellbeing.
You have to be realistic: modern science and technology has brought well-being, but also war (World I and II). The "Machine" (Aristotle) can be used to liberate life, or to end life.
Science and technology presents lights and shadows: wealth-poverty; Liberationslavery; Vitality-death; Standard of living-atrofia of thought. This is especially evident in the "Atrofia of Language" (Horkheimer): "There are many words, but individual language is silent... Television speaks, those who see it remain mute...contact with reality is taken THROUGH TV. "
Difficulty Solving these problems:
Because being "new" Today's man feels disorientd.
Because it tends to go to historical solutions: Oriental Wisdom, escapism towards subcultures; Contemplative mysticism.
Because It is forgotten that the solution must be in the context of the technique (which has led man to unimaginable well-being, and that enables the peace and liberation of all). When a ship threatens to sink, it should not be "thrown overboards", "back to barbarism"...; But we must keep the boat (the technique) by healing the "escape" routes through which the water penetrates.
The solution is both in the technique, and in the face of its inadequacy, in the philosophy, which denounces the barbarity and intolerance and orients on the way to follow: This IS the CHALLENGE OF philosophy today.