World views and Technologies
I was recently in a quick and dirty (short and sweet) discussion about technology versus world view. While the conversation didn't last long...it made me start to wonder a bit.
How is technology crucial to changing cultures and how is world view important? Basically, do cultures and peoples who are at a disadvantage technologically also suffer from a world view that puts them at a disadvantage? Which is more important?
I have no answers...but I did start to more clearly define technology for myself, because those in my short and sweet discussion seemed to have a different definition then I was working with.
So a few definitions thanks to dictionary.com :
- the sum of the ways in which social groups provide themselves with the material objects of their civilization. (based on Random House unabridged).
- Anthropology The body of knowledge available to a society that is of use in fashioning implements, practicing manual arts and skills, and extracting or collecting materials. (American Heritage Dictionary)
- The specific methods, materials, and devices used to solve practical problems. (American Heritage Science Dictionary)
These definitions are the ones I work under. That technology is a set of tools which humans (and in fact non-humans use tools - nests, hives, dams etc) to manipulate their environment.
Most of the definitions listed included the idea of science. The idea that technology was solely scientific and a matter of industry. Even the first example above uses the idea that civilization is a requirement, as though people's in cultures that are not city based don't have their own technologies (or body of knowledge) to benefit themselves.
This then takes me back to the idea of world view.
- The overall perspective from which one sees and interprets the world.
- A collection of beliefs about life and the universe held by an individual or a group.
- American Heritage Dictionary
A groups ability to adapt or overcome difficulty include 1/their world view 2/their ability to use and adapt technologies.
This reminds me of a discussion I had off and on with a classmate of mine in grad school. It basically centers around the power of thought and that by changing our minds or changing our perspectives or by changing our world views we can dramatically change the world around us. And I agreed, to a certain extent. But this perspective has a limitation that is crippling. It places an individual or a community in a position of passivity if all you have to do is think and not take action. It suggests that we will change instead of create it. And oftentimes the changes we are facing and must create are happening to us propelled by outside forces.
For example, the media is covering a global food crisis that is reaching an extreme. It's not new, but it is reaching a pinnacle of problems and even the World Bank President Robert B. Zoellick acknowledges that is is a man-made disaster. Organizations such as the World Bank and the UN are grasping to end short term crisis while encouraging reform of the corporate system to include a lowering of production for fuels as well as an increase of production in developing countries through 'green agriculture' techniques. They also encourage developing countries not to 'hoarde' their food by implementing export bans.
Farmers who rely on their production to feed themselves are not planting because of the costs associated with a corporate food system. Fertilizers are based on petroleum and these costs are rising. Food corporations such as Monsanto have heavily introduced terminator seeds which require a farmer to buy yearly seeds stock instead of using seeds from their own crops. The seeds simply won't grow.
Without technological solutions to this problem, changing perspectives will do no good. Food Security supporters can talk all they want about access to healthy foods, but without technologies (or ways for social groups to meet their material needs) individuals remain hungry. In the US, the development of local food systems (government dependent through Food and Farm bill as well as independent such as small farms) is a response.
How can these concepts be brought or encouraged in regionally adapted manners worldwide? Without actions and technologies, the status quo of oil based trade-first agriculture production will continue and short term crisis will become long term disasters.
