In the 21st century, science and technology have had positive impacts, such as increasing food production, revolutionizing transportation, and improving access to information. But there are also negative impacts, such as environmental pollution, privacy breaches, and weapons development. Let’s discuss the value neutrality of science and technology and emphasize the social responsibility of scientists.

The impact of science and technology in modern society

In the 21st century, the impact of science and technology on modern society is enormous. The invention of chemical fertilizers has increased food production by leaps and bounds to feed the world, and the invention of the steam engine was the foundation of the Industrial Revolution. The birth of the internet made it possible to get information from anywhere in the world in real time, and the rise of railroads and airplanes connected the world’s transportation. New technologies have contributed to human progress in many areas. However, the impact of technology on society is not always positive. The use of chemical fertilizers has caused environmental problems such as eutrophication of groundwater and acidification of soil, and many of the factories built during the Industrial Revolution caused pollution problems. With the development of the internet, there are also ethical issues such as personal information leakage and verbal abuse on the internet using anonymity, and there are technologies that enable genocide such as atomic bombs and weapons of war.
Technology has a profound impact on society, both positive and negative. Despite this, when scientists research and develop new technologies, there is a lack of thought about their impact. There are many reasons for this, but one of them is that scientists believe that technology is value-neutral. The idea that technology is value-neutral justifies scientists in shifting the responsibility for the social impacts of new technologies to the politicians and citizens who use them when they research and develop them. In this section, we’ll discuss whether technology can truly be value-free and, based on that discussion, what social responsibilities scientists have in the modern world.

Value-neutrality of science and technology

Before we talk about the value neutrality of technology, let’s define technology. In the modern era, the boundaries between technology and science have become blurred. “Not all technologies are applications of science, but modern science and technology have multiple points of contact where their theories and practices intersect and interact with each other,” says Hong Wook Hong, a professor at Seoul National University (Science and Technology as Productive Forces and Culture, 1999:193). Just as the discovery of electromagnetic induction led to the invention of the dynamo, and the invention of the telescope aided in many discoveries about the universe, so discoveries of scientific knowledge lead to the invention of technology, and the invention of technology leads to the discovery of new science. In addition, in modern times, scientific research is often conducted to advance a particular technology, and technology is often developed to advance scientific research in a particular field. These characteristics of modern science and technology make it very difficult in practice to draw a clear line between the two, so in order to discuss whether technology is truly value-free, we will discuss the value neutrality of science as well as technology itself.
The values of technology can be categorized into intrinsic and extrinsic values. Intratechnical values include efficiency, economy, and utility, while extratechnical values include ethical, political, and social values. Because it is difficult to argue whether a technology is value-neutral from all perspectives, and because it is not relevant when discussing the responsibilities of scientists later, we will discuss the value-neutrality of technology in relation to extrinsic values.
From an ethical perspective, each technology can be thought of as fundamentally value-neutral, with value being created by the way it is used. However, technologies are created for specific purposes. While some technologies may not have any ethical value for their intended use, others are more likely to have an undesirable value for their intended use, which gives them a biased ethical value. For example, a firearm or weapon of war is intended to kill. Of course, weapons of war can be used as tools to deter war rather than to kill, so it can be argued that their value is created in the process of use, not by their intended use. If we consider the case of the atomic bomb that was created as a result of the Manhattan Plan, which eventually caused mass destruction, the above argument is an idealized idea, but it does not change the fact that the essential purpose of a weapon of war is to kill, and it is difficult to think that it has an ethically neutral value.
From a political and social perspective, for a technology to be value-neutral, it must not be influenced by any external values during its creation and use. However, the invention of a technology is done in the process of creating something useful for a specific industry, government, or society, and is centered around a specific problem. Within this mode of production, it is difficult to call it value-neutral because it is influenced by group interests and value judgments.
However, as mentioned at the beginning, there is a lot of interaction between science and technology in modern society, and the boundaries between them are quite blurred. In this situation, if the purpose of using a technology is only related to the advancement of science, it is difficult to say that it has a specific value from an ethical point of view, and if the group of scientists who develop it has an independent relationship with society, it can be said to have a neutral value from a political and social point of view. Therefore, in order to discuss whether technology is value-neutral, let’s discuss the value-neutrality of science, including all of these points.
The values of science can also be categorized into intrinsic and extrinsic values. Since the value neutrality of science, like that of technology, relates to the latter, we will discuss it from an ethical and a political-social perspective, respectively.
From an ethical perspective, one might think that scientific facts do not have any ethical value because they deal with propositions that are true or false based on observed evidence. This idea stems from David Hume’s distinction between propositions of fact and propositions of truth, and his statement that “propositions of truth cannot be derived from propositions of fact”. Based on this idea, scientific facts themselves are value-neutral. However, we must take into account that scientific facts affect how people perceive the world and influence their personal values. René Descartes, a 17th-century scientist and philosopher, argued that only humans have souls, and that animals have no souls and are therefore no different from machines. Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution and its associated arguments naturally influenced ethical values about animal cruelty, and the values associated with many religions. Scientific facts may be value-free in isolation, but they are influenced by other values as they are perceived by a person. Considering this, we can say that scientific facts themselves are value-free, but the influence of scientific facts is not value-free. And naturally, the influence of scientific facts affects the reference point for judging the value neutrality of technology.
From a political and social perspective, a society of scientists can be considered value-neutral because it maintains its independence from the world. In this regard, consider M. Gibbons’ description of the changes in the process of knowledge production in science.
In modern times, the process of knowledge production in science has changed from the first form to the second form. In the first mode, knowledge production is purely related to research and takes place in an academic setting, with a community of scholars who are not interested in practical applications. In the second form, knowledge production is negotiated with various stakeholders and reflects their interests. Research is also centered on specific issues or problems, with the goal of being useful to industry, government, or society as a whole (M. Gibbons et al., 1994, The New Production of Knowledge).
Through these changes, the modern society of scientists is being influenced by various external groups. In the process, it is influenced by the values and interests of external groups, so it is hardly value-neutral (How is Science, 2004:114-122). If science is influenced by external values and develops in a direction that is consistent with certain values, the technology that is created based on its theoretical foundation cannot be said to be free from values.

Social responsibility of scientists in modern society

In modern society, it is difficult to say that technology itself is completely free from values in ethical, political, and social aspects. In addition, scientific knowledge, which is the theoretical basis of technology, is also influenced by values in the production process, and the influence of science affects the judgment of the value of technology. Therefore, scientists should strive to consider the social impact of technology as much as the effort they put into developing it. Of course, one could argue that “even if there are value judgment issues related to science and technology, these should be addressed and discussed by experts in the field, such as ethicists, not by scientists.” However, modern technology and science are becoming increasingly complex, and predicting their impact on society requires a deep understanding of technology. Considering this, scientists should also think about the impact and value of technology while developing it.
In fact, recent research ethics in science and technology is presented as a comprehensive concept that includes the social responsibility of scientists based on this idea. In particular, the 12 ethical codes of scientists proposed by American ethicist D. B. Resnik include the item of social responsibility, where he suggests that scientists should avoid harming society and strive to create social benefits (Kor. J. Aesthet. Cosmetol., Vol. 10 No. 2, 2012:198-199). It is said that even when crossing a stone bridge, we knock on it before crossing it, but shouldn’t we think more deeply about it and knock on it from various angles before crossing a bridge made with modern science and technology?