2011 RI GP Promo Exam

! 2011_ Year 5 Gener~ll Paper Promotion Examination The famously morose philosopher Thomas Hobbes is known for giving the following description of life on earth: "nasty, brutish ahd short." In that context, this description may actually have an uncomfortable modicum of truth ~- in that age, without the advances civilisation embraces today, it could be quite valid to sound the !death knell for human civilisation. But let us glance into the past. and notice all the inventions and innovations that have heralded a new age - the Gutenberg press, the wheel, modem medicine. I felvently believe that science and technology, and the promise they hold, give us hope for the future. I I Science and technology in this !essay, will refer to innovations or advances in our knowledge of the human body and life on ~arth. The ultimate purpose of science has always been human improvements, and coupled wit~ technology, they guarantee the survival and prosperity of the human race. Of course, gazing into the crystal ball is futile and fruitless, so it is best we extrapolate what the future brings by examini\lg the past and the present, and identifying trends. ! Some detractors - sceptics, luc/dites, 'unenlightened beings' - hold a very pessimistic view of science and technology, believi~g that it is possible for the hubris of scientists to cause us to cross the boundary. Science and technology, when in the hands of unscrupulous characters, are potent and can be manipulated ]to cause greater harm to human society, and this makes one apprehensive about their impact A whole panoply of examples point towards this. Genetically modified food, for instance, broiJght about the Green Revolution, and many perceived it as a panacea for food shortages and I the abject poverty of the Third World. It could have been that But because the technology dev<~loped by multinational giant Monsanto was undertaken with the sole aim to increase its profits a1d gain, it has only led to ruin. They charged high prices for such high yield varieties, and these se<,3ds were in fact specially engineered to only be planted once {i.e. seeds from the plant produced c~>uld not be replanted), sending farmers back to the market place to line the pockets of the MNC. 1 Such exploitation does not bode well for the future of science. Science has also been used as 9n excuse to lead to inhumane cruelty. The Angel of Death, Nazi scientist Josef Mengele, is notor'ious for having carried out deviant experiments on twins. such as cutting off their arms and sew;ng them together. This fear of cruelty resulting from science has touched the hearts of the commdn man as seen from the spate of dystopian movies. such as The I Island, which warns against a tecl,mology that harvests organs, that feeds on this fear. I However. to discount the promise of science and technology on that basis is myopic. These are exceptions. and the fact that wei feel revulsion and condemn them. demonstrates that it has not been accepted. The scientific con/munity is acutely aware of this fact. which explains its hesitations in carrying out stem cell transpl\3nts. or creating designer babies. Our understanding of cloning is already at a very advanced level, yet former President Bush of the United States of America issued a ban on human clonin/J. Our moral compasses have been trusty in restraining such excesses in the past, and we ha,\e no reason to fear a dystopian future created by ourselves. The logical solution, additionally, to such fears, is to tackle them by instituting stringent regulations and guidelines. The enforcement of s)Jch guidelines should assuage such fears. and allow us to focus on the positive side of science ihstead. It would be a pity to relinquish this tool {of science and technology) just to prevent its abJ,se. I ' One way in which science and teichnology grant us hope for the future is that they guarantee us a future in the first place, by ensuri'ng our survivaL Ever since the accidental discovery of antibiotics by Alexander Fleming in the 19ti1 century, science has constantly developed to meet our needs. We now not only have access tp over-the-counter medicines for the slightest discomfort, but to Raffles Institution I ksbull issue 1 I 2012

life spans. We are also constantly reacting to new threats. Malaria, for instance, is a virus that leads to large numbers of casualties, especially in areas with poor sanitation and room for its vector, the mosquito, to breed. To tackle this, scientists have discovered a technique to silence a gene of the mosquito, such that it does not transmit malaria. Ailments and diseases that cause suffering and devastation will likely be conquered sometime in the future. A real threat to our survival now is global warming, and in rapid response to it, innovations such as solar panels, alternative forms of energy, methods to monitor climate changes, have emerged. In this cruel evolutionary struggle, science and technology have aided us in the past, and continue to help us triumph. Science and technology .also give us hope as they are vehicles for human advancement. Not only do they fulfill our physiological requirements of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, they also allow us to achieve self-actualisation, allowing the prosperity of the human race. This has happened in the past with the Neolithic Revolution, which developed tools, freeing up time for the settlers to develop pottery, music and other forms of art, and also with the Industrial Revolution, when the invention of the steam locomotive, division of labour and travel had allowed a greater integration of societies. We can in fact see strains of that now with the increasing ubiquity of social media, a novel form of technology. Humans all over the world are connected to it, and are able to utilise it as a form of expression, and to rally communities together for common causes, such as the Aral? Spring. We may never know if such systems and new ways of life benefit us and enrich our lives, or if they will achieve any form of permanence as Zhou Enlai famously commented about the impact of the French Revolution: "It's too early to tell." But the very fact that humans are able to adapt and build on past changes and advance with the aid of technology and science give us tremendous hope and anticipation for the future and what it may bring. Another role that science and technology increasingly fulfill is that of an equaliser. to develop communities all around the globe. H.G. Wells, in an oft-quoted line, called education "a great equaliser" and the only thing that stands between us and "catastrophe". Science and technology allow us to act on that. Laptops donated by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation have been brought to subsistence-level communities in Africa, and have achieved phenomenal success as children there were able to access a dizzying array of information and in a much more interactive manner than with book~. Science and technology have also been capitalised upon to develop new forms of nourishment for impoverished communities, including Plumpy'nut, a peanut and milk powder mixture that only requires water to become a nutritious meal for families. The fortunate thing is that these technologies are also brought to them and distributed by aid workers. Finally, it also leads to the fulfillment of rights of disenfranchised communities all over the world. Saudi Arabia, for instance, is often lambasted for its lack of civil liberties and its repression of women, and for hiding behind the veil of "culture" to satisfy their actions. The subjugated women had harboured a docile, compliant attitude in this hostile community. However, the advent of social networking and the Internet led to a growing awareness of their rights, and earlier this year, they organised their first protest by breaking the law and driving without a guardian. The king had recenUy capitulated