The Design of Technology: Bridging Highly Advanced Science and Technology with Society Through the Creation of Products - Principia Designae: Pre-Design, Design, and Post-Design - page 7

Fig. 1.4 Conventional engineering design

Fig. 1.5 Modern engineering design

1.4 In What Ways Are Science and Technology

and Its Products Accepted by Society?

It is important to note that both science and technology and its products involve
negative, as well as positive aspects. In other words, although science and technol-
ogy and its products might provide efficiency and comfort to society, they might also
cause damage to individuals. For society to accept science and technology and its
products, society is thought to accept both their negative and positive aspects in a
fundamental way as well as through considering its superficial merit or lack of merit.
One conventional process by which science and technology and its products can
be accepted by society is through specialists' efforts to explain their mechanisms by
the use of plain language or the use of statistics. For example, the physical
principles of thermodynamics, genetic manipulation, or nuclear fission can be
explained by the use of illustrations. The risks involved in these technologies can
be explained by the use of probability. Although these processes are certainly
useful, the author believes additional views may exist that might affect whether
science and technology and its products will be accepted by society.