SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY, AND SOCIETY

Breakdown of topics:
Part 1
 
Topic 1 - Historical Antecedents
                Activity for Topic 1 
Topic 2 - Intellectual Revolutions
                Activity for Topic 2 
Topic 3 - Science and Technology and Nation Building
                Activity for Topic 3
Topic 4 - The Human Person Flourishing 
                Activity for Topic 4
Topic 5 - The Good Life
                Activity for Topic 5 
Topic 6 - When Technology and Humanity Cross
                Activity for Topic 6

 
Topic 7 - Why the Future Does Not Need Us
                Activity for Topic 7
Topic 8 - The Information Age
                Activity for Topic 8 
Topic 9 - Biodiversity and the Healthy Society
                Activity for Topic 9
Topic 10 - The Nano World
                Activity for Topic 10
Topic 11 - Gene Therapy
                Activity for Topic 11 
Topic 12 – Climate Change (Mandated Topic)
                Activity for Topic 12
Part 2

This course...
 engages students to confront the realities brought about by science and
technology in society. Such realities pervade the personal, the public, and
the global aspects of our living and are integral to human development.
seeks to instill reflective knowledge in the students that they are able to live
the good life and display ethical decision making in the face of scientific and
technological advancement. 
includes mandatory topics on climate change and environmental awareness

Pre-assessment activity
List the things that you think are the positive and negative effects of S&T in
our society.

 POSITIVE
 NEGATIVE

Topic 1- Historical antecedents in which social

considerations changed the course of S&T

* Transportation and navigation *Weapons and armors

- travelled to search for food - security and protection
- better locations for settlements - discovery of cures and prevention of
illnes

*Communication and record keeping *Engineering and architecture

- facilitate trade - build infrastructures for human needs and
wants
- prevent conflicts - establish identity of a nation
- document the places and establish identities

*Mass production
- technology to increase food supplies and other survival needs
  TECHNOLOGICAL ADVANCEMENT IN THE:

a. ancient times (6,000 BCE – 650 CE) 

b. middle age (500 – 1500)

o Early Middle Ages (Europe, 5th – 11th century)
o High Middle Ages (Europe, 11th – 14th century)
o Late Middle Ages (Europe, 14th – 15th century)

c. modern age (1500 – present)

o Early Modern Period (1500 – 1750)
o Late Modern Period (1750 – 1945)

d. Philippines 

 Sumerian Civilization
Cuneiform Calendar Ziggurat of Ur Sailboat
Wheel

Babylonian Civilization
Code of Hammurabi

 Egyptian Civilization
Water clock Hieroglyphics Pyramids
Papyrus
  Greek Civilization
War Machines Water Mill Parthenon
Astronomy

 Roman Civilization
Coliseum Bound books Newspaper

 Chinese Civilization
Paper Printing Compass

 Middle Ages
Telescope Spectacle   Printing Press Microscope
Wheel


  Modern ages
Light bulb Steam engine Telephone Penicillin
Computer

 Filipino inventions
Mosquito OL Trap Erythromycin Fluorescent Lamp Incubator
Quink

Activity 1- ‘STANDING ON THE SHOULDER OF

GIANTS’ 
Accomplish the ff:

The class is divided into eight groups. Each group is assigned to a time period
(ancient, middle, modern, and Philippines).
 (Option 1) Draw or print a picture of your chosen discovery/invention.  As a
group, collect and paste these on a ¼ illustration board.  Design the board
with a theme appropriate to the assigned time period.
 (Option 2) Create a ppt slide with the pictures of your chosen 2
discoveries/inventions.  As a group, design the slide with a theme
appropriate to the assigned time period.
 Describe the inventions’ use and purpose.  (For option 1, you may paste it
at the back)
 Present in the class. Conclude your presentation by discussing how these
inventions impacted the people and the society during the time period they
were made.
Topic 2- Intellectual revolutions that defined society
Articulate ways by which society is transformed by science and technology

Copernican Revolution 
A paradigm shift from the Ptolemaic model of the heavens, which described the
cosmos as having Earth stationary at the center of the universe, to the heliocentric
model with the Sun at the center of the Solar System. 
Beginning with the publication of Nicolaus Copernicus’ De revolutionibus orbium
coelestium, contributions to the “revolution” continued through Kepler and Galileo until
finally ending with Isaac Newton’s work over a century later.

(Motion of Sun (yellow), Earth (blue), and Mars (red) according to heliocentrism (left) and

to geocentrism (right), before the Copernican Revolution)

Darwinian Revolution 
The publication in 1859 of The Origin of Species by Charles Darwin ushered in a new
era in the intellectual history of humanity. Darwin is deservedly given credit for the theory of
biological evolution: he accumulated evidence demonstrating that organisms evolve and
discovered the process, natural selection, by which they evolve. 
But the import of Darwin's achievement is that it completed the Copernican revolution
initiated three centuries earlier, and thereby radically changed our conception of the
universe and the place of humanity in it.

Freudian Revolution
Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalytic theory of personality argues that human behavior is the
result of the interactions among three component parts of the mind: the id,
ego, and superego. 
This theory places great emphasis on the role of unconscious psychological conflicts in
shaping behavior and personality. Dynamic interactions among these fundamental parts of
the mind are thought to progress through five distinct psychosexual stages of
development. 
 Activity 2- ‘CREATIVE PRESENTATIONS
Accomplish the ff:
 The class is divided into eight groups. 
 Each group is asked to prepare for a creative presentation showing scientific revolutions (positive and
negative results brought about by innovations and technological advances in the information age) for 3-
5 minutes. 

1 - Copernican
2 - Darwinian
3 - Freudian
4 - Information
5 - Meso–American
6 - Asian
7 - Middle East
8 - African

Topic 3- S&T and Nation Building

The role of S&T in Philippine nation building
*Advanced reading for the
students-                                                                                                                         
“A HISTORY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY IN THE PHILIPPINES” by Olivia C. Caoili
https://phlconnect.ched.gov.ph/admin/uploads/da4902cb0bc38210839714ebdcf0efc3/01-Readings-4.pdf

Pre-colonial
 Herbal medicines
 Farming and animal raising
 Different modes of transportation (terrestrial or maritime)
 Engineering: Rice Terraces in Cordilleras
 Irrigation system

Colonial
     -Spaniard’s colonization
  large infrastructures (walls, roads, bridges)
 health and education systems (principalia class)

     -American occupation
 modernized almost all aspects of life; Bureau of Science

Post-colonial
Under former president and dictator Ferdinand Marcos
 established and strengthened S&T
       agencies:
a. PAGASA
b. NAST (Nat’l Academy of S &T)
c. NSTA (Nat’l S & T Authority)
(NSDB in 1958, now DOST)
 Point of reflection

What have you observed when you trace the development of science and technology from
the pre-colonial times up to the present?

What do you think are the major contributions of science and technology to Philippine nation-
building

 Great Filipino Inventors

Yoyo by Pedro Flores

Erythromycin by Dr. Abelardo Aguilar
Banana Catsup by Maria Orosa y Ylagan
Medical incubator by Fe del Mundo
Quink Ink by Francisco Quisumbing
Anti-cancer cream and mole remover by Rolando dela Cruz
16-Bit Microchip by Diosdado Banatao
Filipino-made Train by Engr. Bryan Yuson
3-in-1 fire truck by Alfredo M. Anos, Sr.

 Great Filipino Scientists

Ramon Cabanos Barba – Phil mango tissue culture

Josefino Cacas Comiso – Antarctica characteristics by using satellite images
Jose Bejar Cruz Jr. – internationally known in the field of electrical engineering
Lourdes Jansuy Cruz – research on sea snail venom
Fabian Millar Dayrit – research on herbal medicine
Rafael Dineros Guerrero III – research on tilapia culture
Enrique Mapua Ostrea Jr. – invented the meconium drug testing
Lilian Formalejo Patena – research on plant technology
Mari –jo Panganiban Ruiz – outstanding educator and graph theorist
Gregory Ligot Tangonan – research in the field of communication technology
Caesar A. Saloma – renowned physicist
Edgardo Gomez – famous scientist in marine science
William Padolina – chemistry and president of NAST (Philippines)
 Angel Alcala – marine science
Activity 3- ‘YOUTUBE VIDEO’ 
Accomplish the ff:

 The class is divided into eight groups. 

 Each group must:
o identify a relevant policy, law, or program that the Philippine government has which is connected with S&T
(e.g. Clean Air Act, RH Law, Phil.Technology Transfer Act, etc.) ;
o evaluate the chosen policy in terms of their contributions to nation building, and;
o prepare a 3-5 minutes audio-video presentation to be uploaded on YOUTUBE, showing all members of the
group presenting their thoughts and opinions about the chosen policy. 

Topic 4- The human person flourishing in terms of S&T

S&T must be taken as part of human life and merits reflective and meditative thinking and
despite its methodical and technical nature, gives meaning to the life of a person making his/her way
in the world.

–Martin Heidegger– 

His method of "questioning" strives to expose the unexamined assumptions that shape our
understanding of the world we live in.

He tries to find the "blind spots" in our thinking that keep us from a more profound--and, we
might say now, more "empowering"--way of conceiving the world and our place in it. 

In "The Question Concerning Technology," he asks, "how do we generally think about

technology?" He comes up with two answers:

 technology is a means to an end

 technology is a human activity

            
"The Question Concerning Technology"
–Martin Heidegger– 

a. technology as a way of revealing

b. technology as poiesis: applicable to modern technology
c. questioning as the piety of thought
d. enframing: way of revealing in modern technology
e. human person swallowed by technology
f. art as a way out of enframing

Point of reflection

Examine the following artworks that help reveal who the human person is in the face of modern
technology.

Reflect and discuss how the artwork describes and reveals techno logy.
 “What is good?"

Nicomachean Ethics and Modern Concepts

Aristotle stated:
All human activities aim at some good.  Every art and human inquiry, and similarly every action and
pursuit, is thought to aim at some good; and for this reason, the good has been rightly declared as
that at which all things aim (Nicomachean Ethics 2:2)

…both the many and the cultivated call it happiness, and suppose that living well and doing well are
the same as being happy (Nicomachean Ethics 1:4)

EUDAIMONIA (Ancient Gk.) 

 “living well and doing well”

 *the good life = happiness and excellence

 Happiness is the ultimate end of human action according to Aristotle

 Now such a thing as happiness above all else, is held to be; for this we always for itself and never for
the sake of something else, but honor, pleasure, reason, and every virtue we choose indeed for
themselves, but we choose them also for the sake of happiness, judging that by means of them we shall
be happy.  Happiness, on the other hand, no one chooses for anything other than itself (Nicomachean
ethics 2:7)

 Happiness defines good life.  This happiness, however, is not the kind that come from sensate
pleasures.  It is that which comes from living life of virtue, a life of excellence, manifested from the
personal to the global scale.

Topic 5- The Good Life

Nicomachean Ethics and Modern Concepts
It is the activities that express virtue that control happiness, and the contrary activities that control its
contrary (Nicomachean Ethics 1:10)

VIRTUE
 Plays significant role in the living and attainment of the good life
 Constant practice of the good no matter how difficult the circumstances are
 Excellence of character
 Cultivated with habit and discipline

Activity 5- ‘FILM CRITIQUE’ 

Accomplish the ff:

 Let the students watch the documentary “That Sugar Film (2014)”
 By oral questioning, ask them for their thoughts on the film with the following as guide questions:
 How does production and consumption of sugar affect your journey towards the good life?
 How does unreflective consumption of goods (sugar) affect human life?