An Autonomous Way for Science and Technology in Asia Romeo F. Quijano, M.D.

Associate Professor Department of Pharmacology, College of medicine University of the Philippines Manila Science and technology as we know them today are largely the products of Western civilization. Inevitably, they carry the elements of western culture and, therefore, scientific norms are defined by the cultural characteristics of the west. Typically, these are individualist in outlook, competitive in character, and exploitative in relations. These western cultural characteristics, I believe, were essentially responsible for the quantum leap of science and technology that brought about the industrial revolution in the west that began in the 16th century. The introspective and liberal nature of individualism made it possible for scientific philosophical thought to flourish, unhampered by the restrictiveness of collectivism and encompassing spirituality. The intense motivation and urgency generated by competitiveness created the accelerative push that resulted in the geometric increase of productivity. The accumulation of capital, resources and power necessary for expansionism was facilitated by the exploitative relations among social groups and between humans and nature. Over the last 400 years of the modern era, the scientific and technological advances brought about by the industrial revolution which started in Western Europe have reached practically every corner of the world, supplanting indigenous knowledge and systems and dominating non-western cultures both by force and cooptation. In Asia, as in most parts of the world, the inroads of western science and technology came largely through colonial conquests and imperialism. As the dominant western powers expanded the arena of competition among themselves in the exploitation of the worlds resources and in the creation of a wider market, so did western science and technology expand its scope and influence. In China, despite the fact that scientific and technological achievements of the Chinese people were quite advanced in the middle ages, the intrusion of western brand of science and technology as part and parcel of mercantilism and capitalism, have resulted in the stagnation of Chinese science and technology after the onset of the industrial revolution. As China succumbed to the military and economic power `of the west, the Chinese began to lose faith in their own knowledge systems and their practical applications. Originality and cultural sensitivity in Chinese scientific endeavor began to decline, and thus, Chinese science and technology lost its autonomy and became largely dependent on the dictates of the west. Consequently thereafter, China was kept underdeveloped economically and was made to serve the interest of the west. It was only after the victory of the socialist revolution in 1949 that China began to chart its own course again. For a while, this seemed to be successful despite the attendant social sacrifices, although recently, the pressures of a New World Order has apparently coopted China back into the market economy and into the western paradigm of science and technology. In Japan, western science and technology seemed to have gained a firm foothold during the Meiji period particularly in the latter part of the 19th century when Japan embarked on a wholesale importation of western science and related institutions. It was during this era that Japan started to adopt western scientific concepts and practices coinciding with its desire to modernize and industrialize as the west did. This was done quite successfully and in no time at all, Japan emerged as the only industrial power in Asia. In so doing, however, Japan also imbibed the cultural dimensions of western science and technology which negated the Asian values and cultural traits that could have set social limits to the development of Japanese industrialization. While being Asian geographically, Japans science and technology cannot be characterized as truly Asian and autonomous from the west. Science and technology in Japan today has lost its Asian character. It has been supplanted by the individualist outlook, although unlike its western counterpart, it is more of a corporate individualism rather than personalistic individualism. It has manifested the western trait of intense competitiveness, with

aggressive promotions program not only to capture a significant, if not the dominant slice of the worlds economic pie, but also to be at par with, if not surpass, the west in scientific prestige. Thus, many Japanese scientists became detached and insensitive to social realities in Asia and the rest of the world and became pre-occupied with publications, science for sciences sake and obsessed in winning a Nobel prize. Science and technology in Japan has also become exploitative and destructive like that of the west. The depletion of forest and marine resources in Japan and in the neighboring countries are in no small measure due to the advanced technology of exploitation available to Japans corporate giants. As a result of the economic prosperity that western science and technology has brought, together with the military power that goes with it, Japan has become one with the west. At various times in its history, Japan also engaged in colonial adventurism: Russia and China in its early stage of industrialization, and Korea and the Far East during the later stages. Today, in an era of the New World Order, Japan is deeply identifiable with western interest. Japan and the industrialized west constitute what is now commonly known as the North. This, I think, reflects the divergence of Japan from the Asian Way as a result of cooptation by western science and technology. While science and technology are perceived as instruments for the upliftment and welfare of humanity, objectively, western science and technology, and the type of industrial development it generates, have become instruments of domination and destruction. At this present stage of social history, practically all countries in Asia, and for that matter, most countries of the world, follow the western model of scientific and technological development, a kind of development based on the operation of market forces obsessed with economic growth. Even the socialist economies have now the tendency to follow this model. Competition and unrestrained pursuit of demand satisfaction became the driving force of scientific and technological advance. Control and domination of nature through reductionist approaches became the norm. This has resulted in commodification of science and the concentration of technological and institutional powers in the hands of a relatively few elite. This kind of science served more as the instrument of exploitative economic and political forces that enslave people, destroy cultures, and ravage the environment. Inappropriate and adverse technologies from such a system have created serious and complex social and ecological problems. Such a system has resulted in an unjust economic world order that is characterized by a division of the world population into rich and poor classes, mainly appearing as a division into rich and poor countries, the North or the First World and the South or the Third World. The growth, wealth and social welfare of the North are inextricably bound up with the wretched poverty of the South. Such a system widen the gap between the rich and poor countries. Today, this gap is worse than ever. The rich countries, with only 25 per cent of the worlds population, dispose of 83 per cent of the gross national product (GNP) of the world. They consume 75 per cent of all energy, 70 per cent of all cereals, 92 per cent of all industrial products, and use 89 per cent of all education offered in the world. The gap in scientific and technological development is even more glaring. Ninety six percent of all money spent on research and development is accounted for by the developed countries and only 4 per cent by the underdeveloped countries. Out of a total of 2.5 million scientists and technologists involved in research and development throughout the world today, only 11 per cent come from the underdeveloped countries. The human cost of this world order is staggering. Of the more than 122 million children born annually in the Third World, 10 per cent die before they reach the age of one year, and a further 4 per cent before they are 5 years old. On a world scale, about 18 million children under five years of age die each year. Seventeen million of them, or 95 per cent, die in the poor countries. More than one billion people or 25 per cent of the total population of the world live in conditions so bad that their lives are threatened. About 450 million people of the Third World suffer from serious under-nourishment. Three out of ten adults in poor countries are illiterates, and this does not include those millions of children who do not attend school today and who will eventually join the masses of illiterates. The environmental cost is even more alarming. As a result of profit-motivated decisions taken in the name of progress since the industrial revolution, the planet earth has increasingly been assaulted by

various forms of adverse technologies. While western science and technology have been commonly credited for the economic growth and the satisfaction of consumer demands, they have escaped scrutiny as instruments of destruction of the habitat of life, with the rate of destruction accelerating at a tremendous pace during the last half-century. The market-oriented science and technology of the west have produced weapons of annihilation such as nuclear bombs which have been ironically accepted by many countries as necessary for survival. Nuclear tests continue to shatter the depths of the earth in the name of national security. Nuclear power plants bring about serious problems of radioactive pollution, nuclear accidents like what happened at Chernobyl and Three Mile Island, and nuclear waste disposal problems. The chemical industries continue to produce thousands of pesticides and other toxic products which poison food and water and deplete the ozone layer of the atmosphere, threaten biodiversity, and cause serious illnesses including cancer. Every year, the world industries produce billions of pounds of hazardous waste, the disposal of which release thousands of new toxic chemicals with the poor countries often being used as dumping grounds. The automobile industry, while providing mobility and comfort mostly to the rich, also spews out carbon dioxide and other poisons into the air making many cities practically unlivable and bringing earth life to the brink of extinction due to the greenhouse effect. The car industry also fuels demand for oil, which by itself, pollutes the environment when it is explored, extracted, transported, refined, dumped, or spilt. The mining industry, while providing the raw materials for infrastructure, machinery, and other industries, have also resulted in pollution and irreversible destruction of the ecosystem. This new world order spawned by western science and technology has produced several killer industries in the hands of a few large transnational corporations and private profiteers. The biggest and most important of these multibillion dollar industries include: alcoholic beverages, tobacco, illicit narcotics, pesticides, infant formula, unnecessary pharmaceuticals, arms and military equipment, and international banking. Both directly and indirectly, these various industries add to the degradation of the environment and to the poverty, poor nutrition, lowered resistance to disease, and high rates of illness, disability and death of billions of people throughout the world especially of the Third World. The giant transnational companies controlling most of these killer industries also control much of the facilities, manpower and finances that maintain the activities and determine further directions of modern science and technology. Quite recently, breakthroughs in modern science have made possible the development of amazing techniques in biotechnology. It is generally believed that biotechnology will trigger a drastic modification of world development. Many people, especially biological scientists, consider biotechnology like a miracle drug, epitomizing the triumph of science and technology over the problems of the world. But this euphoria over biotechnology betrays a narrow view of the environment, organisms and life itself. It is again a manifestation of western reductionism. Solutions to the problems of humanity are reduced deep down at the molecular level and focus on the gene and the DNA as the foundation of life. They give little attention to the interrelationship between and among different levels of organisms and their environment which gives rise to fears of the unknown dangers that biotechnology may cause in the future. Like previous technologies, there is little attention being given to the issues of biosafety and detrimental effects on biodiversity and the environment. More importantly, the social context and power relations under which modern biotechnology arose are again being ignored. Modern biotechnology is in the hands of the rich countries of the North and the resulting unequal exchange will be another assertion of the powerfuls domination over the powerless. Domination will be strengthened since the North will be expected to radically reduce its dependence on the agricultural crops produced by the South due to the production of valuable crops inside the laboratories and factories in the North. On the other hand, the Souths dependence on the North will increase, especially with regards to agricultural chemicals and inputs such as pesticides and seeds due to the development of biotech seeds and pesticide resistant crops. The adverse impact of biotechnology will be more immediate and more devastating on the poor farmers and indigenous collectors of the South, who derive their meager income from the collection of medicinally and commercially valuable plants. Gatherers of the

rosy periwinkle in Madagascar, for example, will be displaced with the successful production of the important elements of this life-saving creeping plant inside biotechnology laboratories in the North. Indigenous communities who have shifted, partly or otherwise, to the commercial production of highvalue crops will be threatened by the developments of modern biotechnology. The discovery of high fructose syrup from corn and artificial sweeteners which substitute for cane sugar brings forth extreme misery to the lives of millions of sugarcane producers and their dependents, especially in the sugar producing regions of the Philippines. Over the long term, modern biotechnology will ultimately result in the erosion of the genetic resources nurtured by the indigenous peoples for millenia. As governments and institutions promote the use of genetically-uniform varieties, and as farmers are induced to shift to using the high response varieties engineered through modern biotechnology, traditional varieties will be gradually pushed into extinction. Clearly, western science and technology has failed and offers no hope to the majority of the worlds population, especially the poorest people of Asia and Africa. The main reason is that it has become monolithic and inappropriate. Western science and technology assumed universal applicability in its philosophy and methods and failed to take into consideration the cultural diversity of of the worlds population. Instead of enhancing the positive cultural traits of the varying groups of people along the path of its expansion, western science and technology subverted and distorted them. The life-affirming wholistic Asian way of interconnectedness, process orientation, openendedness and ecological harmony offer an alternative paradigm. Communal and wholistic, cooperative and socially supportive, nurturing and lasting: these traits are the strength of the peoples of Asia. These are rooted deep in Asian culture and lie within us all despite centuries of western domination. They need only to be rediscovered. Communalism is social interaction at the highest level of humanness. It is based on the concept of shared identity which recognizes the ultimate oneness of humankind and puts high value on the common good. It excludes any action that may be detrimental or harmful to other human beings. It is definitely inconsistent with exploitative human relations. Communalism is the capacity to recognize the good in every human being and the ability to integrate oneself within the widest social fabric. It is necessarily wholistic and involves recognition that the individual exists beyond himself and blends with his physical and non-physical environment. One who has internalized the concept of shared identity sees the non-material essence in every human being and accords him proper dignity. He treats every person as an equal, regardless of the latters role in society. On the other hand, one who has lost his shared identity has descended to the level of brutes and has lost contact with the non-material essence of man. He thus treats others in his environment, both physical and social, as objects of exploitation to satisfy superficial wants and desires. Being communal in character, Asian people are not, by nature, individualist or competitive. Rather, cooperation and social supportiveness are the core traits of indigenous cultures in Asia. These traits, rather than the accumulation of wealth and power, have been the main source of security for individual members of Asian communities. In the non-urbanized and non-westernized rural communities in Asia, with sufficient immersion and integration, one can find the most beautiful expression of these traits. Unfortunately, in the urbanized and consumer-driven high technology centers of Asia today, cooperation and social supportiveness have become as rare as the Panda. The communal and wholistic character of Asian culture also implies nurturing and sustainability. It involves harmony with the environment and recognizes the finite nature of the resources of the earth. This explains the generally frugal lifestyle of Asian communities even in times of prosperity. What is taken is only that what is needed. Overproduction and overconsumption are contrary to the nurturing character of Asian culture. Capital accumulation, market orientation, and pre-occupation with economic growth are incompatible with this nurturing character since they are premised on the assumptions that resources are unlimited, and production and consumption are liberalized and unrestricted. This nurturing characteristic of Asian culture also rejects the faulty assumption that science and technology

can maintain unrestricted growth and that when problems arise, an increase in the level of science and technology will provide the solutions. Perhaps it is not too late to rediscover these Asian cultural traits and allow them to surface and chart the directions of science and technology in Asia, and perhaps, the world. These traits are essential in setting limits to science and technology. For example, there is good reason to believe that Asian cultural characteristics prevented China from being a colonialist at a time when it had the capacity to do so. Prior to western colonialism, the technological requirements that made possible colonial conquest were already present in China even before the Europeans had them. Gunpowder making and iron casting were already highly developed in China even before the Europeans knew about them. The magnetic compass and other navigational technology were already being utilized by China before the west did. The series of maritime expeditions in the early 15th century which was unmatched by the west reflects the high level of navigational capacity of the Chinese at that time. By the time Vasco da Gama set sail for Africa in 1497, the vessels of Cheng Ho had already ceased to frequent the African shores, a difference of at least 50 years. The vessels of Cheng Ho were certainly much larger, weighing as much as 1,500 tons, than those of Vasco da Gama, which weighed only 300 tons or less. Furthermore, Chinese craft and navigation at that time were already a culmination of an earlier development and were much more sophisticated while those of the Portuguese were just starting and less advanced. What is remarkable is that while the Portuguese navy engaged immediately in terrorist warfare against the East African Arabs, the Indians, and other Asians, the entire Chinese operations were peaceful and paying friendly visits to foreign ports. The Chinese fleets were certainly armed with gunpowder weapons, but they seldom got themselves into armed conflict. They did not set up forts or strongholds anywhere and founded no colonies of any kind. This crucial difference can be attributed to the difference in cultural traits between the Portuguese, representing the West, and the Chinese, representing Asia. While the Portuguese expeditions were driven by individualistic motives seeking personal fortune and obtaining profits under the exploitative mercantilist system, the Chinese expeditions were the well-disciplined operations of an enormous feudal-bureacratic state with primarily governmental and communal concerns seeking to enhance their social life, collecting materia medica and other natural rarities. Trade and profit making were secondary and incidental. This brief historical account illustrates the fact that science and technology presents a more humane face if expressed in the original Asian way. This exemplifies the need to extricate ourselves from the quagmire of competition that characterizes the profit-driven and destructive system presently dominating science and technology in Asia and the rest of the world. As scientists and as Asians, our working philosophy of science must be re-examined and made autonomous from the dominant western paradigm that we, wittingly or unwittingly, have helped to perpetuate. This, however, does not mean rejection of everything that western science and technology have already brought to this modern world. It does not mean downgrading the contributions of Galileo, Newton, Pasteur, Einstein, and the other great western scientists. Neither does it mean the discarding of life-saving drugs, more efficient equipment, and better transport and communication systems. We need not go back to isolationism. We dont have to re-invent the wheel. What is needed is to demystify and democratize science and technology and integrate them within the realm of Asian culture. What is needed is to install an efficient social mechanism that would put the interest of the people on top of scientific activities and technological development. We need to humanize science and technology and make them responsive to the crisis of the world. Science and technology must become instruments to strike harmony between nature and humanity, ensure equity in relationships and distribution of resources, and promote peace based on justice. Scientists must come down from their ivory towers and be more sensitive to the aspirations of the people. They must immerse and integrate with the people to neutralize their tendency to technocratic arrogance. They must develop social consciousness and strive to counter the narrowness that their work brings to their worldview. Being a scientist is not an excuse to being impervious to the

political, economic, and cultural milieu prevailing in the society where thay belong. A scientist must realize that being human is more important than being a scientist. An Autonomous Way for science and technology in Asia, therefore, is mass participation rather than specialization and concentration, collegial vision rather than individual ambition, and communal needs and cooperation rather than market demands and competition. Science and technology , the Asian way, is to promote ecological sustainability and social justice.