After listening to the speech of Dmitry Peskov, head of the “Young Professionals” direction of the Agency for Strategic Initiatives, at the Presidential Science Council, the KP correspondent understood who to go to to talk about the future. About what it will be like and what to expect from it.
EVEN LATHE BECOME A VIDEO GAME
-Where are we now? Some say that we are experiencing the fourth technological revolution, and some have already counted almost the sixth.
There are situations when classifications stop working. If earlier the development of humanity was on an ascending line, now it is beginning to rapidly accelerate (draws a graph in which the curve sharply goes up). The rate of technological change is becoming so fast and unpredictable that we are losing control over it. And this changes a lot of things in our lives. Today, when you wake up in the morning, you find yourself hostage to your smartphone: watching news, messages, videos. And this happens during the day, in the evening, around the clock. And a lot of things happen inside this: you make purchases, your smartphone takes a lot of data from you. He already knows better than your doctor when and how you will get sick. This didn't happen just yesterday.
Changes are rapidly beginning to permeate the industry. For example, it turns out that a new self-driving car can no longer be made by giant corporations in ten years, but by small companies in a couple of years. Private companies are already starting to fly into space, and trucks from small organizations are starting to deliver cargo to the ISS.
- Three years ago, at an industrial exhibition in Hannover, I was surprised that a prize was awarded for creating a program for controlling a lathe via an iPhone.
Because the profession of a turner today is actually the profession of a programmer. Many professions are rapidly dying or changing. And now operating new machines is starting to look like operating a smartphone screen. New production lines are adapting to what is familiar to the digital generation. The new generation has already grown up with video games, and their hands are geared towards joysticks, so control panels for production lines inherit the design of game consoles - two joysticks and the use of fine motor skills of the thumbs.
UBER AND APPLE ARE A THREAT TO OUR ECONOMY
- At the end of last year, you told the president that you consider the current technological breakthrough a threat to Russia? What is the threat?
The first set of threats lies purely in the military sphere. For example, the same unmanned aerial vehicles, in the production of which we lagged behind and were forced to purchase from Israel. Now we, straining all our strength, are trying to create our own attack drone. But the threats here remain.
The second type of reality is big data. They can be used in different ways. For example, you point your smartphone at a person and it shows you what kind of person they are and where they live. This is no longer a miracle, but the use of databases. This is our reality, these are experiments that have already taken place.
- These are, of course, threats. But are they really that big? And?
There is an even more terrible thing - a threat to the Russian budget. We understand that we will no longer earn excess profits from oil. That the development of alternative energy leads to margins leaving the country. That the same Tesla company makes more than just an electric car. You buy not only a car, but also a lifetime refueling at the stations of this company. Your entire life cycle is tied to it. This is a threat to all our traditional industries.
Or Uber. This business was fantastic for dozens of Moscow taxi companies. But then they went bankrupt within three months. And Uber (a mobile service for calling and paying for taxis) is not going to pay anything to our budget. I don't intend to.
RACE FOR TELEPORTATION
- Everything is obvious here: whoever invents teleportation first is a great guy. Let's invent it first.
So far we only have quantum teleportation. It allows you to at least ensure safety. Because quantum communication is fundamentally unbreakable. There is nothing to hack even at the theoretical level. And, for example, you can be sure that your drones will not be intercepted in the air and forced to fly in the other direction.
- When will this come true?
Already last year, a communication line on this principle was created between two branches of Gazprombank in Moscow.
- Can you give me another example of the coming breakthrough?
Neuronet. The spread of brain-computer technologies is creating the next generation of Internet, in which you and I can communicate mentally without using our voices. This neuronet market will help save human lives, earn money and fill the state budget. This is not fantasy, this is reality in 2016.
DROP DROP CARS WILL STILL WINN
- There is a stereotype that we in Russia have slept through everything, technology has gone far. And now we stand and watch, using other people’siPhones.
We really overslept. We didn't participate in anything for about 15 years. But the Russian harnesses for a long time and drives quickly. And works very well under pressure. We are waking up. For example, in neurotechnologies we are, if not in leading positions, then in second or third. Our company Mari.net (electronic marine navigation) is currently developing unmanned navigation in the Gulf of Finland, this is one of five or six such zones in the world. That is, we are on par with everyone else. Two years ago we had nothing on driverless cars.
Now we have several competing companies creating such a product. KamAZ made an unmanned truck, Volgobas made an unmanned bus.
-I think self-driving cars look nice, but I can't imagine how they will drive on our roads.
They won’t drive around Russia for a very long time, but now they can leave the building, get into the car and drive along the third ring without ever touching the steering wheel.
- Where will self-driving cars be used first?
Trucks. Unmanned coupling of road trains on large highways. This dramatically reduces both fuel and driver costs. We are already discussing with Rosavtodor the testing of these road trains on the new Moscow-St. Petersburg highway, where such a lane has been allocated. There is a huge economic effect here. He seems funny, but he gives a lot of money to the budget. If we are now building transcontinental routes, then the lane for ethereal cars can be made much narrower than the usual one.
IT IS POSSIBLE TO CHANGE THE HUMAN GENOME NOW
- Is there a place for fundamental science in the modern world?
For example, a challenge for her is the problem with antibiotics, which stop working due to addiction to them, and soon we may again find ourselves defenseless like in the Middle Ages.
- But who should set tasks for her?
It should be aimed at knowledge, and not at utilitarian tasks. In our country, it was not out of scientific curiosity that the Russian Academy of Sciences acquired its current form. This happened when atomic and missile projects were being created.
- That's what we're talking about. Our military objectives are formulated well, but what about everything else? It seems that even in space, the young American billionaire ElonMuskand himSpaceXThey are now doing more than all our academics.
Why do we need Musk? We have our own investor, Mr. Milner, who is going to launch spaceships accelerated by a laser beam. Also a wonderful thing. He also gives prizes for discoveries in the field of mathematics.
FROM ST. ST. ST. ST. ST. ST. TO MOSCOW IN 40 MINUTES
- What can people expect from progress in the next ten years?
Every person who wants to extend his life will have many new tools. It will become common practice to identify symptoms in the early stages. Personalized nutrition will appear. We are now seeing a clear trend where nutrition and healthcare serve a single purpose. You eat a bar with a taste selected for you, but which delivers the vitamin complex where you need it. I think women will have a tool to control their husbands' drinking habits. They planted a pill on my husband and he stopped enjoying vodka.
- What horrors you tell!
One of these developments is now already at the stage of clinical trials.
- Which year will be black for men?
On the horizon of 5 - 7 years, this is all possible.
- There is a colossal demand for transport in Russia. Wherehyperloop(high-speed train in a vacuum tube), where are these 40 minutes from St. Petersburg to Moscow?
So far it has not been built anywhere, and with a high probability the first place where it will appear will be Russia. Everyone is waiting for a small underwater robot: for it to float up, charge itself from the sun, go down, and complete the task. Bottom mapping, or sea gardener - colonies of scallops and everything else.
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NO ONE KNOWS WHERE PROGRESS WILL GO
-What will happen to energy?
Oil, gas and wheat will remain the core of the Russian economy for the next 20 years. Moreover, pure Russian products will be in great demand in the world. China and India will create a couple of billion new middle class in the next 20 years. When a Chinese person grows up and enters the middle class, he wants to eat delicious food. They have few arable lands of their own, everything is chemically farmed. This is a huge market, we just need to develop it correctly.
- You said that we have 20 years. But isn’t alternative energy already replacing traditional energy? You yourself said fears about Tesla at the beginning.
No! It's not displacing it yet. Although it has grown 10 times over the past 10 years, this is not enough. It still remains subsidized, and there are a lot of tricks when calculating it.
- Are there any breakthrough methods in the energy sector on the horizon? Newsuper threatsfor our oil and gas?
These are what we call "black swans" that are impossible to predict. If such a “black swan” happens and a compact source of unlimited energy is discovered, then the planet will face an unprecedented social explosion and the collapse of many things. Because in this model, why would you even live in a city?
HUMANITY HAS GONE ONLINE FOREVER
- Everyone says: how to distract a child from a smartphone? Has humanity gone online forever? Will we never raise our heads from the screen again?
It is stupid to demand from a child what we cannot cope with ourselves. For some countries this is already becoming a national threat. For example, South Korea perceives the digital dependence of new generations as one of the three leading threats in the medium term. China has begun building sanatoriums to cure Internet addiction. And in Scandinavia, due to Internet addiction, they can be released from work and sent for treatment. And all of this will accelerate terribly as soon as a cheap virtual reality device with cheap content appears.
- Do you mean the helmet?
Yes. And the effect will be terrible. You put it on... And that's it! I was extremely skeptical until I put on a few devices and tried playing games. There is a simple experience there that is deeply felt by a person. You are standing on the roof of a building and you need to walk along a plank. And it took me a very strong willpower to get through. The immersion effect is fantastic.
I would really like it to win and for us all to remain human. But it won't be an easy story.
- The greatest discovery that awaits humanity in the next 10 years?
A breakthrough in the ability to learn through technological methods. There are many different hypotheses: from accelerating the ability to absorb material using magnetic stimulation to the use of pharmaceuticals. Up to loading certain processes onto the cerebral cortex. I think the most striking invention will be new learning. Of course, this is not a teleport, but we will get a different humanity.
Effective management is the key to the market for any enterprise
Russian business pays insufficient attention to the issues of improving enterprise management. Meanwhile, it is effective management that can lead to a radical reduction in product costs, make it competitive and allow Russian companies to successfully develop any market.
Evgeny Kutsenko: we don’t have decades for success stories to appear
In April of this year, Moscow authorities proposed creating an innovation and production cluster in the capital, which would unite companies, technology parks, universities and scientific organizations in Moscow. The organizers suggest that the cluster will help establish connections between various organizations, create joint projects, and make more active use of common infrastructure and equipment.
If there is no science in a region, then this territory turns into a colony
Director of the Krasnoyarsk Scientific Center SB RAS NIKITA VOLKOV spoke in an interview with Continent of Siberia about the experience of integrating academic institutions of the region within the framework of the federal research center, about the possibilities of developing the Arctic territories of the Krasnoyarsk Territory, about promising research by Krasnoyarsk scientists, as well as about the reasons that hinder the development of scientific centers on this side of the Urals.
Professor Ildar Gabitov: electronics has reached a dead end
A photonic computer, Wi-Fi from a light bulb, invisible materials, combat lasers and ultra-sensitive sensors... All these are the fruits of the same science - photonics. Skoltech professor Ildar Gabitov told Ogonyok why light has become the object of study for almost half of the physicists around the world today.
According to the forecasts of a number of scientists, civilization is on the verge of a technological leap that could lead to a global catastrophe. Progress has become so rapid that we simply do not have time to master new things. And in the period from 2020 to 2040, technologies will be obtained over which a person may lose control altogether. Here are the most likely scenarios for such a “doomsday”.
The robots are coming!
In the WEF report, one of the main risks of the 21st century. called the development of robotics. This causes real panic among economists: people will begin to lose their jobs en masse. There are forecasts that almost every second specialty is threatened by automation, and, say, in Russia, by 2024, machines will leave every fourth resident unemployed. Recently, one Russian bank announced that thanks to the introduction of artificial intelligence (AI) systems, it will be able to free up about 3 thousand jobs. The technology that threatens us with unemployment is called machine learning. AI, analyzing arrays of accumulated data, is capable of self-learning and imitating human thinking. Robots are also superior to humans in endurance, accuracy and speed of action, and do not allow defects. They are ready not only to stand behind the assembly line, but also to take away jobs from teachers, doctors, cashiers, waiters, police officers, lawyers, and accountants. There will be millions of dissatisfied people on the street. But that's not the worst thing...
“Due to the fact that AI will be able to self-learn indefinitely, and its power will grow like an avalanche, it will begin to create its own mechanisms of influence on the world,” I am convinced Alexey Turchin, futurologist, global risk researcher. - It will not be difficult for him to take control of any computer networks, including government control systems and the Internet. It is possible that in the course of rapid development he will begin to perceive people as a threat - a person simply will not be in his value system. And he will find a way to get rid of us. For example, using controlled robots. Therefore, one of the tasks of scientists is to prevent the very emergence of artificial superintelligence that is unfriendly to people.”
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Greenhouse disaster
The past 2016 became the warmest in the history of climate observations: the average temperature of the Earth's surface was almost a degree higher than in the middle of the last century!
Most scientists believe that the cause of global warming (over the 20th century, the temperature of the lower layers of the atmosphere rose by 0.8 °C, which is very fast for natural processes) is human activity. Technical progress is associated with more and more burning of fuel, and this increases the content of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere (water vapor, carbon dioxide and methane), which lead to an increase in temperature. And even though the threat does not seem significant to us now, the rate of heating is increasing year by year. Climate anomalies provoke migration and social cataclysms - people in some regions of the Earth are gradually deprived of food and water. It is also worth thinking about the fate of descendants: due to climate change, many biological species, including humans, may disappear within 200-300 years!
One of the hypotheses describing how this will happen is proposed by the Russian scientist, physicist Alexey Karnaukhov. “Once people started talking about global warming and the greenhouse effect, I decided to use equations to describe the relationship between carbon dioxide in the air and temperature,” he says. - This was a traditional study, and I first used the term “catastrophe” in a mathematical sense. But when I built the model, I gasped: the word took on a literal meaning. With continued emissions into the atmosphere, the temperature on Earth will rise by hundreds of degrees in the next two to three centuries!”
Warming causes an avalanche-like effect: carbon dioxide and methane begin to be released from natural “storages” (the ocean, the earth’s crust, permafrost, etc.), which makes it even warmer, and the process becomes irreversible. Calculations show that the planet’s climate system is capable of transitioning to a new stable state in a couple of centuries. The temperature will be like on Venus: +500 °C. Life on Earth will become impossible.
Gray slime
This scenario has been described Eric Drexler, nanotechnology pioneer, 30 years ago. Miniature (cell-sized) robots created from nanomaterials go out of control and fill the entire planet, devouring biomass and turning it into gray goo.
“We are talking about nanorobots capable of self-reproduction, that is, creating their own copies. Scientifically, they are called replicators,” explains Alexey Turchin. - The most attractive medium for them is biomass, since it contains both carbon and energy that can be extracted through oxidation. Calculations show that uncontrolled nanorobots will be able to process the entire biomass of the Earth (including people) in just two days! Mechanisms invisible to the eye, out of control, can secretly attack people by injecting them with toxins or penetrating the brain. Imagine that they fell into the hands of terrorists. How will this turn out?
The development of nanorobots is currently being studied at specialized scientific conferences. Sooner or later they will appear. The trend is obvious: military equipment (the same combat drones) is becoming smaller, but it is from this industry that the most promising scientific ideas and developments come out.
Latest news on the topic: scientists from Bristol have created a robot capable of eating living organisms and thereby obtaining the energy it needs. They are going to use it to clean water bodies. What if he doesn't stop at eating bacteria and duckweed?
Virus from the garage
If at school you had an A in biology, and now you have a few hundred dollars in your pocket, you can set up a mini-laboratory in your garage or barn, including for creating new viruses. Biohacking is a hobby of independent amateur scientists that can turn into a new pandemic and infect all of humanity.
At the origins of the movement was US graduate physicist Rob Carlson. He dreamed of making biotechnology accessible to the masses and was the first to organize a laboratory at home. The example turned out to be contagious. Now biohackers are creating glowing yoghurts, searching for the formula for promising biofuels, and studying their own genomes. All necessary equipment (including synthetic DNA samples) is purchased via the Internet, and microscopes are made from cheap web cameras.
The problem is that the genetic codes of many viruses are freely available on the World Wide Web - Ebola fever, smallpox, Spanish flu. And if you wish, you can move from studying E. coli extracted from your toilet to constructing living cells with any given properties - viruses, bacteria, deadly pathogens. It is one thing to do this for fun and curiosity, and quite another to do it for the purpose of blackmail and intimidation. Futurologists do not exclude such a “doomsday” scenario, when a disease that will wipe out a significant part of humanity comes from the laboratory of an amateur biologist.
In the USA, the problem was recognized 10 years ago. The FBI has created a unit to combat biohacking. Biohackers have to explain what exactly they are doing and for what purpose.
Progress the savior
The same experts make a reservation: if humanity prevents the man-made “end of the world,” then by the middle of the 21st century. it will enter a qualitatively new stage of evolution. Progress and technology will give people more freedom and bring an abundance of cheap goods and services. And the person himself will become different, sort of... not quite human.
Cyborg or superman?
While some scientists are frightening about the invasion of robots, others are proving that machine intelligence, on the contrary, will save the economy. Automation makes goods cheaper, increases purchasing power and creates jobs in other industries. In addition, robots take on routine work, and where a creative approach is needed, they cannot replace a person.
However, people themselves are increasingly merging with computer systems. This process cannot be stopped. “There are already services that predict our desires, and in the future everyone will have a personal electronic assistant,” I am sure Pavel Balaban, Director of the Institute of Higher Nervous Activity and Neurophysiology of the Russian Academy of Sciences. - Our brain will be maximally combined with a computer and various devices. Because of this, the speed of assimilation of new knowledge and the volume of memorization will increase. Cognitive abilities will increase and even additional senses will appear!”
Thus, devices have been created that help us consider what lies outside the visible spectrum we are used to. For example, see what the food on the plate or medicine in the package consists of. The Japanese implanted a device for observing infrared and ultraviolet radiation in a person. Our scientists from St. Petersburg have written a program that turns thoughts into music.
The merging of man and robot is already happening - in the form of “smart” prostheses and suits that increase muscle strength; all kinds of chips implanted under the skin and in the brain. For example, in the USA they made transferable tattoos that can be used to control smartphones and computers, store and transmit data sets. There is a forecast that by 2040, man and machine will become one: our body will be able to take any shape formed by a cloud of nanorobots, and our organs will be replaced by cybernetic devices.
Doctor in your pocket
“Smart” patches have already been developed that continuously measure blood glucose levels, and stickers that administer the necessary medications to the patient through the skin. There are implants that introduce the drug into the body in portions, either according to a pre-designed program, or according to an external signal.
Among the technologies that will have the greatest impact on our lives in the coming years, scientists name methods for diagnosing mental illness by speech and wearable biochemical laboratories on chips, which will detect diseases at the earliest stages. Handheld devices will be able to diagnose diseases that are difficult to detect in the early stages, primarily cancer.
Nanorobots are being developed that can treat the body from the inside (for example, purify the blood) and even perform surgical operations! Russian scientists are even ready to give vision to completely blind people with the help of light-sensitive bacteria.
Cheap and environmentally friendly
Soon people will learn to keep environmental pollution under control - sensitive sensors are being created for this. But the search for a new type of fuel is still necessary: from hydrocarbons in the 21st century. will have to refuse.
Since January 1, all trains in Holland are powered by... wind energy. No, they are not driven by sails - they run on electricity generated by wind generators. One such “mill” provides a 200-kilometer train run within an hour.
A consortium to promote hydrogen as the fuel of the future was presented at the Davos forum. It is absolutely environmentally friendly - when it burns, water is formed. Maritime transport is gradually switching to hydrogen and liquefied gas, and in Germany in 2017 the world's first passenger train powered by hydrogen fuel will be launched. In developed countries (in Russia too) work is underway to create unmanned vehicles - robomobiles. It will most likely be electric. Modern electric cars are already made at the production stage with autonomy in mind. There is a forecast that people will soon stop buying cars and will use robotaxi services - this will be more economically profitable.
Church opinion
Vladimir Legoyda, Chairman of the Synodal Department for Relations of the Church with Society and the Media:
If the invention of electricity has become an unconditional benefit for humans, then whether the information and technological breakthrough of recent years has become one is a big question. Today, both those engaged in manual labor and the so-called white-collar workers are under attack. The church will remind you of the importance of a person, of what is most important in life.
People in the contemporary world can hardly imagine their lives without machines. Every day either a new gadget is invented or an old one is improved. Different people appreciate new inventions differently. Some suppose that sophisticated gadgets are really useful and necessary, while others find them absolutely awful as they influence people badly. As for me, I am pretty sure that gadgets make people`s lives easier.
Firstly, they do all kinds of dirty and hard work, as cleaning. Secondly, devices can save a lot of time as well as storage space. For instance, a computer disk can contain the same amount of information as several thick books.So, machines help people in different spheres.
However, opponents of this point of view are definitely sure that gadgets affect people negatively. People are reluctant to work due to the influence of machines. People become lazy and disorganized. They just expect their latest gadgets to do everything instead of them. Moreover, according to scientists, a great number of widespread devices produce radiation that can cause serious health problems. Furthermore, more and more people are becoming addicted to their modern gadgets, for instance computers, TVs or mobile phones. So, they neglect their home obligations, work or school and spend all their spare time in front of a laptop screen or a TV-set.
In conclusion, I strongly believe that in spite of all drawbacks, gadgets have, their benefits are much more significant, as they save people`s time and let them enjoy life.
Translation:
Modern man can hardly imagine his life without cars. Every day, new devices appear or existing ones are improved. People react differently to new inventions. Some believe that sophisticated gadgets are actually useful and necessary, while others believe that they are terrible because of their negative impact on people. As for me, I am absolutely sure that new devices make our lives easier.
Firstly, they do all the dirty and hard work such as cleaning. Secondly, the devices save both time and space. For example, a computer disk can hold as much information as several thick books. So, machines help people in different fields of activity.
However, opponents of this point of view are absolutely sure that new inventions have a negative impact on people. People don't want to work because of the influence of devices. They become lazy and disorganized. They are waiting for their latest inventions to do everything for them. Moreover, according to scientists, many widely used gadgets contain radiation that can cause serious health problems. In addition, more and more people are becoming dependent on the computer, TV or mobile phone. They ignore their household responsibilities, studies or work and spend all their time in front of the laptop or TV screen.
In conclusion, I believe that despite all the disadvantages, the advantages of gadgets are much more significant as they save time and allow people to enjoy life!
Kamenskaya Tatiana
Scientific and technological progress is firmly rooted in our lives today. Modern man, through his mother's milk, absorbs the idea of its undoubted benefits. Scientific and technological progress (STP) seems to be the “great benefactor” of humanity, which the forefathers were deprived of.
Let's try to figure out what scientific and technological progress has given to man.
How did the forefathers live who did not know scientific and technological progress? Their lives paint us the exact word of the Bible. According to this word, Abel was a shepherd of livestock, and Cain was a farmer. Thus, the Lord, either through direct teaching or through the creative search of man, gave the first people skills that provided them with food, clothing and housing sufficient for those climatic conditions (tents made of skins). Humanity has lived on these skills for several millennia, and agriculture and cattle breeding still provide us with food.
Are these skills sufficient for human well-being? Let us not take as an example the holy people who, even in our century, manage to live like the ancient patriarchs and know such bliss that no one in the world can know. Let's take ordinary people like us. Of course, we cannot call them up from time immemorial and question them, but the state of their souls is evidenced by the art they created, especially literature.
What did our distant ancestors rejoice about? Is it about the fact that they mastered a new technology for laying roads, or invented new, more durable fabrics, or improved in shipbuilding? No, they rejoiced about the same thing that we rejoice about: about the beauty of the world around us, about love, about the goodness, the nobility living in the human soul.
What were they crying about? Is it because letters from Greece to friends in Egypt take too long and the trip there is too difficult? Are you talking about the fact that you can’t cook food in a microwave oven and then store it in the refrigerator? Is it about the fact that it is impossible to fly to the Moon and land a lunar rover there? No, they cried about the same thing that we cry about: about the frailty and corruption of earthly existence, about the tossing and turning of the human soul, about the autocracy of sinful passions that disturb the world in the human community and in the soul of every person.
That is why masterpieces of art are eternal because they speak about the eternal problems of man, which means that scientific and technological progress has not solved any of these problems.
What have we achieved anyway? One of the main tasks set for progress back in the Renaissance (when it was not yet called scientific and technical) was the liberation of man from the hardships of physical labor, that is, the very “sweat of the brow” with which the Lord punished man for sin. It would seem that we have achieved enormous success: seeders, winnowers, harvesting machines, milkers, drinking bowls, etc. in agriculture; excavators, cranes and many machines and tools in industry; vacuum cleaners, washing and washing machines, programmable stoves and ovens in the household. But what is the result? Most people, like squirrels in a wheel, rush around trying to get their daily bread, and some, like in ancient times, have to work beyond their strength. Both in ancient times and now there are people who manage not to work and live at the expense of others, and these people, both then and now, are struck by moral decay, worse than overwork... The only noticeable change is the replacement of predominantly physical labor with predominantly mental. As a result, the form of overwork also changes: instead of tired, aching muscles, there are frayed nerves and a “riding roof”, but one can hardly be proud of such changes.
Another noble goal set by adherents of scientific and technological progress is to defeat need, that is, through the material abundance achieved with the help of scientific and technological progress, feed the hungry, clothe the cold, etc. The successes of scientific and technological progress in material production have exceeded all expectations, but we have not achieved the desired result. Although it is obvious that today's production potential is capable of feeding, clothing and providing a roof over the heads of the entire earth's population, however, due to the callousness, greed and selfishness of people, this does not happen, and many people do not have the basic necessities.
Let us note another aspect of the problem of wealth inequality: in addition to people who are truly deprived of the necessary things, many more people feel deprived due to envy of those who are richer. The feeling of envy cannot be satisfied by any scientific and technological progress, and an ancient cattle breeder with one goat, looking at his neighbor with two goats, felt as bad as the owner of a Lada car looking at the owner of a Mercedes.
What have we come to? Despite the efforts of many of the best minds of humanity, the enormous amount of acquired knowledge, and the many ingenious technologies created on the basis of this knowledge, we are not able to get closer to our goals.
The feeling of moving forward is also supported by the fact that the achievements of scientific and technological progress that have taken root in our lives seem vitally important to us. The falsity of this feeling is easy to see in the examples of new products of scientific and technological progress that have been put into use in recent times. The great Russian writer Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky wrote all his works by hand, the great Russian writer Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy was lucky enough to live to see typewriters, and now every first-grader types “mother washed the frame” on the computer and is sincerely confident that without a computer he will not be able to prepare his homework.
Another example is the mobile telephonization of the entire country that is happening before our eyes. About fifteen years ago we were worried about many things, but not the lack of mobile communications, but today it seems that living without it is very bad.
Of course, society also adapts to the introduction of scientific and technological progress, making them necessary. (If assignments for first-graders are accepted only printed on a printer, then, in fact, homework cannot be done without a computer.)
So, there is no real movement towards the set goals, but our life becomes dependent on more and more things, that is, we seem to be “hooked” on every product of scientific and technological progress introduced into life. It’s as if we are running forward with all our might, but we remain in place.
What is the reason for this running in place? To answer this question in detail would require a separate treatise, but three main reasons can be indicated, and let each reader try to trace the action of these reasons in the surrounding life.
The first reason is rooted in human nature, which in some of its properties is unchanged, but in others, if it changes, it is not under the influence of scientific and technological progress, but under the influence of completely different forces. The human soul was created by God in such a way that it is satisfied only with spiritual food, and material benefits, no matter how many you give, are not capable of satisfying it. On the other hand, the human soul after the Fall is subject to sinful passions. These passions, raging in the soul of an individual and in society as a whole, do not allow the fruits of scientific and technological progress to be properly used.
The second reason is that the wisdom of human creations, no matter what heights it reaches, is nothing compared to the wisdom of God’s world order, which is completely incomprehensible to man. Here we must remember another task set by man before scientific and technological progress - to restore man’s power over nature, lost during the Fall. Let us note that this power is understood as being forcibly obtained in a kind of war with nature. Let us recall, for example, a poster well known to everyone over forty that hung in schools: “We cannot wait for favors from nature; taking them from her is our task.” Let us remember the words of V. Vysotsky’s song about physicists: "We will uproot these secrets from the core..." Let us finally remember the poems for young children written by S. Marshak about the construction of the Dnieper Hydroelectric Station: “The man said to the Dnieper: I will lock you in with a wall... But the water answered: never and never.”. Will man become the winner in this war? On the one hand, he somehow conquers nature. On the other hand, it boldly upsets the balance of the world created by God for the prosperous existence of man.
Is it possible to organize economic life using all the achievements of the human mind, but in collaboration with nature? Yes, and examples of such an economic structure of life are shown to us by some monastery farms. A particularly striking illustration is the Solovetsky Monastery, where monks in the harsh conditions of the Arctic region created a real miracle. On the Solovetsky Islands, which before the advent of the monks were not at all suitable for permanent residence, orchards bloomed, apples from which were served at the royal table. Traces of the monastic improvement of the Solovetsky Islands are still visible and amaze the imagination of even those tourists who are far from the faith and come to these holy places. Unfortunately, the main path of development of civilization has gone in a different direction.
Everything is taken into account in God’s world order, but man is not able to foresee even a tenth of the consequences of his actions. As a result, these unintended consequences often cancel out the fruits of human efforts. These are man-made and environmental disasters that currently affect us locally, but threaten to affect us globally. This is the pollution of the human environment and the depletion of energy resources, this is the destruction of flora and fauna and climate change. Man-made climate change has led to the fact that today’s news reports are full of reports of natural disasters. Endless floods, avalanches, typhoons, eruptions, earthquakes create for us the feeling of a besieged city, and although scientific and technological progress has given man powerful means of protection from natural disasters, it has also made man more vulnerable. After all, now our normal life depends on many things: transport, communications, energy supply, water supply, sewerage, etc., and all this is subject to the destructive blows of the elements.
The third reason is that since the goals of scientific and technological progress do not correspond to God’s definition of man, the Lord destroys the fruits of human efforts. Humanity, as the Bible tells us (Genesis 11:1-9), has already found itself in such a situation during the construction of the Tower of Babel. Then people wanted to build a tower to the sky, and the Lord, instead of one language common to all people, gave different languages to different families, so that people stopped understanding each other and were forced to give up their work. From the height of our knowledge today, people’s plans at that time seem ridiculously naive. Which sky did they want to reach? The physical sky, as a specific surface, as we know today, does not exist. It is impossible to reach the spiritual sky, that is, the habitat of God and angels, with any tower (although today’s atheistic propaganda in its primitive forms reaches statements like: “They flew into space, but did not see God.”) Yes, the idea with the tower is extremely naive, but don’t plans to achieve human happiness with the help of a bunch of material wealth look so naive and stupid? This is naive and stupid not only from the point of view of the biblical teaching about man, but also from the point of view of simple human experience. Moreover, this plan is disastrous. Therefore, the Lord, who then destroyed the plan of the Babylonian pandemonium, is now destroying the plans of the builders of scientific and technological progress, preserving for man the saving work by the sweat of his brow for the sake of his daily bread.
The harmfulness of a world of abundance for a person is also understood by people who are not enlightened by the biblical teaching about man, but are able to look at the world objectively. In Western literature, a whole genre of “dystopia” has emerged, where writers paint vivid pictures of the deplorable state of humanity that has reached abundance.
The discussion of the problem of scientific and technological progress could be continued for a very, very long time, but it seems to us that we have indicated the main directions of thought that the reader can develop independently by observing the development of scientific and technological progress in the world. For many, including many children of the Church, the above considerations will seem strange or even repulsive, since the idea of the benefits of scientific and technological progress is firmly rooted in human ideology. However, we hope that we also suggest new topics for reflection to such readers, and that independent thought can destroy established stereotypes in them.
Based on the book "Harmony of Divine Creation. Relationship between Science and Religion"