Science, technology and wellbeing

Ian Lowe

“Scientific understanding of the world has enabled us to improve material wellbeing on a scale that previous generations would find difficult to believe. For all but the last few decades, most humans have struggled to obtain the basic necessities for a civilised life: clean water, sanitation, adequate nutrition, shelter and health care. Now, the majority of the human population has all those basics as well as such luxuries as energy, transport and communications. These improvements in our material wellbeing have been made possible by our growing scientific understanding and our increasingly powerful technologies. These have also enabled significant improvements in our mental wellbeing by freeing us from some kinds of stress and giving us much better access to culture: music, literature and drama …”