SCIENCE AND HUMAN HAPPINESS
Ours is the age of science. The contribution of science to human happiness is by no means small. Borders of human knowledge have been pushed forward in all directions. Man’s working capacity, in all fields has enormously increased. It is by virtue of scientific knowledge that man has performed stupendous tasks. Man has explored the bottom of the oceans, conquered the high mountains, stepped on the moon and now hopes to set foot on the other planets also. Science has given sophisticated instruments to man for research and the deadly weapons of offence and of defence.
Transport and communication have become extremely easy. Time and distance have been almost annihilated. Radio, TV and now Internet have made it possible to know many things of the importance that happen in any part of the globe.Radio television, cinematograph provide entertainment and knowledge. Two powerful agents – steam and electricity have revolutionized the world. The two grand servants, electricity and steam have accomplished mammoth tasks for men. Electricity is working wonders. Electricity is a magic-hand maid. It has given in our hands the lamp of Aladdin; with the help of it we run our water coolers, water heaters, washing machines, refrigerators, air conditioners, radios, televisions,typewriters, printing machines, computers and numerous other important and useful machines. Science has helped save labour, time and money. Science has helped us to right against diseases. Sources of these far ‘incurable’ diseases have been successfully encountered with. Science has enabled the blinds to see, the deaf to hear, the dumb to talk, the lame to walk – science has made the birth easy, death difficult; life comfortable; pleasure more pleasant. Painless and bloodless surgery has already become a practical possibility. Sulpha drugs, streptomycin, penicillin, aspirin etc. have reduced human suffering to a great extent. Birth and death have already been brought under control. Science and life have become synonyms. Blessings of the science are numerous. We are born and we die under the shadow of science. Science is our eyes, ears, nose, throat, lungs, hands, feet and all.
Science has its darker side too. The banes and the boons of science balance each other in well-balanced pans of a scale. Science has contributed to human comforts greatly, but what is the contribution of science towards happiness? It is very doubtful as science has made life – human life ‘happy’. Not only human life but science has also made thetypewriters, printing machines, computers and numerous other important and useful machines. Science has helped save labour, time and money. Science has helped us to right against diseases. Sources of these far ‘incurable’ diseases have been successfully encountered with. Science has enabled the blinds to see, the deaf to hear, the dumb to talk, the lame to walk – science has made the birth easy, death difficult; life comfortable; pleasure more pleasant. Painless and bloodless surgery has already become a practical possibility. Sulpha drugs, streptomycin, penicillin, aspirin etc. have reduced human suffering to a great extent. Birth and death have already been brought under control. Science and life have become synonyms. Blessings of the science are numerous. We are born and we die under the shadow of science. Science is our eyes, ears, nose, throat, lungs, hands, feet and all.
life of even animals, the so-called lower creation, happy. Comfort can be misnamed happiness. Science has made life happier but comfort is not happiness and comfort means the annihilation of all incentives to work. Human life has been so much mechanized that had we been able to walk about rather than being carried about, lifted about, dragged about, flown about, pushed and jolted about, and rocketed to and fro, life could have been happier. Science has turned man into machines, robots – working, eating, seeing, hearing mechanically. We have given ourselves away for
this ‘sordid boon’ of science. Nothing is ours. Science has brain washed us, it has ‘brain drained’ us. We human beings are human machines. If a part of the body, human or animal, is disfigured, mutilated or amputated,
“don’t worry”, the doctors say. Artificial limbs, foot, leg; arm can be attached to the body to replace the damaged one. The exterior or interior parts that cannot be manufactured synthetically or artificially, an identical part from another human being or even of an animal can be transplanted. A kidney, an eye, the liver, a lung, and even the heart can be and has also been transplanted. Science can give new hearts in place of old ones. Though science has made possible the replacement, transplantation or even exchange of heart, yet science has not been able to bring about the “change of hearts” which is essential agency which remains as ‘unfulfilled’ as ever. Here science has failed – science has failed the scientists. Science is the ethics, the religion of the atheists.