In today’s society, there seems to be a “preference for solving problems with technology”¹. This preference leads to the development of a compound noun: technological fix. In Dane Scott’s paper, The Technological Fix Criticisms and the Agricultural Biotechnology Debate, he defines a technological fix as “an attempt to solve problems using technology that will ultimately prove to be counterproductive”¹. It is interesting to note that while the social bias of preferring technological solutions exists, the word “technological fix”, indicating an exact opposite impression, also exists. This paradox occurs because while technological fixes seem effective and practical at the moment, they ultimately make things worse in the long run¹. To explain how it is so, Scott analyzed both the philosophical and practical criticisms of technological fixes. To focus on the practical criticisms, these are his concerns regarding technological fixes: the inability to solve underlying problems, creating new problems, as well as being conservative of the present state¹. To better understand these criticisms, this blog post will use two example applications to test Scott’s analysis.

In his paper, Scott expressed his concerns for the future of “both [needing to] feed an additional 3 billion people over the next 50 years and reducing the environmental impacts of agriculture”¹. This is a concern that seems solvable by technological advancements. Anthony Trewavas, a biochemist (which Scott considered to be “representative of mainstream scientists working in this field”), advocated that agricultural biotechnology would be the key solution to the paradoxical problem mentioned above¹. But is it true that to harmonize such a difficult task, we must seek technology for help? In focusing on one solution, we can easily overlook other solutions. Let us shift our focus to the part of the problem concerning population growth. Perhaps it cannot be determined whether poverty causes population growth or vice versa², but nonetheless, an absolute correlation between the two suggests a potential concern that would not be addressed by a technological fix. We may easily overlook the problem of excessive birth or poverty, which would lead to an increasing population demand that our planet cannot keep up with. Here we see the conservative problem outlined by Scott, as we fail to acknowledge the underlying social issue that needs to be resolved, while having our attention directed towards a technological fix.

Scott’s analysis on technological fixes can also apply to climaterianism. Climaterianism advocates for vegetarianism in order to promote sustainability, among numerous reasons, including methane emission and water resource degradation. From this perspective arises the need to convince meat-lovers to become a vegetarian. One technological fix seems to be the development of synthetic animal products, which attempts to replace natural animal products such as meat, milk, and eggs for those who need these in their diet. On the surface, it seems that by making these replacement products, more people would be able to join the vegetarian side. However, in directing our attention towards these technological fixes, we can easily neglect the actual root problems. If we take a step back from the technology and examine the reasons that have led to climaterianism, we would see more solutions that could fix these concerns directly. Take the case of water degradation for instance, which is the result of mainly runoff fertilizer and manure from farms, leading to oxygen-deprived waters as a result of bacterial or algae growth³. Yes indeed, if we limit cattle consumption, we would limit manures, and in limiting manures, we could protect water sources from being contaminated. However, this thought process lies two flaws. One being that vegetarianism will not be able to solve the problem of fertilizer runoff, as plantation agriculture will continue to cause this problem. Possibly with worse impacts than before, after plants become the primary food source for all, while farmers attempt to increase crop yields. The other flaw then stems from the first one: it is not vegetarianism that can solve water contamination, but the farmers. Only the farmers can handle manure so it is used and distributed properly (as fertilizer or else), just as only the farmers can control the amount of fertilizer they apply to the crops to prevent excess. This underlying problem would not be recognized had we fixated only on technological fixes that could guarantee the adoption of climaterianism. These popularized technological solutions blind us from the actual, deeper problems that deserve attention, as concluded by Scott.

When we “reframe a social problem as a technological one”, we seem to have simplified the “complexity and unpredictability of human behavior”¹. But as Scott concluded, these technological fixes are rarely true solutions to a problem, environmental or social. The real cause is usually left untouched. While Alvin Weinberg claimed that technological fixes “can buy time until the problem can be dealt with on a deeper level”, Scott maintains that the conservative nature of technological fixes will only let the present state persist, instead of actually leading to deep solutions¹. Through the two examples, Scott’s conclusions are seen to be effective in seeking to understand a problem instead of seeking mere technological fixes.

 

¹ Scott, Dane. “The Technological Fix Criticisms and the Agricultural Biotechnology Debate.” Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics 24, no. 3 (2010): 207–26. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10806-010-9253-7.

² Meadows, Donella. “Poverty Causes Population Growth Causes Poverty.” The Academy for Systems Change, July 24, 2013. http://donellameadows.org/archives/poverty-causes-population-growth-causes-poverty/.

³ National Geographic Society. “Dead Zone.” National Geographic Society, October 9, 2012. https://www.nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/dead-zone/.