Science, Technology, Technique and the Blackbox
Science ? - The intellectual and practical activity encompassing the systematic study of the structure and behavior of the physical and natural world through observation and experiment
(Source:Google)
Technology ? - The application of scientific knowledge for practical purposes (Source:Google)
Technique ? - A way of carrying out a particular task, esp. the execution or performance of an artistic work (Source:Google)
Blackbox ? - In science and engineering, a black box is a device, system or object which can be viewed solely in terms of its input, output and transfer characteristics without any knowledge of its internal workings, that is, its implementation is "opaque" (black). Almost anything might be referred to as a black box: a transistor, an algorithm, or the human mind. (Source:Wikipedia)
Are they “all” interconnected ?
My thoughts : Science is everything and everything is science. (In reference to the above four).
Technology, Technique and Blackbox are all Science behind the scene. All Science.
If we (by “we”, I mean the End User) interpret Technology, Technique and Blackbox – all as a job or an aid for a job, then we can think in this way. - They can all be considered as a Development Kit (DK). Just in case of softwares, we have Software Development Kit (SDK), which are all just libraries of code behind the scene, we can think here that Technology is nothing but a Development Kit (DK), which is nothing but Science behind the scene.
Same is true for technique and black boxed approach. A Technique – like driving a car – can be considered as a Development Kit (DK) which is nothing but an abstraction of a set of scientic principles which are aidful for that job. These scientific principles are moulded for easier and quick manipulation for the particular technique or job. When we learn a new technique, we dont learn anything new, we only combine a set of scientific principles that we already know and mould them in a manner that we can easily remeber and can quickly use.
In the case of a car, we can clearly realise that the actual working of car engine is pretty complex and what we really see is an abstraction of the science that goes in the making of the car engine. What we see is the Steering, the Gear, the Clutch, the Acclerator and the Brake. We think of our car in terms of these parameters, hence , these parameters comprise our Development Kit (DK). The Car does not appear to us in terms of its science, in terms of the actual scientific principles that lie behind the scenes, but those principles are “moulded” for easier and quick manipulation – it is really easy for us to view the car in terms of the Steering and the Gear rather than to view that car in terms of its complex interconnections. This is a very good example of a black boxed approach. Another good example is the Computer – very similiar to the above example works on complex interconnections but is viewed differently and abstractly.
It can be concluded from the above that Technology, Technique and the Blackbox are no different from science, at least behind the scene, and therefore should not be viewed differently either. This observation can help us keep our minds composed in case we face a new Technology, because we generally need not learn anything new, we only need to mould science together to achieve success.
