Against technology as applied science with reference to Kenya

Abstract

In Kenya socioeconomic development is very considerably predicated upon technology as an instrument by means of which to work on the environment. National development discourse and social praxis point to the existence of certain sections of the intelligentsia where technology is believed or regarded to be applied science. The author examines the analytic and concrete problems attendant upon the widespread practice of viewing technology as applied science, arguing that the view of technology as applied science not only distorts the relationship of technology to science in the context of the dynamics of change and development in Kenya, but also that it does not tally well with the objectively observable technology in use in the nation. A valid view of technology in use in Kenya is that which does not reduce technology to direct technological derivatives of scientific inquiry and which recognizes not only the symbiosis between science and technology, but also the fact that development is a process which depends on many variables