The Dharma of a Technocrat

The advent and domination of modern technology today extends from our daily domestic use all the way to national defence and international communications. However, whenever there are questions being posed by the modern technology such as the Nuclear Power Plant in Koodankulam[1] or the introduction of Genetically Modified Crops, we find that even the best among us don’t have a framework or approach that is clear and easy to understand. Question such as “what is the limit to the usage of modern technology?”, “how do we measure its benefits as against its harms?” and more importantly, “when to reject modern technology?” are not always eliciting a clear response from intellectuals, leaders and even scientists and technocrats. We find that they are unable balance their professional interest against the common interest for humanity.

If there was a question as to ‘whether the healthy and peaceful life of our people is important or having an advanced technology based Nuclear power plant is important?’, most of us will find it easy to choose the former. Similarly, if the question was ‘do we need a technology such as Genetically Modified crops which cannot guarantee its long-term health or environmental impact for short term gains?”, we would obviously choose to reject the technology.

Such simple posing of questions on issues of public welfare seems to elude the ‘experts’ whom the government often listens to in taking important technology issue-based decision. “Public Ignorance”, “Un-Scientific Approach”, “Fear Mindset”, “Unnecessary Fear”, etc., are the kind of terms often adopted by these experts to refer to refer to people like us, raising questions about such technology. 

So, what are the options in front of us? Then what choice do we have? Do we submit the genuine concerns of the 99% of people like us to the 1% ‘expert’ knowledge? 

Majority of our people often are happy to adopt such an opinion, ‘after all they are well educated’, ‘they are in high positions, so, should know better’, ‘isn’t it scientifically valid?’ and several other justifications are used within our societies and communities to accept the verdict of the 1% , sometimes against our own common sense.

• How do we, as a society, evaluate technologies or initiatives that may have long term disastrous impact?
• Where does our responsibility towards the future generations come in when we adopt such technologies?
• Should we be even concerned about the future welfare or are we to be limited in our concern with current challenges?
• Are we comfortable to limit our responsibility to our own personal life, aggrandizement of wealth, asset creation and eventual demise?

these could be some of the thoughts in the minds of those who are seeking and thinking beyond their own personal lives and care for society at large.

Some of us may be inclined to look at the past, to see how our ancestors made decisions on common welfare of humanity beyond their times. To analyse and understand the different approach they adopted towards such human conflicts, after all we are not the first ones to face such a situation.

In our culture, every vocation has been guided by the ‘dharma’[2] of that particular vocation in its social engagement.

To state a few –

• to feed everyone and ensure no one goes without food is the dharma of the farmer
• to ensure no one falls sick in society is the dharma of the traditional doctor
• to elevate human mind through aesthetics is the dharma of the artist
• to not merely produce clothing, but in the process also determine some social customs was the dharma of the weaver
• to create wealth for the entire community was the dharma of the trader
• to sustain the beauty of the language was the dharma of the poet
• to maintain peace, order and sense of security was the dharma of the king and
• to maintain higher aspiration and orientation in society was the dharma of the religious leaders

Thus, practitioner of every vocation had a dharma or an ethical social commitment that guided their engagement with the larger society.  These values are mentioned in several scriptures in many languages of spiritual and material life. It is an amazing society that could draw a code of conduct and behaviour to so many vocations and sustain the society for a long period of time. I am not at this time getting into an argument as to whether this was adhered to all the time by everyone or not. Every society will go through better and difficult times but having a system and criteria by which such articulation and practice can be done in itself shows a level of maturity that perhaps prevails in all ancient societies like India. 

Our modern-day challenge is that, an expert or a technocrat is a construct of a vocation and does not directly fit into any traditional category for us to be able to apply the ethical code of conduct like those listed above. So, we need to evolve it from the basic principles. If one were to examine the questions on technology, we started this article with, from the lens of the above ethical commitment society, we arrive at two questions - 

• What would be the dharma for the ‘experts’ of modern technology today?
• What are the guidelines by which they determine whether to recommend for instance the two examples we started the article with, viz., a nuclear power plant or a genetically modified crop?

“That which is felt as being truth and for the befit of all by a mind that is uncluttered is called dharma” defines an old scripture. The values that are highlighted in this statement are truth, benefit for all and examined with no bias (uncluttered mind). It takes courage to be truthful at all times; it takes patience to examine how any action maybe beneficial to all beings and it takes discipline and focussed unemotional mind to examine things without any clutter.  Courage, patience, discipline and unemotional nature are the characteristics that are required of us to be able to arrive at the dharma of the expert or a technocrat. 

If one were to utilize these values and characteristics, for the two examples provided, one may ask the below questions – 

• “can we see the truth of the claims behind the nuclear technology? Is it really the only solution that can provide the required electricity that is for the beneficial of humanity? can the technology and its consequent electricity provide human beings true happiness and contentment? what would be the long-term health consequences in the successive generations who live close to the power plant?” 
• “is the pest management best solved through such an expensive technology? don’t we have cheaper and simpler ways of controlling the same pests? whom does the real benefits of the GM technology serve? will it ensure a continued profit for the poorest farmer without additional burden on her wealth or health?” may be some of the question on the genetically modified crops.

When an expert says that the radioactivity is within the permissible limits from a nuclear power plant for human beings, the question arises as to what are the other radio waves that are impacting our lives in the daily basis, what if some of us are less healthy than others and fall ill even for lesser doses of the waves? 

Similarly, when experts state that the GM crops are ‘substantially equivalent’ to that of naturally grown crops and they are more or less similar, we see that the experts are resorting to a newer language to explain away the inadequacies of the technology which cannot state the truth in simple language because the truth maybe contrary to the sense of security they assure us of.

We know from history that experts denied that smoking causes cancer for several decades before conceding that it does. What was public knowledge and concern taking the experts several decades of studies to arrive at to state a simple truth. The Bhopal emission victims even today have not found justice, but, importantly, the experts who pronounced the factory safe have had it easy while the victims and their families have suffered beyond generation.  Infact every modern technology that has had disastrous impact on human and animal health and well-being has always started with a promise that no such damage will occur. 

In an era where our lives are often dictated and dominated by so many products of technology and based on expert opinions, it is important that the Dharma of the Expert is defined for our times from basics so that it is clearly articulated and practiced. One does not find any such practice among experts in any fields today, there doesn’t seem to be a compelling reason for the ‘experts’ to adhere to any code or dharma today. Neither do the custodians of our social discourse on ethics, whether they be religious leaders or intellectuals, evolving and articulating such code of ethics for the society. Today our society has elevated ‘experts’ and ‘scientists / technocrats’ into a demi-god status. We notice for instance a dominant computer technocrat like Bill Gates dictating food security solutions for poorer countries in Africa. Elon Musk speaks about the desirable characteristics of entire western civilization. Many of these modern technocrats will miserably fail our ethical interrogation if we look for adherence to truth, larger benefit for all,  or uncluttered mind in their lives and work.  And yet ethical examination does not precede our seeking their counsel on subjects such as social norm or food security. 

Many of us pride our children being educated in higher levels of technical or scientific education. However, several such institutions today don’t provide them with required ethical understanding that could help them differentiate as a responsible practitioner rather than a destructive one of their vocation. We need to stop the celebrating, “my son/daughter will be a wealthy engineer / doctor / scientist” and start to celebrate “my son / daughter will be ethical practitioner of his / her vocation”. Unless we do this in personal and social life, we can at the best bemoan the lack of ethics while benefiting from it, or at worst become its victims. It is time that we choose not being passive consumers of the ‘expert’ knowledge pervading our lives in a thousand ways each day or place an active demand of ethical behaviour on the experts. 

Let’s start with a demand - to define the dharma of technocrats.

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