We're
living in one of those wrenching moments in history when the old order
is dying of its own moral disease, and the new one hasn't become
manifest yet. (Likewise, the old gods are dead and the new one[s] have
not appeared yet.)
This
is certain: the Enlightenment is over. The old model of doing science
without con-science, and increasing our technical capability with no
reference to moral responsibility, is finished. So is the notion that
for one to succeed, another must fail.
Now
two paths are opening up to us. Either a modern dark ages where
superstition and ignorance are honored (see the platforms of both US
political parties). Or we will move on to a more enlighten notion of
business and technology - where we pay as much attention to the social
and moral consequences on the user end of the fulcrum, as to the
ingenuity of engineering at the input side of the fulcrum. (It's all
about leverage: technical and financial.)
Long ago, the author of Deuteronomy described such a time as ours: I set before you the path of life and (true) prosperity, or death and destruction. I beseech you to pursue the former that you and your offspring may live.
Turning
a deaf ear to the students, and then beating them down, is the same
mistake the US government made 45 years ago when men of my generation
first got called up to serve in Vietnam. In the first years ('64-65) we
were willing to go - as our fathers had in WWII - but wanted to know why before we went. Johnson, then Nixon, both said "Shut up and fall in line."
When
our govt refused to answer that most basic question, young people then
began to raise a whole lot of other questions in the late 1960s which
are still in front of us: regarding the environment (the first Earth
Day), women's rights (Roe v Wade), ethics in govt (Watergate).