Scientific Advancement a Boon or a Bane

SCIENTIFIC ADVANCEMENT IS A BOON OR BANE

INTRODUCTION
Science offers knowledge based on experiment and observation, but technologyis the total sum of the application of knowledge. This has made life easy and comfortablefor the user. A country said to be a developed country when it has many technicaladvancements. A small country like japan has succeeded to acquire this prestige becauseof its advancements and applications of technology at a high level. This century is the ageof Science. We cannot imagine our life without science. It has become a part and parcelof life. It is a symbol of progress.

INVENTION OF ELECTRICITY:
We are enjoying the comfort of science in all the fields. Electricity is another important scientific invention. The comforts of life like electric lamps, fridges, washingmachines, Air conditioners are the gifts of electricity.

DEVELOPMENT OF SCIENCE IN AGRICULTURE:
The development in the agricultural front, which is the backbone of our country,is really encouraging. New improved techniques have helped to increase crop yield,methods like drip irrigation, invention of hybrid varieties of seed have gone a long way tohelp agriculturists.Production of disease resistant seeds leads to high yield and it paved way for thegreen revolution also. But using of pesticides affects the soil and reduces the nitrogencontent and it leads to land pollution.

DEVELOPMENT IN MEDICINE:
Development in medicine is marvelous. Without shedding a drop of blood,doctors are able to do surgeries. The latest devices helps to diagnose diseases at an earlystage itself, thus bringing the death rate down. X-rays and laser were also used in themedical field. Almost all kinds of diseases are entirely cured by modern medicines and drugs. Plastic surgery plays important role in the field of Surgery. Organ transplantationhas become reality. Test tube babies become very common.

COMPUTER AND ITS ADVANTAGES:
Computer is an electronic device that can store information. It can alsomanipulate and transmit data. It can process and retrieve data very fast. Super computer ishelpful for weather forecasting. Telephone booths, hotels, railway stations, banks usescomputer. Communication satellites are watched with computers; also they assistscientists in Atomic power stations. Computer is a boon to engineers. Computers helpthem to design structures eg: bridges, vehicles etc computer find applications inComputer Aided Designing (CAD), Computer Aided Manufacture (CAM), andComputer Aided Engineering (CAE).

INVENTION OF INTERNET:
People exchange valuable information through internet. One can reach anywebsite and learn anything. Children could consult internet and can clarify their doubts.Communications are developed in leaps and bounds. With the help of button the commonman can interact and chat with dear and near ones. Video conferences and web camerashave made easier for executives to travel to have face-to- face interactions. It is a network through which we can connect with entire world and can collect information about anytopics.

POLLUTION:
Pollution is the greatest enemy to the mankind today. Human life has becomemiserable due to all kinds of pollutions. Strangely man himself is responsible for the problem of pollution faced by him. Air pollution: It is due to industrial and automobileexhaust, mostly due to the smokes from factories and vehicles... They contain CO2 andSO2 and other oxides of Nitrogen. They cause breathing problem even cancer. Proper awareness must be made among people. Non governmental Organizations must alsoshould take part for making awareness among people. WATER POLLUTION:
Water is a elixir of life. letting of domestic sewage, industrial wastes into drinkingwater pollutes water. Oil leaks in ocean affect marine life.They endanger many marinespecies .The latest is the leakage of cyanide from a gold mining company into the blueDanube .More than 80% of the marine species died.The river has turned grey color ..

LAND POLLUTION:
It is due to usage of pesticides, and un decomposable plastics and other synthetic fibers..Government should ban the use of plastic covers. People should reduce the usage of plastic bags in their day today life.

DEPLETION OF OZONE LAYER
:The protective ozone layer is affected there by exposing us to harmful radioactiverays. This hole in the ozone layer is due to the CFC- Chloro Fluro carbon. This CFC isevolved from the AC and fridge used by man kind.

GREEN HOUSE EFFECT:
Due to this effect the temperature of earth increases and also mountains likeHimalayas starts melting, there by increasing the level of water.They also affect the species that live in Himalayas also...

ATOM BOMBS AND HYDROGEN BOMBS:
Science had also destroyed mankind. Modern scientific weapons like Atom bombs and Hydrogen Bombs can wipe out human race. Hiroshima, Nagasaki andVietnam stands as examples of destruction due to scientific inventions. Everybodywitnessed the power of technology in the recent Iraq war - a combination of satellite imagery and precision guided missles... Terrorists also take a major part to destroy humanraces.

RADIOACTIVITY:
Radioactivity is the spontaneous emission of certain radiations by some elementsof matter. The radiations emitted are: gamma rays, beta rays, alpha rays. Gamma rays arevery penetrating and radioisotopes emitting these radiations are used for industrialradiography, and also for treatment of cancer. An isotope of Iridium or of cobalt or cesium is used in industrial radiography. The same radioisotopes are also used inmedicine. Iridium wires or cesium capsules are implanted in cavities to treat cancer.Similarly cobalt installed in machines is employed for treatment of deep seated cancerslike lung, breast and so on. Very briefly, the cancer cells are more sensitive to the gammaradiations than the normal cells and are more easily killed.Normal cells are also killed butmuch less and can recover. The above mentioned ones and several others are producedartificially in reactors and accelerators. Radioisotopes are also put in many gadgets whichfind numerous applications.

NUCLEAR ENERGY:
The discovery of fission led to the creation of nuclear reactors and generation of energy. Fission is a process in which a relatively less abundant isotope of the heavy metaluranium, when bombarded with the neutral particle neutron is broken into three smaller elements and in the process energy is released following Einstein’s equation of massenergy equivalence. The amount of energy released is huge and is used to convert water into steam and run turbines to produce electricity as in a conventional coal fired thermal power plant. Nuclear reactors have been built which produce enough energy to be able togenerate upwards of 1000 MW of electricity in a single power plants reactor. Manycountries of the world are having Nuclear Power Plants. France produces the mostamount of electricity through nuclear means for its consumption. Russia and the UnitedStates also have several Plants to produce significant amounts of Nuclear Power.Trouble for nuclear energy comes from these. They have to be contained.Therefore, all the precautions and complications of nuclear power stem from theradioactive products in the process of fission. Lot of technology and science goes in thedesigning and construction of nuclear reactors. The isotope of uranium fashioning andgiving energy gets depleted in the fuel of the reactor, it has to be replaced by fresh fuel.The depleted fuel or the spent fuel, as it is termed, has to be stored for cooling for considerable length of time and then must be disposed off safely. Many of the radioisotopes used in industry and medicine and research are produced in these reactors.Thousands of units of radioactivity are required and that can be made only over prolonged periods in reactors.

CONCLUSION:
The boon of science and technology becomes a bane when the same is deployedfor destructive purposes. Both radioactive isotopes and nuclear energy are capable of sinister uses. Radiations from the radioactive isotopes are very dangerous. Large amountsof these can be fatal and also induce cancer. Similarly fission has been used to producenuclear bombs of enormous destructive power. The energy, which in a reactor is releasedslowly and utilized, is created in a bomb in a matter of split second and released. Theresult is intense heat and intense radiation. But this bane is not the fault of technology butour failing.