A Comment on the Comments

I am grateful to all three commentators for the time and attention they have devoted to my essay, and to Mr. Drucker in particular for his perceptive appreciation of the spirit and focus of the Harvard Program on Technology and Society. The purpose of this comment, thus, is not to deny the compliment of serious criticism but to clarify a few points of fact and interpretation and to respond to some of the questions in the three commentaries. Mr. Drucker finds a fatal weakness in what he takes to be my implicit belief that the impacts of technology are foreseeable and indeed foreseen. Mr. Ramo, by contrast, apparently does not find such a belief in my essay, for he urges upon our Program an effort... to see change ahead and, with this advance notice, to adjust society. My actual position in this matter is intermediate between these two readings. I do not believe that specific technologies or specific consequences of specific technologies can be predicted accurately or reliably, because a significant residue of uncertainty is implied by the very concept of innovation. To that extent, I am dubious about the promise of technological forecasting. On the other hand, I do not deny the usefulness of systematic attempts to forecast a surprise-free future as a methodological device for dealing more effectively with the inevitable surprises when they do come. Moreover, I think it is possible to identify some respects in which technology entails change (entails is the operative word) and to suggest the broad kinds or general directions of the social changes it can be expected to lead or contribute to. I nowhere suggest that improved sensing mechanisms will make our social problems disappear. But I believe enhanced understanding of the origin and nature of those problems, and of the cause-effect mechanisms by which change affects their shape, can help society to deal with them more effectively. Both Mr. Drucker and Mr. Dupree charge me (and our Program) with not taking history seriously enough. To the extent that we seek after origins, natures, and mechanisms, however, I do not believe it can be fairly said that formulation of our research questions is devoid of a historical sense. It is true that we have not so far engaged in projects in the history of technology. That is largely because the modem ap

Computer Science · Innovation Diffusion and Forecasting