Cal Tech University Lecture

Excerpt from two-hour California Institute of Technology University Lecture, 2012:

"What is technology? Have any of you really thought about it? You are here at a school that calls itself a university of technology and what does that imply? Have any of you really thought about it? The root meaning of the word, Technology, comes from two Greek words, Techne--meaning art or skill, and Logia, meaning, to study. So the word's roots come from the study of an art of skill. And our modern-day use has turned it into the making of or use of machinery to mimic skills. And this is very telling of the way we have approached human skills since the beginning of this 21st century, that "skill" is no longer human based but is now machine based, and so even the word, "technology", denotes a machine-based process; and shouldn't we be questioning this? Is this direction of "technology" really a healthy direction we are taking? One thing that many of you have not considered is, what is the moral principle, the moral imperative that technology has brought to human life? Are we creating a technology that is devoid of consequence, devoid of moral accountability? We have been sold on the idea of technology making communication between people easier and how has that helped us to ease conflict, to create a deeper human understanding between people? Has it created a more compassionate, a more empathetic world? We have nearly 40 wars going on among various nations globally and social conflict and environmental destruction is everywhere. Has the machinery of technology made any difference? If not, why not?"

Eugene Tssui, Beckman Auditorium, Saturday, May 26, 2012, California Institute of Technology

*Photo depicts Eugene Tssui with Chancellor of the California Institute of Technology, Jean-Lou Chameau (Led CalTech to be number one university in the world for two years in a row), in 2012 after Tssui's lecture.