Technological Revolutions as a Social Phenomenon

The issue of revolutions and evolutions in science and society has been a focal point of intense scrutiny among researchers in science and technology studies. Methodologists have developed models of scientific revolutions that significantly influence shifts in the worldview, directions of scientific inquiry, and the ideals and norms of science. However, technological revolutions – which alter the living environment and induce transformations in sociality and consciousness – remain an understudied area. As early as the beginning of the 20th century, scientific and technological progress elicited ambivalent attitudes among philosophers of technology, scientists, and literary figures. By the early 21st century, the divide between techno-optimists and techno-pessimists had intensified. Issues of technocenosis (B.I. Kudrin) and technological determinism have come to the forefront in debates within the social philosophy of technoscience. By the 21st century, a vast sociotechnical organism had emerged, integrating science, technology, education, politics, economics, business, industry, society, and culture. The phenomenon of technoscience prompts reflection on the changing nature of revolutionary and coevolutionary processes in this interconnected world. With the accelerating pace of technogenic civilization, scientific and technological revolutions have assumed a permanent and cascading character – on the one hand, accelerating the dynamics of social transformations (the positive pole), while on the other, generating risk scenarios that demand breakthroughs and new revolutionary solutions (the negative pole). Thanks to the major technological revolutions of the 20th and early 21st centuries, everyday life has acquired new social qualities, such as technologically enabled unrestricted global mobility, interconnectedness, accelerated development, and enhanced comfort. A pressing issue today is the governance of the coevolution of technoscience, society, and culture. In addressing the challenges of harmonizing the sociotechnosphere, a key role must be played by humanitarian technologies of synthesis culture – approaches oriented toward cooperation in the name of peace and the common good.