The Use of Structural Methodology in Postmodern Concepts of Technology

The article is aimed at defining the possibilities for structural methodology to understand the phenomenon of modern technology. Some principles of postmodernists’ structural research are highlighted. The embodiment of these principles in the analytical discourse is shown, considering the state and development of technical activities and how they allow one to assess and predict future events. These predictions about mechanization, informatization and virtualization of almost all areas of modern society are contemplated pessimistic by some thinkers and optimistic by others. The conducted study showed that the structural methodology is a fairly effective means of philosophical understanding of the phenomena of technical reality. More and more people become involved in technology, and it is generally not perceived as involved in global threats. Instead, the dynamics and the consequences of structural transformations in the technical field are deeply interpreted by philosophers, who formulate their predictions and thus signal the dangers to culture and civilization.

INTERPRETING THE CONCEPTS OF TECHNOLOGY-SOCIETY TO PUBLIC POLICY: THE POTENTIALS OF SYSTEM DYNAMICS AND COMPUTER GAMES

In this paper, we explore how Civilization, and – in a more general approach – computer games can enhance public administration (PA) education for interpreting technology-society concepts (or Science Technology Studies). We pose the research question, how computer games at the early stage of PA studies aligned with systematic curriculum design make educational experiences and the learning process more sensitised to system complexity, creativity and understanding the role of technology. The paper shows an educational experiment where Sid Meier’s Civilization series is used at the University of Public Service in Budapest. Civilization is one of the most famous turn-based strategy games, illustrating the complex causalities of economic development, geographical expansion, technology innovation, government structure and warfare. The players experience historical development through the ages of human Civilization – starting to build simple ancient huts to modern space exploration – and choosing different strategies to guide their Civilization through the challenges of allocating resources, managing conflicts, or deploying technological innovations. Civilization has been used in several classroom experiences for teaching history and complex system analysis.

Using Task Models to Understand the Intersection of Numeracy Skills and Technical Competence With Medical Device Design

Task models are used in many different ways throughout the design and development of interactive systems. When the interactive systems are safety critical, task models can play an important role in ensuring system behaviours are consistent with user requirements, which may help to prevent errors. While task models can be used to describe a user’s goals and the steps required to achieve that goal, to understand where user errors may occur we also need to consider the users’ understanding of how to perform a task and how this relates to the system they are using. Our focus is on the use of medical devices such as syringe drivers and infusion pumps for intravenous medication, which forms a major part of hospital inpatient care throughout the world. While we might rely on software engineering and human factors techniques to ensure correctness of such devices, their use by medical personnel in practice includes other factors that are equally important. These include training medical personnel in the use of medical devices. Also numeracy education for medical staff to ensure that they are able to set up and perform the necessary calculations to convert prescribed medication into the appropriate values and measures for their delivery mechanisms. We have developed an approach that aims to bring together concepts of technology design (both functional correctness and usability concerns), numeracy and medication delivery competency. In order to do so we use task models as a common language that enables us to consider these different domains in a single way. We find that the ability to describe the two domains within a single process allows us to compare models of knowledge, tasks and use of devices, which can elicit potential mismatches and problems.

Technology Transfer and Commercialization: Functional Delineation of Definitions

A terminological analysis of the concepts of technology transfer and commercialization is presented. Functional differentiation of definitions is shown and proposals for their concretization are developed.

On Scientific and Technological Paradigms Competitions in Ideological Control in Science Conditions

Modern science is, as Thomas Kuhn pointed out in his fundamental work The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, a science that develops in stages: “scientific revolution” – “nor­mal science” – “scientific revolution”. During periods of normal functioning of science, the rules of testing and testing show established and perceived without reflection para­digms, but in the case of technical disciplines, this rule does not work, since technical paradigms do not change according to the same rules as other scientific paradigms. To change technical paradigms, you only need to accept them by the expert community – you also need to accept them by technical consumers. The article discusses the difficul­ties of defining the concepts of “technology” and “technical knowledge” as knowledge about artifacts, their use and the consequences of their use (Bernhard Irrgang). On two examples of the control of technical paradigms in two totalitarian regimes of the twenti­eth century (Lysenkoism, or Lysenkovshchina and “Aryan physics”), the role of para­digms in the situation of ideological control is presented. In these cases, we used at­tempts to “correct” genetics and quantum physics (more precisely, to completely abandon it), respectively. Of course, this control brought biology in the Soviet Union and physics in Nazi Germany to the brink of disaster. In this article, with the help of Gisle Solbu's theory of epi-knowing (knowledge at the general educational level), we propose solutions to the problem of purposeful ideological interference in the scientific and ideo­logical adjustments of not only scientific paradigms, but also scientific paradigms.

Internet of Things and Data Science in Healthcare

Undoubtedly the IoT is the future of technology, which can provide manifold benefits to health care. However, the posed challenges are also great. Concerning the analysis of healthcare data, various tools have been introduced to deal efficiently with the large volumes as well as the various peculiarities of data. The most popular representative of these modern tools is data mining. Although the KDD process has provided a lot of solutions, these techniques have to be scaled in order to deal with the new challenges posed by the big data paradigm. Cloud computing, as well as edge computing are the modern infrastructures that can provide the means to efficiently manage big data. Both cloud/edge computing and the IoT are very promising concepts of technology and their complementary characteristics assure that their integration, Cloud-IoT, provides a great potential of applications. The introduction of the Cloud-IoT paradigm in the healthcare domain can offer manifold benefits and opportunities that will considerably improve the quality of health care.

Historical analysis of innovation paradigms in the education system

The article analyzes various studies and publications of Ukrainian and foreign scholars-educators related to the organization of innovative activities in the education system. Innovations in pedagogical and music-pedagogical activity in the XX and XXI centuries are considered. The concepts of «technology» and «pedagogical technology» are defined. Attention is drawn to the pedagogical technologies used in the work of outstanding scientists-pedagogues: K. Ushinsky, B. Grinchenko, A. Makarenko, S. Shatsky, V. Shatskaya, V. Sukhomlinsky, O. Rostovsky, V. Shatalov, M. Shchetinin, E. Ilyin. There are also four stages in the development of the information technology of teaching in the field of view of the author, namely: verbal – audiovisual – programmable – multimedia and hypermedia. The approximate life of each of the four stages is determined. The modern pedagogical technologies of teaching in the higher educational establishments are characterized. First and foremost, it is computer and multimedia technologies that allow the use of a multifaceted field of information by means of technical means, first of all, of the computer, in the most optimal form of learning and information hypermedia environment. The historical analysis of paradigms of innovations in the education system conducted in the article allowed us to recognize that scientific and technological progress in the XX–XXI centuries not only led to the technologicalization of numerous industries. He also touched upon the sphere of culture, humanitarian branches of knowledge, in which the general idea is a humanistic worldview, which implies a rejection of authoritarian style of thinking, tolerance, compromise, respect for other people's opinions, other cultures, values and beliefs. At the heart of this process of technologicalization is the formation of a new methodology, the creation of innovative paradigms of teaching and education, the focus of which is the individual. Outstanding teachers of the twentieth century have left a valuable educational, theoretical and practical heritage, which continues to be relevant and needs deep knowledge and use in the modern pedagogical space. Assimilation of educational, scientific and pedagogical achievements accumulated by mankind over the centuries, allows to objectively assess the pedagogical phenomena of today and on this basis to formulate the conceptual foundations of modern innovative pedagogical technologies related to the interaction of science, art and human values.

A Scoping Review of the Conceptual Differentiation of Technology for Healthy Aging

Background and Objectives With the emergence of healthy aging as a key societal issue in recent decades, technology has often been proposed as a solution to the challenges faced by aging societies. From a public health perspective, however, aging-related technologies have been inconsistently conceptualized and ill-defined. By examining how relevant concepts in “technology for aging” have been developed to date, we hope to identify gaps and begin clarifying the topic. Research Design and Methods We conducted a scoping review according to PRISMA-ScR, drawing on PubMed and Embase. We selected articles that directly reported concepts of technology for aging, or from which such concepts could be inferred. Results We identified 43 articles, most of which were narrative reviews (n = 31). Concepts of technology for aging were presented in diverse ways with some overlap. Most studies provided some terminology (n = 36), but with little conceptual uniformity. Conceptual discourse was often focused on the aging agenda; while technological aspects were poorly defined. A conceptual framework from a public health perspective was derived from 8 articles—it showed that technology strategies do not take a population approach. Discussion and Implications While the potential of “technology for aging” is vast, its real capacity to deliver a desirable life for older people remains underdeveloped. Clearer concepts and realistic goals at population level are lacking. Efficient investment must be made throughout the social system, and technology needs to be integrated via macro-level practices.

A FRAMEWORK FOR TECHNOLOGY DRIVEN DESIGN: CRITICALITY AND COMFORT ZONE FOR EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES

This paper proposes an analytical framework for estimating the domain where a type of technology can be used in a system. In order to achieve this aim, we have elaborated on the concepts of technology critical, technology sensitive, and the technology comfort zone, to analytically assess the impact of a new technology in the early phases of system design. The result is a general method to indicate the range of requirements that can result in valid designs. This tool can assist in the decision-making processes for technology portfolio selection based on sustainable principles.