Download The Central Role of International Scientific Cooperation

The Central Role of International Scientific
Cooperation in Meeting Global Challenges
József Pálinkás
President of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and
President of the World Science Forum – Budapest
We live in a world of growing
complexity
Financial
Complexity in satisfying
basic needs
(food, water, energy)
Social
Technological
Complexity of the
impacts of the
unprecedented power of
humankind
Complexity-crisis
These dynamics of natural and social
processes need a systemic approach to
the complex problems:
Changes
Impacts
Responses
The problems of the world cannot be solved with the
same kind of thinking that created them.
(Albert Einstein)
Common origin of „challenges”
Many of the balances are lost:
local – global
freedom – responsibility
capacity of the individual perception – high-tech appliances
and tools
Crisis of the Sustainability!
Imbalances
Challenges
Challenges: their scales and degrees
• If we are loosing the balance on a global
scale, we talk about a “global challenge”
• Major changes that lead to significant lost
of balances have unpredictable impacts
on our life
The state of the world:
Global challenges and their crosscutting
nature
•
Financial and economic crisis
•
Climate change
•
Energy security
•
Population explosion in the
developing world
•
Ageing in the developed world
•
Terrorism and local wars
•
Complexity of decisions
Requirements for the solution:
• Long time-horizon
• New ideas, intellectual innovation
• Harmony of local and global scales
• Authenticity
• Creditability
• Transparency
• Objectivity
Mission and characteristics of science in the 21th century
Science can contribute to restore balances!
The state of science: change of paradigm
• The knowledge base means:
• common sense
• experience, skills
• scientific knowledge
Holistic approach
• Growing need for inter- and multidisciplinarity
• Need for a better collaboration and common understanding
between natural and social sciences (climate change)
• Technology dependence of science is growing
• We need science and technology policy
Science in the 21st Century
• Accepted and unique social and cultural
mission
• A highly acknowledged human activity
with widely appreciated institutions
• Policy for Science
• Policy for Technology
Policy for the
“and”
The role of science beyond laboratories
and scientific findings
• In identifying the changes – measuring the impacts –
advising adequate responses
• characteristics and methods are universal
• objectivity and transparency
• time scale and standards
• authenticity and ethics
• frontier of “known” and “unknown”
International scientific cooperation in
the lead of global collaboration
Large scale science and technology projects bring together scientists of the
whole world, providing “best practice” for other human activities.
•
•
•
•
International Space Station
Large Hadron Collider
Mapping the Human Genome
Fighting AIDS and HIV
The credibility of science and its institutions
makes international scientific collaboration a
highly credible, widely supported and deeply
appreciated human activity.
International potential
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Tradition
Practice
Instead of politics
Previous to politics
Cooperation of many people
Different cultures
Common platforms:
– scientific methods
– pursuit of the truth
Science Diplomacy
Ability to communicate
and to build relationships
Science provides
valuable, sometimes
inevitable contribution to
solving national and
international problems
Role of civil society
An event of global science diplomacy:
World Science Forum – Budapest
Science and society at a global scale
since 2003
• Start:
– World Conference on Science (1999) in Budapest, Hungary
(UNESCO, ICSU, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Hungarian
Government)
• Missions:
– To provide a forum for major stakeholders of society for clarifying:
Science on its own is not enough, economic, cultural and social
aspects and instruments should be applied
– To better understand the needs for science in political decisionmaking
• Messages:
– We can define the new roles of science in society only with common
efforts and can work out the bases for mutual commitments with joint
inputs only
– The WSF events have offered new ideas, ways and means for the
interaction of science and society
The next Forum will take place from 5 to 7 November, 2009
December 6-8, 2008.
Academy Presidents' Forum,
Taivan
16
Thank you for your attention!
József Pálinkás