Technology is power and will continue to be so in the foreseeable future, R. Chidambaram, Nuclear Scientist and former Principal Scientific Adviser to Government of India, has said.
“Technology domination is sought in the fields as diverse as human genomics and nuclear weapons through mechanisms of Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) and technology control regimes,” said Dr. Chidambaram during a seminar on ‘The Many Dimensions of Scientific Research’, organised at SRM University coinciding with the first Research Day it observed here on Friday.
Dr. Chidambaram, who held major portfolios such as Chairman of the Scientific Advisory Committee to the Cabinet, Director of Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) and Chairman of Atomic Energy Commission, further said that Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning were omnipresent concepts.
In this context, Dr. Chidambaram said he had not agreed to what Stephen Hawking said a few years ago that development of AI could spell the end of human race.
The lecture covered a wide gamut of issues ranging from the nuclear path of India, research by IITs, which included the machine tool project by IIT- Madras, and the many dimensions of research and possible linkages.
Beginning his address with the quote, “Always work on important problems important to science or important to society,” Dr. Chidambaram narrated a few innovations by BARC such as building bridges in the mountainous regions of Rajasthan.
Development indices
He, however, added that real development of a country could only be gauged by factors such as Human Development Index, high female literacy, scientific advancement, knowledge economy, and R&D ecosystem.
“Path-breaking research is also going on in the areas such as tumuor knee prosthetics, resecting the malignant bone in bone cancer,” he observed.
Vice-Chancellor of Sri Venkateswara Institute of Medical Sciences Vengamma spoke on the latest neurological research solutions.
Pro Vice-Chancellor D. Narayana Rao, Registrar Gunasekharan and Dean Vijaya Sekhar were present.
