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ASSIGNMENT SOLUTIONS GUIDE (2014-2015)

F.S.T.-1
Science and Technology
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Q. 1. Identify the correct words from the brackets:

(a) (Insulin/Penicillin) is a synthetically prepared anti-diabetic drug.
Ans. Insulin

(b) Two atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in the year (1945/1955)
Ans. 1945

Q. 2. Write the terms for the following:

(a) The branch of science that deals with the study of relationships between organisms and their environment.
Ans. Ecology

(b) Satellite Instruction Television Experiment.

Ans. SITE

Q. 3. Match the items of Column-1 with those of Column-2

Coulmn-1
(a) Mechanics

Column-2

(i) Green plants

(b) Circulation of blood

(ii) Lasers

(c) Air purification

(iii) Greek civilisation

(d) Long distance communication

(iv) William Harvey

Ans. (a)- (iii), (b)-(iv), (c)-(i), (d)-(ii)

Q. 4. Which one of the following statements is true and which is false? Write the reason for the statement
being true or false.
(a) Mars has several features that are similar to Earth.

Ans. True. Mars has plains, canyons, volcanoes, valleys, gullies, and polar ice similar to Earth.
(b) Nuclear wastes are biodegradable.

Ans. False. It doesnt have a life cycle. Organic matter is composed almost exclusively of carbon and other
light elements.
Q. 5. Explain the tradition and social functions of science.
Ans. Generally, practical needs and demands, first of all of industry, determined the path of development of
science, which was conditioned by the needs and demands of industry. Now we see another picture: today the most
important factor in social progress is not industry, but science. Todays social industry depends upon the development of science, upon new technologies and so on.
Science consists in progress by innovation. Scientists, however, are committed to all kinds of traditions that
persist or recur in society regardless of intellectual and institutional changes. Mertons thesis about the origins of the
scientific revolution in seventeenth-century England offers a sociohistorical confirmation of this revisionist view:
the emergence of a highly rational scientific method out of the religious-ethical sentiments of the English Puritans
implies that scientific knowledge does indeed grow out of and not really against customary modes of thought.
In tracing the intellectual origins of this view back to the religious controversy between Protestants and Catholics, the essay demonstrates that the essential conflict between them with regard to natural science stemmed from
their antagonistic conceptions of tradition and its function in the production of genuine knowledge of religious as
well as of natural affairs. Whereas the Protestants believed only in those truths that are immediately revealed by God
to each man through his reason, the Catholics adhered to truths that are related to men or made by them through
culture and history.

The major function of science fiction writers is to describe the nature of and to find resolutions for the role
conflicts which confront their social group as it moves into the future. Most science fiction performs what is best
described as a magical function.
Q. 6. Describe any five technical devices that were invented or improved upon in Medieval India.
Ans. This list of Indian inventions and discoveries details the inventions, scientific discoveries and contributions of India, including both the ancient and medieval nations in the subcontinent historically referred to as India
and the modern Indian state. It draws from the whole cultural and technological history of India, during which
architecture, astronomy, cartography,metallurgy, logic, mathematics, metrology and mineralogy were among the
branches of study pursued by its scholars. During recent times science and technology in the Republic of India has
also focused on automobile engineering, information technology, communications as well as research into space and
polar technology. Some of the discoveries of this era are:
(1) The Heavy Plough: The heavy plough was first used in the fifth century. It was a modification of already
existing mouldboard plough.
(2) Tidal Mills: The Tidal mills were first used during the seventh century in the medieval Europe and they are
considered as one of the great examples of improving Middle Ages technology.
(3) The Mechanical Clock: Another important achievement of the Middle Ages technology was the mechanical
clock which was developed during the 13th century.
(4) Spinning Wheel: The origins of spinning wheel are obscure. However, it is believed that the spinning wheel
was invented in India. During the European Middle Ages, the Indian spinning wheel reached to Europe.
(5) Gunpowder Weapons: Gunpowder had long been known to Chinese. However, it became a serious battle
material during the fourteenth century as the people of European medieval period succeeded in developing and
advancing it as corned gunpowder and they also produced canons.
Q. 7. Citing suitable examples describe the operations involved in the method of science.
Ans. The scientific method is a method for conducting an objective investigation. The scientific method involves making observations and conducting an experiment to test a hypothesis. The number of steps of the scientific

method isn't standard. Some texts and instructors break up the scientific method into more or fewer steps. Some
people start listing steps with the hypothesis, but since a hypothesis is based on observations (even if they aren't
formal), the hypothesis usually is considered to be the second step. Here are the usual steps of the scientific method.
Scientific Method Step 1: Make Observations - Ask a Question
You may think the hypothesis is the start of the scientific method, but you will have made some observations
first, even if they were informal. What you observe leads you to ask a question or identify a problem.
Scientific Method Step 2: Propose a Hypothesis
It's easiest to test the null or no-difference hypothesis because you can prove it to be wrong. It's practically
impossible to prove a hypothesis is correct.
Scientific Method Step 3: Design an Experiment to Test the Hypothesis
When you design an experiment, you are controlling and measuring variables.
There are three types of variables:

Controlled Variables

You can have as many controlled variables as you like. These are parts of the experiment that you try to keep
constant throughout an experiment so that they won't interfere with your test. Writing down controlled variables is a good idea because it helps make your experiment reproducible, which is important in science! If
you have trouble duplicating results from one experiment to another, there may be a controlled variable that
you missed.

Independent Variable

This is the variable you control.

Dependent Variable

This is the variable you measure. It is called the dependent variable because it depends on the independent
variable.
Q. 8. Detail the techniques and instruments that have helped us in gathering information about the Universe.
Ans. The instrument is being designed to gather data of objects so distant from Earth that they no longer can be
observed in visible light, only in the infrared bands of the electromagnetic spectrum. In particular, this instrument,
called a spectrometer, will measure the properties of the infrared light to identify the objects composition and other
physical properties.
Throughout History humans have looked to the sky to navigate the vast oceans, to decide when to plant their
crops and to answer questions of where we came from and how we got here. It is a discipline that opens our eyes,
gives context to our place in the Universe and that can reshape how we see the world. When Copernicus claimed that
Earth was not the centre of the Universe, it triggered a revolution.
Scientists know what the universe looked like when it was a baby. They know what it looks like today. What they
dont know is how it looked in its youth. Thanks to technological advances, however, scientists hope to complete the
photo album and provide a picture of how the cosmos developed into the kind of place that could support life like
that found on Earth.
Today, science and technology have become more complex as we learn more about our universe and develop
ways of changing it. Also, because there is so much more knowledge available, scientists are forced to specialise in
particular areas, to keep pace with advances.

Science and technology today range all the way from basically theoretical subjects such as quantum physics to
more practical subjects like medicine, agriculture and engineering.
Q. 9. What goals need to be set for the management of water resources? How water can be managed in a
scientific manner?
Ans. Water resource management is the activity of planning, developing, distributing and managing the optimum use of water resources. It is a sub-set of water cycle management. Ideally, water resource management planning has regard to all the competing demands for water and seeks to allocate water on an equitable basis to satisfy all
uses and demands. As with other resource management, this is rarely possible in practice.
Water is one of the biggest challenges for sustainable development over the coming decades. Its effects can be
felt right across all three pillars of sustainability - environmental, social and economic. There is one important
dimension of the social pillar of sustainability that must be kept in mind: water for survival is a human right.
Government, of course, has a pivotal role to play in managing water resources by defining a strategy that reflects
national priorities and in building an institutional framework that supports it. But since government resources are
increasingly limited, businesses could and should also have a stake in the solution.
The shape of this 'stake' was the focus of discussion last week at the World Bank headquarters where, in my
Water Resources Group role, I made the introduction to a high level dialogue about "Sustainable Development
Goals on Water Resources Management and the Role of the Private Sector".

Global companies are rightly concerned. Healthy people with access to safe water and decent sanitation are both
our employees and consumers. We are also concerned as global citizens: there are growing signs of apparent overuse
in an increasing number of watersheds, and we want all people to access truly safe water and acceptable sanitation
- sooner rather than later.
The factors affecting water resources include the following:

population growth, particularly in water-short regions,

movement of large numbers of people from the countryside to towns and cities,

demands for greater food security and higher living standards,

increased competition between different uses of water resources, and

pollution from factories, cities, and farmlands.

Q. 10. There is a mismatch between man's ability to produce and social incapacity to utilize. Explain
the meaning of this statement.
Ans. Unless our scientific and technological skills are suitably backed by a political and administrative will to
implement the right. Kind of rural and urban development programme, poverty and malnutrition will continue to
threaten us. About 55.5 million people (22.7%) in our country are agricultural labour who has neither land to cultivate nor farm animal to keep. They are willing to work hard and expect to be paid by the evening, since they head a
hand to mouth existence. A vigorous employment generation dive alone can improve their lot. Employment can be
generating through development programmes of the government.
Group action backed by bank finance and village cooperatives Marketing, storage, transport these all are beyond
the capacity of an individual villager. These can also be assured by village cooperatives. The government can take up
massive programmes dealing with irrigation, supply of drinking water and construction of permanent roads and well
planned houses in the countryside with the help of banks and insurance agencies, village cooperatives should pay
special attention to problems of national importance that can be solved only through coordinated group Action.
Q. 11. Elucidate any five contributions made by the human factor specialists.

Ans. Human factors works to apply principles of psychology to designing products and creating work environments that boost productivity while minimizing safety issues. The field of human factors formally began during
World War II, when a range of experts worked together to improve the safety of airplanes. Since that time, human
factors psychology has continued to grow and today plays an important role in many other fields, including computing, manufacturing, product design, engineering, military, and government industries.
To achieve these qualities, five essential activities must be included within the overall design process:
1. Plan the human centred process: Ensure that specific human factors activities are built in to project plans
and sufficiently resourced.
2. Understand and specify the context of use: Identify who the users are, what they will be doing. Ensure that
descriptions of user characteristics and tasks are considered as the basis for design.
3. Specify the user and organisational requirements: Specify the characteristics required of aspects of the
system which affect users and their wider organisation.
4. Produce design solutions: Apply Human Factor expertise to generate design options which meet user requirements. Design iteratively. Use prototypes to clarify requirements.
5. Evaluate designs against user requirements: Test out requirements by involving target users and Human
Factor specialists.
These activities can be supported by a range of human factors techniques.

Q. 12. Discuss with the help of examples as to how the research programmes not only benefit the industry
but also give rise to new industries.
Ans. In any industry the success of an organization is extremely dependent on its human resources. Although
there are many other factors that play a key role, a company must have effective employees in order to stay financially solvent and competitive. In order to maintain this valuable commodity, organizations must be aware of employee satisfaction and retention. Many companies make the mistake of assuming that employees are only seeking
financial benefits for their jobs. This assumption overlooks the high importance many people place on the intrinsic
benefits of their careers. It is not only a mistake for employee satisfaction and retention, but it also has negative
business consequences. Organizations must have employees who are able to quickly adapt to an ever-changing
world market. Companies need to invest in on-going employee development in order to both keep employees and be
successful.
This research analyzes the significance of employee development programs on employee retention and job
satisfaction. It also takes business success into consideration. The method for this project consisted of an analysis of
two studies, one conducted by the Gallup Organization and the other conducted by the American Society for Training and Development and the Society for Human Resource Management. The study determined that training and
development increase employee satisfaction and are significant in an employee's decision to stay with a company. It
also indicated that the impact of training decreases without the organizational culture to support employees in the
development process.
S&T has enormous significance foreconomic growth at the macro level and for building business competitiveness at the micro level. Globalisation and liberalisation have thrown up immense opportunities and some challenges
for S&T. In an increasingly competitive world, Indian industry needs the support of indigenous S&T in a big way.
Q. 13. Why is it important to pursue the policy of self-reliance for the progress of science and technology
and for the development of the nation?
Ans. The scientific revolutions of the 20th century have led to many technologies, which promise to herald
wholly new eras in many fields, As we stand today at the beginning of a new century, we have to ensure fullest use
of these developments for the well-being of our people. Science and technology have been an integral part of Indian

civilisation and culture over the past several millennia. Few are aware that India was the fountainhead of important
foundational scientific developments and approaches. These cover many great scientific discoveries and technological achievements in Mathematics, Astronomy, Architecture, Chemistry, Metallurgy, Medicine, Natural Philosophy
and other areas. A great deal of this travelled outwards from India. Equally, India also assimilated scientific ideas
and techniques from elsewhere, with open-mindedness and a rational attitude, characteristic of a scientific ethos.
Indias traditions have been founded on the principles of universal harmony, respect for all creations and an integrated holistic approach. This background is likely to provide valuable insights for future scientific advances. During the century prior to independence, there was an awakening of modem science in India through the efforts of a
number of outstanding scientists. They were responsible for great scientific advances of the highest international
calibre.
In a country of Indias size and endownments, self-reliance is inescapable and must be at the very heart of
technological development. We must aim at major technological breakthroughs in the shortest possible time for the
development of indigenous technology appropriate to national priorities and resources. For this, the role of different
agencies will be identified, responsibilities assigned and the necessary linkages established.
Strengthening the Technology Base: Research and Development, together with S&T education and training of
a high order, will be accorded pride of place. The base of science and technology consists of trained and skilled
manpower at various levels, covering a wide range of disciplines, and an appropriate institutional, legal and fiscal
infrastructure. Consolidation of the existing scientific base and selective strengthening of thrust area in it are essential.

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