Group No: 3

Group Leader: Coronado, Christine

Group Members:
Duhilag, Kristine Joy
Yeo, Charlene
Eltagon, EJ
Elvina, Elvin
Dima-ampao, Fatma Hannen

Topic:
SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY AND NATION-BUILDING
● Post-Colonial Period
● Pre-Colonial Period
● Colonial Period

PRE-COLONIAL PERIOD

The history of science and technology in the Philippines started way before the
conflicting independence from the American colonizers. Before the coming of the
Spaniards colonizers the early inhabitants of the archipelago had their own culture and
traditions, they have their own belief systems and indigenous system that keep them
organized and sustain their lives and communities for many years. There is a very little
reliable written information about Philippine society, culture and technology before the
arrival of the Spaniards in 1521, as such one has to reconstruct a picture of this past
using accounts by early traders and foreign travelers and the narratives about the
condition of the archipelago which were written by first Spanish missionaries and
colonial officials.
 Scientific and technological development in the Philippines began in the pre-
colonial period. Even before the Spaniards came to the Philippine islands, there were
numerous, scattered, thriving relatively self-sufficient and autonomous communities
where early Filipino settlers are already using certain plants, and herbs as medicine. For
about 40,000 years, they made simple tools or weapons of stone flakes but eventually
develop techniques for sawing, drilling and polishing hard stones. Gradually the early
Filipinos learned to make metal tools and implements such as copper, gold, bronze and
later, iron. Filipinos during this period engage in the actual extraction of iron from ore,
smelting and refining. By the first century A.D Filipinos were weaving cotton, smelting
iron, making pottery and glass ornaments. System of farming and animal-raising were
also implemented. Moreover, early Filipino had developed different modes of
transportation, whether terrestrial or maritime.

One of the greatest contributions of early Filipino to science and technology was
achieved by the native of the Cordilleras, a complicated engineering feat where they
built rice terraces by hand. Through these terraces, the people were able to cultivate
crops on the mountainsides in cold temperatures. They incorporated an irrigation
system that uses water from the forest and mountain tops to achieve an elaborate
farming system. The rice terraces of an elaborate farming system. The rice terraces of
the cordilleras, which are still functional, show the innovative and ingenious way of the
natives to survive in an otherwise unfriendly environment. Filipinos had also learned to
build boats for the coastal trade. By the 10 th century A.D., this had become a highly
developed technology. In fact, the early Spanish chroniclers took note of the refined
plank-built warship called caracoa. These boats were well suited for inter-island raids.
Spaniards later utilized the Filipino expertise in boat-building and seamanship to fight
the raiding Dutch, Portuguese, Muslims and the Chinese pirate Limahong as well as to
build and man the galleons that sailed to Mexico.

Early communities before Spanish rule seemed to exhibit uneven technological

developments. Settlements along the coastal areas which had been exposed to foreign
trade and cultural contacts such as Manila, Mindoro, Cebu, Southern Mindanao and
Sulu seemed to have attained a more sophisticated technology. In 1570 before total
Spanish control, Spaniards found the town of Mindoro fortified by a stone wall over
fourteen feet thick and defended by armed Moros with bowmen, lancers, some gunners
with linstocks in hand. They found Manila similarly defended by a palisade along its
front with pieces of artillery at its gate. Next to the house of wealthy Raja Soliman
reportedly contain articles of trade such as wax, cotton, wooden vats full of brandy,
iron, copper, culverins and cannons which had melted. There were clay and wax molds,
the largest of which is for a
cannon resembling a culverin.
These reports indicate that the Filipinos in Manila had learned to make and use of
modern artillery. The Spanish colonizers noted that all over the islands, Filipinos were
growing rice, vegetables, and cotton; raising swine, goats, fowls; making wine, vinegar
and salt; weaving cloth, and producing beeswax and honey. The Filipinos were also
mining gold in such places such as Panay, Mindoro and Bicol. They wore colorful clothes,
made their own gold jewelry and even filled their teeth with gold. Their houses were
made of wood or bamboo and nipa. They had their own system of writing and weights
and measures. Some communities had become renowned for their plank-built boats.
They had no calendar but counted the years by moons and from one harvest to another.

COLONIAL PERIOD
 COLONIZATION BY THE SPANIARDS provided the Philippines with modern means
of construction. Walls, roads, bridges, and other large infrastructures were built using
some of the engineering skills and tools brought by the Spaniards that can be seen
mostly in the Intramuros manila Tayaba’s Quezon such as the Malagonlong Bridge and
other Old Catholic churches located in the different areas in the Philippines such as the
San Agustin Church in Manila, San Agustin Church in Paoay, Santo Tomas de Villanueva
Church in Iloilo, and the Nuestra Seṅora de la Asuncion in Santa Maria.
The Spanish introduced a formal education in through parish school they brought with
them their own cultures and practices they established schools for boys and girls and
introduced the concept of subject and disciplines. It was the beginning of formal science
and technology in the country known as school of science and technology religion,
reading, writing, arithmetic and music were taught. Science institutions were
established sanitation and advanced method of agriculture were taught to the nations.
Later the Spanish established colleges in the universities in the archipelago including the
University of Santo Tomas.

Malagonlong Bridge San Agustin Church in Manila

San Agustin Church in Paoay Santo Tomas de Villanueva Church in Iloilo

Nuestra Senora de la Asuncion in Santa Maria

Accounts by Spanish friars in the 1580s showed that astronomy was already
known and practiced. The accounts also give the local names of constellations, such as
Moroporo for the Pleiades and Balatik for Ursa Major among others. In 1687, Isaac
Newton included an explicit reference to the Philippines in his classic Philosophiæ
Naturalis Principia Mathematica by mentioning Leuconia, the ancient Ptolemaic name
for the Philippines.
The study of medicine in the Philippines was given priority and contributed to the field
of engineering in the island. Biology is given focus. Contributors to science in the
archipelago during the 19th century were botanists, Fr. Ignacio Mercado., Dr. Trinidad
Pardo de Tavera and Dr. Leon Ma Guerrero, chemist Anaclento Del Rosario, and
medicine scholars Dr. Manuel Guerrero, Dr, Jose Montes and Dr. Elrodario Mercado.
However, the Spanish government developed exclusive health and educational systems
that were enjoyed by the principalia class.
The Galleon Trade have accounted in the Philippine colonial economy. Trade was given
more focus by the Spaniard colonial authorities due to the prospects of big profits.
Agriculture and industrial development on the other hand were relatively neglected.[4]
The opening of the Suez Canal saw the influx of European visitors to the Spanish colony
and some Filipinos were able to study in Europe who were probably influenced by the
rapid development of scientific ideals brought by the Age of Enlightenment.

The American period

The progress of science and technology in the Philippines continued under

American rule. On July 1, 1901 the Philippine Commission established the Bureau of
Government Laboratories which was placed under the Department of Interior. The
Bureau replaced the Laboratorio Municipal, which was established under the Spanish
colonial era. The Bureau dealt with the study of tropical diseases and laboratory
projects. On October 26, 1905, the Bureau of Government Laboratories was replaced by
the Bureau of Science and on December 8, 1933, the National Research Council of the
Philippines was established. The Bureau of Science became the primary research center
of the Philippines until World War II. Science during the American period was inclined
towards agriculture, food processing, medicine and pharmacy. Not much focus was
given on the development of industrial technology due to free trade policy with the
United States which nurtured an economy geared towards agriculture and trade.
In 1946 the Bureau of Science was replaced by the Institute of Science. In a report by
the US Economic Survey to the Philippines in 1950, there is a lack of basic information
which were necessities to the country's industries, lack of support of experimental work
and minimal budget for scientific research and low salaries of scientists employed by the
government. In 1958, during the regime of President Carlos P. Garcia, the Philippine
Congress passed the Science Act of 1958 which established the National Science
Development Board.

POST-COLONIAL PERIOD

Ever since the early 1960s, the United Nations has acknowledged science and
technology as integral components of developmental policies. While this connection
was initially perceived as the application of findings from scientific research conducted
in the Global North, by the 1970s, in the context of negotiations for a New International
Economic Order, attention shifted towards the structures of the global management of
science. Accordingly in 1979 the UN Conference on Science and Technology for
Development discussed possibilities of strengthening scientific and technological
research and teaching, particularly in developing countries. During subsequent
negotiations conflicts erupted over the question of how to finance programs supporting
science. When the G-77 nations presented plans involving automatic financing schemes,
these concepts proved incompatible with the insistence of important industrialized
countries that all financial contributions should be voluntary. These discussions
appeared to be concerned with the size of financial contributions. In a larger
perspective, however, they reflected fundamentally different concepts of a world order,
turning science and technology into a medium for far-reaching debates about questions
of global development and justice.
The Postcolonial Science and Technology Studies Reader

For twenty years, the renowned philosopher of science Sandra Harding has
argued that science and technology studies, postcolonial studies, and feminist critique
must inform one another. In The Postcolonial Science and Technology Studies Reader,
Harding puts those fields in critical conversation, assembling the anthology that she has
long wanted for classroom use. In classic and recent essays, international scholars from
a range of disciplines think through a broad array of science and technology
philosophies and practices. The contributors reevaluate conventional accounts of the
West’s scientific and technological projects in the past and present, rethink the
strengths and limitations of non-Western societies’ knowledge traditions, and assess the
legacies of colonialism and imperialism. The collection concludes with forward-looking
essays, which explore strategies for cultivating new visions of a multicultural,
democratic world of sciences and for turning those visions into realities. Feminist
science and technology concerns run throughout the reader and are the focus of several
essays. Harding provides helpful background for each essay in her introductions to the
reader’s four sections.

Post-Colonial Period

One of the presidents who ushered in advancements in science and technology was
former President Ferdinand Marcos. Under his term, many agencies in science and
technology were established and strengthened.
During Ferdinand Marcos in two terms of Presidency, pioneering hospitals were built
such as;
1. Developing heart center
2. Non-center of the Philippines
3. National Kidney and transplant Institute.

Light rail transit

Marcos created this railway as a government agency.
North Luzon expressway was built in 1969, formerly known as North diversion road and
Manila North expressways is a 4 to 8 lane limited access toll expressway that connects
Metro Manila to the provinces of the central Luzon region in the Philippines

Nationwide telecommunication System and Interprovincial toll centers are also built.

The Philippine Atmospheric Geophysical and astronomical Services Administration

(PAGASA) in place of the abolished Weather bureau; the National Academy of Science
and Technology (NAST); and the reconstituted National Science and Technology
Authority (Originally established in 1958 as the National Science and Development
Board and now the Department of Science and Technology; among others. Marcos saw
that the key to nation building is the continued development of Science and Technology.
The progress in Science and Technology continued even after his presidency which lived
a legacy in this particular field.