The meanings of the terms science and technology have changed significantly from one generation to another. More similarities than differences, however, can be found between the terms.
Both science and technology imply a thinking process, both are concerned with causal relationships in the material world, and both employ an experimental methodology that results in empirical demonstrations that can be verified by repetition. Science, at least in theory, is less concerned with the practicality of its results and more concerned with the development of general laws, but in practice science and technology are inextricably involved with each other. The varying interplay of the two can be observed in the historical development of such practitioners as chemists, engineers, physicists, astronomers, carpenters, potters, and many other specialists. Differing educational requirements, social status, vocabulary, methodology, and types of rewards, as well as institutional objectives and professional goals, contribute to such distinctions as can be made between the activities of scientists and technologists; but throughout history the practitioners of "pure" science have made many practical as well as theoretical contributions.