Possible relationships between industrial innovation and science education are discussed, focusing on three systems for studying the process of development and identifying certain determining factors. The purpose of the approach is to identify the salient characteristics of the industrial world, technological development, and science teaching by examining the tentative groupings of social innovations, with their successes and failures, and, by so doing, to arrive at a new project and a new scale of values. Discussions are presented in five sections. Following introductory material in section 1, industrial change is considered in section 2, focusing on the innovation process (including the function of information, the Gruber and Marquis model, practical implications, and function of the entrepreneur), the origin of inventions, and a typology of innovation. Technology of the 1990s (considering energy, the environment, biotechnology, and the redeployment of technology) is discussed in section 3. The process of creativity, profile of the creative individual, and the development and influence of the computer as they relate to science teaching are considered in section 4. The final section, a scenario that suggests a thorough reorganization of science education from a global perspective, outlines and discusses the characteristics of this holistic approach (the macroscole). The appendix contains a summary of research on characteristics of creative individuals and techniques for stimulating creativity. (JN)