I think that the humanities have been discussing questions such as these even before technology advanced to the point where such discussion became necessary. This bit actually reminds me of a line from Jurassic Park: "We were so concerned with if we could [engineer dinosaurs] that we never stopped to consider if we should." Science can get so wrapped up in innovation for innovation's sake that it doesn't stop to consider social implications.

I read that in the earliest university systems, the humanities were all they had to study and STEM studies are, by comparison, a rather recent phenomenon. In light of this, I think that humanities are at the heart of the university system as we know it today and that the model would become unsustainable without them.