Atomically precise manufacturing (APM) is the assembly of materials with atomic precision. APM does not currently exist, and may not be feasible, but if it is feasible, then the societal impacts could be dramatic. This paper assesses the net societal impacts of APM across the full range of important APM sectors: general material wealth, environmental issues, military affairs, surveillance, artificial intelligence, and space travel. Positive effects were found for material wealth, the environment, military affairs (specifically nuclear disarmament), and space travel. (...) Negative effects were found for military affairs (specifically rogue actor violence and AI. The net effect for surveillance was ambiguous. The effects for the environment, military affairs, and AI appear to be the largest, with the environment perhaps being the largest of these, suggesting that APM would be net beneficial to society. However, these factors are not well quantified and no definitive conclusion can be made. One conclusion that can be reached is that if APM R&D is pursued, it should go hand-in-hand with effective governance strategies to increase the benefits and reduce the harms. (shrink)

Ethicists have investigated ethical problems in other disciplines, but there has not been much discussion of the ethics of their own activities. Research in ethics has many ethical problems in common with other areas of research, and it also has problems of its own. The researcher’s integrity is more precarious than in most other disciplines, and therefore even stronger procedural checks are needed to protect it. The promotion of some standpoints in ethical issues may be socially harmful, and even our (...) decisions as to which issues we label as “ethical” may have unintended and potentially harmful social consequences. It can be argued that ethicists have an obligation to make positive contributions to society, but the practical implications of such an obligation are not easily identified. This article provides an overview of ethical issues that arise in research into ethics and in the application of such research. It ends with a list of ten practical proposals for how these issues should be dealt with. (shrink)

PurposeThe paper aims to explore future and emerging information and communication technologies. It gives a general overview of the social consequences and ethical issues arising from technologies that can currently be reasonably expected. This overview is used to present recommendations and integrate these in a framework of responsible innovation.Design/methodology/approachThe identification of emerging ICTs and their ethical consequences is based on the review and analysis if several different bodies of literature. The individual features of the ICTs and the ethical issues identified (...) this way are then aggregated and analysed.FindingsThe paper outlines the 11 ICTs identified. Some of the shared features that are likely to have social relevance include an increase in natural interaction, the invisibility of technology, direct links between humans and technology, detailed models and data of humans and an increasing autonomy of technology that may lead to power over the user. Ethical issues include several current topics such as privacy, data protection, intellectual property and digital divides. New problems may include changes to the way humans are perceived and the role of humans and technology in society. This includes changing power structures and different ways of treating humans.Research limitations/implicationsThe paper presents a piece of foresight research which cannot claim exact knowledge of the future. However, by developing a detailed understanding of possible futures it provides an important basis for current decisions relating to future technology development and governance.Practical implicationsThe paper spells out a range of recommendations for both policy makers and researchers/industry. These refer to the framework within which technology is developed and how such a framework could be designed to allow the development of ethical reflexivity.Social implicationsThe work described here is likely to influence EU policy on ICT research and technology research and innovation more broadly. This may have implications for the type of technologies funded and broad implications for the social use of emerging technologies.Originality/valueThe paper presents a novel and important broad view of the future of ICTs that is required in order to inform current policy decisions. (shrink)

Most of the reports on synthetic biology include not only familiar topics like biosafety and biosecurity but also a chapter on ‘ethical concerns’; a variety of diffuse topics that are interrelated in some way or another. This article deals with these ‘ethical concerns’. In particular it addresses issues such as the intrinsic value of life and how to deal with ‘artificial life’, and the fear that synthetic biologists are tampering with nature or playing God. Its aim is to analyse what (...) exactly is the nature of the concerns and what rationale may lie behind them. The analysis concludes that the above-mentioned worries do not give genuine cause for serious concern. In the best possible way they are interpreted as slippery slope arguments, yet arguments of this type need to be handled with care. It is argued that although we are urged to be especially vigilant we do not have sufficiently cogent reasons to assume that synthetic biology will cause such fundamental hazards as to warrant restricting or refraining from research in this field. (shrink)

Among the various experiments in ‘new governance’, the model of Responsible Research and Innovation is emerging in the European landscape as quite promising. Up to now, there have been two versions of RRI: a socio-empirical version which tends to underline the role of democratic processes aimed at identifying values on which governance needs to be anchored and a normative version which stresses the role of EU goals as ‘normative anchor points’ of both governance strategies and policy making. Both versions are (...) unsatisfactory. The first since it suggests movable anchorage which could clash with prefixed values, such as individual rights. The second since it does not safeguard fundamental rights in the process of balancing ‘anchor points’. This result is counterintuitive because it exposes governance to the risk of facing adverse court decisions in the defense of individual rights, thus losing its anticipative attitude. In order to avoid this outcome, the paper argues that it is only through better integration between the system of human rights and that of EU fundamental rights that the anticipative feature of RRI can be preserved. (shrink)

Available methods such as technology assessment and risk analysis have failed to predict the effects of technological choices. We need to give up the futile predictive ambitions of previous approaches and instead base decisions on systematic studies of alternative future developments. It will then be necessary to cope with mere possibility arguments, i.e., arguments in which a conclusion is drawn from a mere possibility that a course of action may have certain consequences. A five-step procedure is proposed for the assessment (...) of such arguments. It includes a search for mere possibility arguments pointing in different directions, a scientific evaluation that may lead to the specification or refutation of some of these arguments, two symmetry tests, evaluation of the seriousness of the arguments in terms of novelty, spatio-temporal unlimitedness and interference with complex systems, and hypothetical retrospection that aims at finding a course of action that will be defensible in retrospect. (shrink)

Expectations play a central role in understanding scientific and technological changes. Future-oriented representations are also central with regard to nanotechnologies as they can guide policy activities, provide structures and legitimation, attract different interests, focus policy-makers’ attention and foster investments for research. However, the emphasis on future scenarios tends to underrate the complexity of the challenges of the present market of nanotechnologies by flattening them under the needs and promises of scientific research. This is particularly apparent if we consider the viewpoint (...) of the regulator who faces two different ranges of problems with regard to the market and research and is expected, simultaneously, to manage two different types of regulatory instruments, pursuing at the same time the same goals. Instead, by favoring only the future scenarios, the regulator runs the risk of abruptly shifting from more flexible and elastic tools to forms of hard legislation, wasting, thus, the resources of the soft-regulation, in particular those of self-regulation. By referring primarily to the European context, human rights, also thanks to their normative structure of principles, can help in strengthening both the legislation needed for regulating the present market and the soft instruments needed for steering research and for fostering the stakeholders’ participation without sacrificing the coherence of the regulatory response. (shrink)

Anticipation is one of the main goals of new governance models, such as Responsible Research and Innovation. However, there is not a single mode of anticipation in this model. Two approaches can be addressed within the RRI framework: a socio-empirical one, which tends to underline the role of the democratic processes, aimed at identifying values on which governance needs to be anchored ; and a normative one, which stresses the role of EU goals as ‘normative anchor points’ in governance. These (...) two approaches also address two different models of anticipation: one based on the construction of shared pathways for reflexivity on the purposes of innovation, the other based on the progressive implementation of constitutional goals in risk assessment and management tools. However, both can be deemed partially unsatisfactory from the standpoint of human rights since one puts individual rights in the middle of the ‘values lottery’ where any participatory process ultimately leads; the other can be inadequate since fundamental rights are balanced alongside other goals and thus can be sacrificed, exposing the system to possible adverse court decisions. The normative framework of human rights can help to counterbalance both models aimed at maximising inclusion and those aimed at pursuing constitutional normative principles at the basis of technologically advanced societies, strengthening their dimension of anticipation according to a rights-based perspective. (shrink)

In anticipatory governance and responsible innovation, anticipation is a key theoretical and practical dimension for promoting a more responsible governance of new and emerging sciences and technologies. Yet, anticipation has been subjected to a range of criticisms, such that many now see it as unnecessary for AG and RI. According to Alfred Nordmann, practices engaging with ‘the future’, when performed under certain conditions, may reify the future, diminish our ability to see what is happening, and/or reproduce the illusion of control (...) over the future. Several authors have stressed that these critiques fail to capture the heterogeneous character of anticipatory practices, and yet research on the question of what particular kind of socio-epistemic engagements with ‘the future’ AG and RI aim to enact through anticipation remains fragmentary and their underlying rationale under-theorised. This article aims to advance the theoretical characterisation and problematisation of anticipation as key interventive tools for AG and RI. By distinguishing between four modes of anticipation and heuristically testing them against Nordmann’s critiques, the article argues that despite his assessment failing to recognise the heterogeneity of anticipatory practices considered valuable for AG and RI, it reinforces the relevance of performing certain modes of anticipatory exercises, namely critical-hermeneutic ones. Thus, anticipation continues to be a necessary heuristic dimension for AG and RI. More concretely, the article maintains that such anticipatory heuristics may find their radical constructive and critical-reflective character in the dynamics of inclusive scrutiny and negotiation about the plausibility and desirability of the envisioned or created futures. (shrink)

In this paper, we explore how the definition of life takes on an essential character in the ethical debates around health technologies, with life thus being manufactured in the tensions and conflicts around the use of such artefacts and devices. We introduce concepts from science and technology studies (STS) to approach bioethics, overcoming the dualistic conception that separates the natural and the technological and questioning the dominant rationality that divides life into dualities. Drawing on two research projects in which we (...) have been involved in recent years, one regarding biobanks and the other regarding social care robots, we explore how the ethical discussions about biobanks and robots imply particular notions of life. We argue that the contemporary epistemic category of life is a manufactured life in which various rationalities coexist: one rationality based on a separation between the technological and the human, focused on pragmatism and functionalities that tend towards a dualized notion of life divided into qualified and non-qualified life, and another rationality based on a non-essentialist ontology, focused on the mediating role of health technologies, that entails a distributed life appearing as a precarious effect of a network. Each of these rationalities allows the emergence of different issues and ethical concerns, thus enriching the bioethical debate. (shrink)

The program of intervening, manipulating, constructing and creating is central to natural and engineering sciences. A renewed wave of interest in this program has emerged within the recent practices and discourse of nano-technoscience. However, it is striking that, framed from the perspective of well-established epistemologies, the constructed technoscientific objects and engineered things remain invisible. Their ontological and epistemological status is unclear. The purpose of the present paper is to support present-day approaches to techno-objects ( ontology ) insofar as they make (...) these hidden objects epistemologically perceivable. To accomplish this goal, it is inspiring to look back to the origin of the project of modernity and to its founding father: Francis Bacon. The thesis is that everything we need today for an adequate (dialectic-materialist), ontologically well-informed epistemology of technoscience can be found in the works of Bacon—this position will be called epistemological real-constructivism. Rather than describing it as realist or constructivist, empiricist or rationalist, Bacon’s position can best be understood as real-constructivist since it challenges modern dichotomies, including the dichotomy between epistemology and ontology. Such real-constructive turn might serve to promote the acknowledgement that natural and engineering sciences, in particular recent technosciences, are creating and producing the world we live in. Reflection upon the contemporary relevance of Bacon is intended as a contribution to the expanding and critical discussion on nano-technoscience. (shrink)

In response to calls for a research and innovation system that is more open to public scrutiny, we have seen a growth of formal and informal public engagement activities in the past decades. Nevertheless, critiques of several persistent routines in public engagement continue to resurface, in particular the focus on expert knowledge, cognitive exchange, risk discourse, and understandings of public opinion as being static. In an attempt to break out of these routines, we experimented with an innovative engagement format that (...) employs situated speculative prototyping to support citizens in contextualizing and discussing developments regarding—in this case—nanotechnology. This format invites participants to imagine and critically reflect on technological futures through collaborative prototyping and story-writing. In this paper, we outline five reconstructed contextualization patterns in which participants engaged during the format’s exercises and use these to assess the value of the format in the current engagement landscape. We show that situated speculative prototyping has potential in the realm of informal public engagement initiatives, taking an explorative approach, but also warn of ‘the designer fallacy’ as a prominent pitfall of prototyping that could reproduce techno-scientific framings and obstruct critical reflection on technological directions and implications if not treated with caution. (shrink)

The field of nanoscience and nanotechnology is expanding rapidly, promising great benefits for society in the form of better medicine, more efficient energy production, new types of materials, etc. Naturally, in order for the science and technology to live up to these promises, it is important to continue scientific research and development, but equally important is the ethical dimension. Giving attention to the social, ethical and legal aspects of the field, among others, will help in developing a fully responsible—and thereby (...) capable—science and technology. Nanoethics has emerged as a field concerned with such ethical issues related to nanoscience and nanotechnology. Even though this field is relatively new, a significant amount of literature has already been published. This paper focuses on three of the major issues which are discussed in the literature of nanoethics, and also points to a certain bias in this literature. Each quite different in nature, these issues are: (1) The naming and (2) the timing of and approach to the field, as well as (3) the issue of safety. As will be seen, these issues are almost exclusively discussed by ethicists, (throughout the article, the term’ethicist’ is used in a broad definition covering philosophers, social and political scientists as well as philosophers of science) thus having no direct influence on the work being carried out by scientists. One can argue, therefore, that this bias creates a distortion of the ethical debate, making it insufficient and misleading. Ultimately, this bias is caused by the lack of communication and collaboration between ethicists on the one hand, and nanoscientists on the other. Thus, an argument is made for the different disciplines to begin collaborating, so as to more effectively and responsibly develop the field of nanoscience. (shrink)

Human enhancement is one of the leading research topics in contemporary applied ethics. Interestingly, the widespread attention to the ethical aspects of future enhancement applications has generated misgivings. Are researchers who spend their time investigating the ethics of futuristic human enhancement scenarios acting in an ethically suboptimal manner? Are the methods they use to analyze future technological developments appropriate? Are institutions wasting resources by funding such research? In this article, I address the ethics of doing human enhancement ethics focusing on (...) two main concerns. The Methodological Problem refers to the question of how we should methodologically address the moral aspects of future enhancement applications. The Normative Problem refers to what is the normative justification for investigating and funding the research on the ethical aspects of future human enhancement. This article aims to give a satisfactory response to both meta-questions in order to ethically justify the inquiry into the ethical aspects of emerging enhancement technologies. (shrink)

In 2003, Peter Singer and others sounded a warning in the pages of the journal Nanotechnology that research into the ethical, social, and legal implications of nanotechnology was increasingly lagging behind research into nanotechnology itself. More recently, Alfred Nordmann and Arie Rip have argued that while the pace of ELSI inquiry has now picked up, the inquiry itself is focused far too much on hypothetical and futuristic scenarios. But might there be advantages for ethicists and philosophers of technology interested in (...) the ELSI of emerging technologies to continue to think in a speculative vein? Drawing upon some lessons learned from the development of environmental ethics, and looking primarily at information and computing technologies, I suggest three reasons as to how speculative thinking can add value to ELSI reflection. I argue that it can allow for critical values to emerge that might otherwise go unheeded, open up avenues to reframe issues that might otherwise go unnoticed, and, perhaps most importantly, permit questions to be raised that might otherwise go unvoiced. (shrink)

In this chapter, I propose the mechanism of cognitive enhancement based on studies of cognitive-enhancing drugs and behavioral training. I argue that there are mechanistic differences between cognitive-enhancing drugs and behavioral training due to their different enhancing effects. I also suggest possible mechanisms for cognitive-enhancing drugs and behavioral training and for the synergistic effects of their simultaneous application.

This edited collection presents a selection of papers from the 2012 conference of the Society for the Study of Nanoscience and Emerging Technologies , an international network of scholars and practitioners who seek to understand and influence the relationships between technologies and socio-economic contexts. Like S.NET itself, the collection is heterogeneous: organized under the headings of Engagements, Regulatory Governance, Innovation, and Discourse, its sixteen chapters reflect a broad range of political, epistemological, and methodological standpoints. Thus, unlike many other conference publications, (...) this one speaks to no single disciplinary audience. Researchers interested in emerging technologies will likely find at least one chapter that resonates with their own approach, plus a host of other perspectives, some of which may challenge their views about how and why such research should be undertaken in the first place. This plurality will be familiar to readers of NanoEthi .. (shrink)

This art-science interaction evokes two ‘neuroimages’. However, the term ‘neuroimage’ does not refer, as usual, to images that emerge from scientific practices that seek to gain insight into the structural and functional properties of brains. Rather, it is meant that the images considered have as their theme neurotechnologies: specifically, those that concern the control of neuroprostheses, and neuroprostheses themselves. The first neuroimage appears in a biosignal sensing cap catalogue, and the second appears in the science fiction film Blade Runner 2049. (...) While neither neuroimage is actually included in the piece, each is described to the reader before being speculatively analysed, and therefore becomes a ‘mental’ image in the mind’s eye, calling upon the ancient art of ekphrasis. (shrink)

The concept of innovation defines our age. It fuels the global economy, promises a sustainable future, and stands at the heart of our interconnected society. On the one hand, the concept of innovation is widely presupposed in terms of the commercial value it generates. As claimed in the tradition of economic analysis, innovation is characterized by its competitive dynamics and primarily directed at developing marketable products and services. On the other hand, the reality of today’s global issues, such as climate (...) change and food security, urges innovation to generate societal value beyond mainstream economic incentive. To this end, the EU policy discourse has paved the way for Responsible Innovation. The core idea here is to steer innovation processes towards societally desirable outcomes, specifically in response to the ‘grand challenges’ of our time. Under the sway of ‘science with and for society’, the hypothesis is that innovation can only respond to the needs and ambitions of society by including all its actors throughout the process. However, while much effort is dedicated to governing innovation, little thought goes to what innovation itself means conceptually. What understanding of innovation underpins the framework of RI? What implications, if any, does this have for the ambition to achieve RI? These are important questions to raise as they enable critical reflection on the relation between responsibility and innovation, broadly speaking. Does the ‘R’ in RI entail an application of ethical keys to an already existing concept of innovation, or does it require us to rethink the concept of innovation altogether? After providing a general introduction in chapter 1 on the context of the dissertation and its main research objectives, chapter 2 shows how RI emerged from a longer history of efforts to incorporate ethical dimensions in new and emerging technologies, such as Technology Assessment and Science and Technology Studies. While similar to its precursors in prioritizing ethical concerns, RI clearly distinguishes itself by shifting from an ethics of constraints to an ethics of construction. The chapter continues to show that such an approach comes with an epistemic challenge, a political challenge, and a conceptual challenge. Through an extensive analysis of policy documents and academic literature, chapter 3 breaks open the concept of innovation in the RI discourse. Firstly, it demonstrates that the RI discourse tends to presuppose a techno-economic concept of innovation, as coined by the terms ‘technological innovation’ and ‘commercialized innovation’. Secondly, it provides a historical analysis to show that the concept of innovation was originally politically oriented and had little to do with the way in which it is commonly understood today. Thirdly, it discusses the implications of a techno-economic concept of innovation for achieving the ideal of RI and brings into question whether the political origins of innovation may inspire an alternative route. Chapter 4 engages with the philosophy of technology to assess the feasibility of RI at both an ontic and ontological level. While innovation at the ontic level refers to concrete innovative artefacts, innovation at the ontological level refers to the mode through which these artefacts are seen, understood, and created. At the ontic level, RI is shown to play a significant role in steering emerging technologies towards societally desirable outcomes. Even so, at the ontological level, the question is whether the ideal of RI is feasible insofar its scope is limited to governing a techno-economic concept of innovation. Parallel to Martin Heidegger’s view of technology as Enframing, this chapter denotes that in trying to govern a techno-economic concept of innovation, the RI discourse remains subject to its dominance. This in turn explains why, at the operational level, RI is often employed for mere strategic and instrumental purposes, while falling short on its promoted ambitions. Chapter 5 articulates an orientation shift from a techno-economic concept of innovation towards a political concept of innovation in the RI discourse. To this end, the chapter distinguishes between weak RI, which seeks to govern a techno-economic concept of innovation through an applied set of ethical dimensions; and strong RI, which seeks to conceive a political concept of innovation beyond techno-economic ideology and practice. Inspired by the work of Hannah Arendt, the chapter establishes a political concept of innovation that actualizes the human capacity for speech and action, inspires radical novelty, and empowers the public sphere. In doing so, the chapter concludes that strong RI is principally a plural undertaking which guards individual opinion from collective opinion; enables a physical and symbolic openness that genuinely activates citizenry; and stimulates performative speech. The final chapter, chapter 6, briefly recaps the main research objectives and takes stock of the insights gained. It concludes that the contribution of this dissertation does not reside in the concern with the techno-economic ideology of innovation as such – a concern which RI in fact already expressed when it first emerged – but more so in the ontological critique to the idea that this ideology can somehow be overpowered through governance and regulation. The rehabilitation of an ontological dimension in RI in turn provides a new perspective to the philosophy of technology, which over the years has taken a course away from ontological viewpoints. Moreover, the chapter elaborates on how a political concept of innovation adds depth to the foundational claims of RI. Based on these conclusions, the chapter reflects on a range of broader insights, particularly in relation to the philosophy of innovation and the ethics of socially disruptive technologies. In sum, this dissertation politicizes the RI discourse precisely in the way it was originally envisioned, that is, through conceptualizing innovation as a fundamentally political matter. In this view, politics is not merely an extension of RI but is itself the condition of RI; it is what enables innovation to genuinely serve the public good. (shrink)

In recent years, several authors have argued that the desirability of novel technologies should be assessed early, when they are still emerging. Such an ethical assessment of emerging technologies is by definition focused on an elusive object. Usually promises, expectations, and visions of the technology are taken as a starting point. As Nordmann and Rip have pointed out in a recent article, however, ethicists should not take for granted the plausibility of such expectations and visions. In this paper, we explore (...) how the quality of expectations on emerging technologies might be assessed when engaging in a reflection on the desirability of emerging technologies. We propose that an assessment of expectations’ plausibility should focus on statements on technological feasibility, societal usability, and desirability of the expected technology. Whereas the feasibility statement and, to a lesser extent, the usability statements are frequently quite futuristic, the claims on desirability, by contrast, often display a conservative stance towards the future. Assessing the quality of expectations and visions on behalf of emerging technologies requires, then, a careful and well-directed use of both skepticism and imagination. We conclude with a brief overview of the tools and methods ethicists could use to assess claims made on behalf of emerging technologies and improve the ethical reflection on them. (shrink)

Although applications are being developed and have reached the market, nanopharmacy to date is generally still conceived as an emerging technology. Its concept is ill-defined. Nanopharmacy can also be construed as a converging technology, which combines features of multiple technologies, ranging from nanotechnology to medicine and ICT. It is still debated whether its features give rise to new ethical issues or that issues associated with nanopharma are merely an extension of existing issues in the underlying fields. We argue here that, (...) regardless of the alleged newness of the ethical issues involved, developments occasioned by technological advances affect the roles played by stakeholders in the field of nanopharmacy to such an extent that this calls for a different approach to responsible innovation in this field. Specific features associated with nanopharmacy itself and features introduced to the associated converging technologies- bring about a shift in the roles of stakeholders that call for a different approach to responsibility. We suggest that Value Sensitive Design is a suitable framework to involve stakeholders in addressing moral issues responsibly at an early stage of development of new nanopharmaceuticals. (shrink)

Abstract In his paper “The Opposite of Human Enhancement: Nanotechnology and the Blind Chicken problem” ( Nanoethics 2: 305-36, 2008) Thompson argued that technological attempts to reduce or eliminate selected non-human animals’ capabilities (animal disenhancements) in order to solve or mitigate animal welfare problems in animals’ use pose a philosophical conundrum, because there is a contradiction between rational arguments in favor of these technological interventions and intuitions against them. In her response “Animal Disenhancement and the Non-Identity Problem: A Response to (...) Thompson” ( Nanoethics 5:43–48, 2011), Palmer maintained that the philosophical conundrum is even deeper if we introduce the non-identity problem into the discussion. In my brief response, I claim that in order to avoid the pitfalls of speculative ethics, empirical facts related to the technologies involved as well as costs for the non-human animals have to be taken into account. Depending on which changes we are referring to, ethical problems can be seen very differently. Widening the consideration to the socio-economic context in which non-human animals are currently used by humans, I challenge the idea of genuine philosophical conundrums from an antispeciesist and abolitionist perspective. Only in a context of exploitation, in which non-human animals are deprived of basic rights and their existence is totally dependent on human exploitation, the contradictions between improvement of welfare and disenhancement of capabilities make sense. Content Type Journal Article Category Critical Discussion Notes Pages 1-12 DOI 10.1007/s11569-012-0139-1 Authors Arianna Ferrari, KIT/ITAS (Karlsruhe Institute of Technology/Institute for Technology Assessment and Systems Analysis), Karlsruhe, Germany Journal NanoEthics Online ISSN 1871-4765 Print ISSN 1871-4757. (shrink)

Nanotechnology shows great promise in a variety of applications with attractive economic and societal benefits. However, societal issues associated with nanotechnology are still a concern to the general public. While numerous technological advancements in nanotechnology have been achieved over the past decade, research into the broader societal issues of nanotechnology is still in its early phases. Based on the data from the Web of Science database, we applied the main path analysis, cluster analysis and text mining tools to explore the (...) main research fronts and hierarchical structure of these societal issues. We found that the research studies fell into four categories: "General Toxicity and EHS (Environment, Health and Safety)," "Medicine and Cytotoxicity," "Assessment and Regulation," and "Environment and Ecotoxicity." These research studies have disclosed much information about the potential effect of nanotechnology on public health and the environment. Relatively speaking, the studies on the assessment, regulation, preventive solutions, and environmental protection are just emerging. This finding indicates that an abundance of effort should be conducted on these emerging themes to maximize the benefits of nanotechnology while minimizing its potential harm. The implications for various parties in this domain are also presented. (shrink)

Societal views about livestock production systems in Europe are changing dramatically in a negative direction. Based on the tradition of pragmatism in applied philosophy I develop a Moral Operating System of animal production systems in cooperating a plurality of ethical views. This moral operating system of animal production systems consists of two interactive, dynamic parts: an internal professional care ethics combined with an emergent ethics in life sciences enabling change by responsible innovation, and external ethical boundary conditions based on societal (...) values and concerns in animal ethics and environmental ethics. I focus on the emergent ethics in life sciences because it most normative ethical theories have problems in dealing with the future. In moral reasoning about innovations in the making, the relevant moral facts and the appropriate principles are more or less still unknown, as also the relevant moral consequences. Only by doing ethics in life sciences in future projects will the moral dilemmas emerge in the trajectories of responsible innovation like molecular technologies in animal sciences and precision livestock farming. (shrink)

'Concerns about livestock farming mainly focus on animal welfare. Societal groups address livestock farmers on their duty of care because more and more animals are kept in increasingly intensive systems. Most farmers, as caring farmers, are willing to take various measures to improve the welfare of their animals. However, not all solutions to animal welfare problems are seen as a welfare improvement or give rise to other welfare concerns. How will farmers be able to perform their duty of care?'.