ethics of science and technology?
Márcio Rojas da Cruz 1, Gabriele Cornelli 2Abstract
Born to enable its creators to fulill their needs, scieniic technique has always played a signiicant role in human civilizaion. This is the context in which we glimpse the advent of modern technoscience, which has signiicantly contributed to the increment of human control over nature. This study aims to analyze, under the focus of bioethics, relecions on the philosophy of science as they relate to the neutrality of science and converge with epistemic raionality, as well as to relate those relecions to the process of making decisions in the administraion of technoscience. The study has raised doubts about the capacity of technoscieniic knowledge to legiimize and jusify the decisions within the ambit of the naional science and technology systems, thus signaling the need for promoing a link between technoscieniic self-regulaion and bioethic hetero-regulaion.
Keywords:Bioethics. Knowledge. Science. Science, technology and society.
Resumo
O que pode a ilosoia da ciência contribuir para a éica da ciência e tecnologia?
Nascida para permiir que seus criadores possam atender suas próprias necessidades, a técnica cieníica sempre desempenhou papel signiicaivo na civilização humana. Este é o contexto em que podemos vis-lumbrar o advento da tecnociência moderna, que tem contribuído signiicaivamente para o incremento do controle humano sobre a natureza. Este estudo tem por objeivo analisar, sob o enfoque da bioéica, relexões sobre como a ilosoia da ciência entende a neutralidade da ciência e sua convergência com a racionalidade epistêmica, bem como relacionar essas relexões ao processo de tomada de decisões na administração da tecnociência. O estudo levantou dúvidas sobre a capacidade do conhecimento tecnocieníico para legiimar e jusiicar as decisões no âmbito dos sistemas de ciência e tecnologia nacionais, sinalizando assim a necessi-dade de promover ligação entre a auto-regulação tecnocieníico e hetero-regulação bioéica.
Palavras-chave: Bioéica. Conhecimento. Ciência. Ciência, tecnologia e sociedade.
Resumen
¿En qué puede contribuir la ilosoía de la ciencia a la éica de la ciencia y la tecnología?
Nacida para permiir a sus creadores saisfacer sus necesidades, la técnica cieníica siempre ha desempeñado un papel importante en la civilización humana. Este es el contexto en el que se vislumbra el advenimiento de la tecnociencia moderna, la cual ha contribuido signiicaivamente al incremento del control humano sobre la naturaleza. Este estudio iene como objeivo analizar, bajo el enfoque de la bioéica, relexiones acerca de cómo la ilosoía de la ciencia eniende a la neutralidad de la ciencia y a su convergencia con la racionalidad epistémica, así como relacionar estas relexiones con el proceso de toma de decisiones en la administración de la tecnociencia. El estudio ha puesto en duda la capacidad del conocimiento tecnocieníico para legiimar y jusiicar las decisiones en el ámbito de los sistemas nacionales de ciencia y tecnología, señalando así la necesidad de promover un vínculo entre la autorregulación tecnocieníica y la hetero-regulación bioéica. Palabras-clave: Bioéica. Conocimiento. Ciencia. Ciencia, tecnología y sociedad.
1. Pós-doutorando mrojas@mci.gov.br 2. PhD cornelli@unb.br – Universidade de Brasília (UnB), Brasília/DF, Brasil.
Correspondência
Gabriele Cornelli – Programa de Pós-Graduação em Bioéica da Universidade de Brasília. Campus Universitário Darcy Ribeiro, Faculdade de Ciências da Saúde – Caixa Postal 04451 – CEP 70904-970. Brasília/DF, Brasil.
Declaram não haver conlitos de interesse.
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On a certain occasion Popper registered his agreement with Russell regarding epistemolo-gy’s pracical consequences for science itself, as well as for ethics and poliics. Popper and Russell agreed to draw both epistemological relaivism and epistemological pragmaism closer to totali-tarian and authoritotali-tarian ideas 1. Based on Popper’s
and Russell’s view of the proximity between epis-temological relaivism/episepis-temological pragmaism and totalitarian/authoritarian ideas, we propose to approach the philosophy of science in order to elucidate the pracical consequences that could be drawn from its contribuions to epistemology.
We have been following the remarkable sci-eniic advances of recent years, paricularly those concerning the biotechnoscieniic paradigm. Made possible by Darwin’s theory of evoluion and Mendel’s geneic theory, and brought into being by Watson and Crick’s elucidaion of the structure of DNA and by the subsequent development of geneic engineering protocols (with restricion enzymes, DNA ligases, DNA polymerases, chain reacions, etc), the biotechnoscieniic paradigm represents our technical competence for transforming and re-programming the natural environment, other living beings and oneself according to one’s plans and wishes 2, allowing us in theory to become, in a way,
immune to the mechanisms of natural selecion and the other signiicant factors inluencing the process of evoluion of living species 3.
It is noteworthy that this someimes surprising potenial had already been pointed out by Popper himself when, relecing upon scieniic progress in general, he realized that from an evoluional and biological point of view science is an instrument used by the human species to adapt to the environ-ment, to invade new environmental niches and even to create new environmental niches 4.
In this context we are confronted by the fol-lowing issue: scieniic undertaking grants us an exclusively technical a priori competence, but
not necessarily an ethical competence. A signii-cant proporion of products and processes which adhere strictly to the biotechnoscieniic paradigm raise ethical dilemmas which cannot be resolved in even a minimally saisfactory way without exhaus-ive studies and discussions. We cannot, therefore, evade our responsibility to evaluate the ethical and moral consequences of modern scieniic acions.
Scieniic and technological progress, which together ofer the prospect of deiniively solving the most diverse problems (health, social, environ-mental, etc.), have also allowed modern society the
development of an ariculated process of mythiica-ion of the pracice of science itself.
For Feyerabend, a myth is a system of thought, imposed and preserved through indoctrinaion, which ofers explanaions about reality according to facts which correspond to elements of so-called common sense, and also possesses the character-isic of infallibility 5. Scieniic theory, on the other hand, is a system of thought with counterintuiive and counter-inducive general explanaions which
are arrived at by the most brilliant thinkers. How-ever, since scieniic theory is essenially a human achievement, it has the characterisic of fallibility 6-7. The lack of clarity between the deining properies and the consequent limitaions of a scieniic theory, confusing itself with the concepion of a myth, ends up allowing the possibility to perceive science as a myth, creaing the risk that possible mistakes and negaive efects in modern scieniic acivity might be neglected.
It is relevant to point out that the prevailing concepion of scieniic knowledge, which is exclu-sively focused on methodological and epistemic jusiicaion – the mythiied image of scieniic en-deavors – is liable to create an asymmetry between science on one side and moral and poliical aspects on the other, with the corollary of creaing a hierar-chy in which epistemic values take priority posiions to the detriment of poliical and ethical values. In this context the issue of “epistemic authoritari-anism” arises, characterized by the ideology that scieniic knowledge is not only a necessary condi-ion but is also suicient to jusify and legiimate
poliical decisions 8.
This study will therefore aim to relate the neutrality of science and convergence on epistemic raionality to ethics in science and technology. Spe-ciically, we will relect upon the contribuion of Karl R. Popper, Thomas S. Kuhn and Paul K. Feyerabend’s philosophy of science to the fundamental as-sumpions of scieniic acivity in its interface with bioethics.
It’s noteworthy that the discussions par-icularly related to scieniic neutrality and the convergence on epistemic raionality are funda-mental to the relecion concerning the bioethical management of technoscieniic systems. This cen-trality is a consequence of the fact that scieniic neutrality is the main argument in defense of total scieniic autonomy, prescinding any type of regula-ion other than autoregularegula-ion, bestowing a sort of “immunity” or “privilege” on the exercise of scienif-ic acivity regarding consideraions of a moral order.
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As for the convergence on epistemic raionality, on the other hand, the centrality emerges because it is the main argument in defense of the suiciency of opinions and recommendaions based on scieniic knowledge on maters that aim to setle contenions of various orders, endowing scieniic speech with a sort of “superiority” that would make its “exclusivi-ty” acceptable.
Popperian proposiions
I disbelieve in specializaion and in experts. By paying too much respect to the specialist, we are destroying the commonwealth of learning, the traionalist tra -diion, and science itself 9.
Let us irst elucidate in the most precise way possible the pracical consequences, within the ambit of bioethics, of Popper’s contribuions to the philosophy of science. The irst point regards ethi-cal principles as the search for truth and the ideas of intellectual honesty and fallibility, such principles forming part of the very basis of science 10. Without meaning to belitle these principles, it is clear that they are far from suicient in order for the scienist to be clearly and transparently provided with advice from physics about whether to build “a plow, an airplane or an atomic bomb” 11. Therefore,
acknowl-edging that the scienist is inluenced by a number of factors – not only from their professional sphere but also from their personal sphere – in proposing “new professional ethics”, Popper states that the irst principle should be an acknowledgment that
there is no authority, since our conjectural and ob-jecive knowledge exceeds, more and more, what one person can master 12.
The second point addresses the “problem of inducion”, where universal empirical statements are logically prevented from being declared true, independently of the quanity and quality of conir-matory evidence. The expression “scieniic truth” completely loses the meaning of its existence, since the successes from the “trial, error and successes method” do not guarantee the imelessness of a cer-tain scieniic theory. One cannot abstract the ime factor from any element of scieniic knowledge, however solid it might iniially appear, even if it re-mains irrefutable for decades or even for centuries. The case of Newtonian physics, sill applied today in numerous situaions even though it has been overtaken by Einsteinian physics, is a good example of how a high degree of empirical solidity
is not enough for a scieniic theory to be declared true. The lay concepion that scieniic theories are hypotheses that have been conirmed by experi-mentaion strictly adjusted to a virtually infallible methodology is to be replaced by a medley of hy-potheses and scieniic theories. What we accept today as scieniic theories are actually conjectures, hypotheses, assumpions and possibiliies which unil now have remained worthy of consideraion in the scieniic sphere – but there is no guarantee such worthiness will endure in the future.
The next point to emerge concerns the origin of scieniic theories and their impact on scieniic progress. According to Popper, pure and imparial sensory percepions are not in the basis of scien-iic theories, so the “bucket theory of the mind” is discarded. The data must not be worshipped on the altar of science because they are not the basis nor the guarantee for the theories: they are no more re-liable than any of our theories or ‘biases’, but much less, if anything 13. This role of basis to the science
is performed by problems the scieniic community regards as important and theories the scieniic com-munity not only formulates in speculaive fashion but also someimes defends in a dogmaic way, ig-noring occasional empirical refutaions, as indicated by the “spotlight theory”.
Naturally, at each one of these stages – the prioriizaion of problems to be solved, the formula-ion of scieniic theories to be tested, the dogmaic defense of certain theories – there are countless opportuniies for idiosyncrasies to inluence the scienist’s thoughts and acions. Popper himself de-clares that nothing is ever accomplished without a dose of passion 14, acknowledging the pariality and
subjecivity of men of science who allow themselves to be guided by fears, necessiies and preferences. By airming that the objecivity and raionality of all scienists hinder the scieniic process, prece-dents are created so that the very idea of scieniic neutrality, and consequently scieniic autonomy, is called into quesion.
It is noteworthy that even though science could surely be considered neutral and autonomous, it would be inconsistent to automaically atach such adjecives to individual scienists or organized research groups. Their aciviies should be subjected to thorough examinaions of an ethical nature in or-der to minimize the risk of abuses commited in the name of science. In this sense the epistemologist argues that scieniic raionality and objecivity do not depend on the personal raionality and objec-ivity of each of the scienists working in a certain
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ield. Instead they emerge from the social aspect of the scieniic method, more speciically through the tradiion of criical review which drives scienists to-wards leaning through the detecion of errors.
Would this argument be enough for science to be considered raional and objecive? Undoubtedly the intersubjecivity of scieniic method is able to make a posiive contribuion to the raionality and objecivity of science. However, such a contribuion is not absolute, not being able to exhaust all pos-sibiliies for eliminaing irraional and subjecive inluences.
Such a scenario would not only compromise the raionality and objecivity of science but also compromise the convergent concepion of scieniic raionality and objecivity. As Popper realized, the emergent conlict in the scieniic dynamic between the feature of science developing in a path-depen-dent way and the inal convergence tendency might only be parially resolved by looking into the mater of raional criical review as responsible for enabling the approach to one truth, having also overcome the restricions imposed by the debate regarding in-commensurability, or by the “myth of the context”.
Considering that the scienist is involved in an undertaking which minds more the doxa than the epistēmē – making it impossible to guarantee the veracity of the knowledge regarded as the refer-ence point – when their consideraions are being applied, especially when such consideraions con-lict with recommendaions from other secions of society, it should not be the case that greater weight is atached, a priori, to the scienist’s
feed-back than to that of the non-scienist. At this point it should be made clear that the “principle of ob-jecivity of basic statements”, valid to all sciences, does not necessarily imply the denial or refutaion of statements which are not intersubjecively test-able. Such statements must be ignored by science, in the sense that science is intrinsically limited to its ability of evaluaion outside the empirical sphere 15. Therefore, certain lines of thought in psychology or theology, for example, are not necessarily false just because they have not been submited to the mechanisms of intersubjecive tests.
Kuhnian proposiions
Science is not the only acivity the praciioners of which can be grouped into communiies, but it is the only one in which each community is its own exclusi -ve audience and judge 16.
As was done with Popper, we will now analyze Kuhn’s contribuions, staring with those currently considered to be under the ambit of bioethics and extrapolaing them from their iniial context so they can interact with contemporary bioethical concerns.
Let us begin, then, with the exising relaion be-tween the facts as they are laid out by the world and the beliefs inhabiing our cogniion concerning this world. According to Kuhn, the incommensurability which is perceived when two paradigms separat-ed from each other in their imeline are analyzseparat-ed atests to the nonexistence of a neutral empirical language system or concept system 17. In this situa-ion we come across a signiicant limitasitua-ion of our abiliies to analyze a data set.
In the universe of all possible and imagin-able paradigms, we are consequently restricted by the incommensurability to only access the set of paradigms our scieniic lexicon allows us. We are raional beings gited with a “vision through a par-adigm”, as if something that could be considered a kind of paradigm was an indispensable requisite to percepion, as if what we see were in a way a prod-uct of our previous visual-conceptual experience 18.
On this topic there is sill room for a detail that makes the fact-belief relaionship even more com-plex: the individual nature of the vision through a paradigm. The simulus-sensaion correlaion, due to the neural process that happens when a sim-ulus to the percepion of sensaion is received, is neither absolutely linear nor independent from the previous educaion of each researcher. It is perfect-ly conceivable that two scienists who perform an idenical experiment see diferent things, or see the same thing diferently, receiving diferent data and processing diferent simuli 19. It is interesing to note that this relecion already appeared in Kuhn’s irst texts, in the 1940s, when it was concluded that the condiions of cause and efect actually result from construcions of determinisic mathemaical formulas responsible for the causal connecion of events 20,21.
Add to that a direct implicaion of incommen-surability, which equally impacts on the belief that science, throughout its progress, is moving ever closer to the truth as realized by tradiion in the philosophy of science, meaning something which corresponds to what is real, to the outside world, independently from the mind. When the designa-ion of “truth” is applied to a theory, in an internal and restricted way, there is no reason for unrest or discomfort. In fact, as a general rule, pracically all members of a scieniic community will agree on the
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consequences of a theory. Conclusions that remain unshaken throughout experiments will be held to be correct, the ones that don’t it will be held as wrong, and there may sill be a third group of consequences which would encompass those conclusions which haven’t been properly tested.
Nonetheless, when subsituing the compar-ison among consequences of the same theory for the comparison among disinct theories called to ofer an organized vision of the same group of natu-ral phenomena, the use of the “truth” label must be more parsimonious. Previous theories are no longer a consensus for being considered false in the light of a more recent theory, even though they were once held to be true 22. Kuhn uses the expression
tran-siency of treasured scieniic beliefs to call atenion to the fact that there were no means to prove that a certain paradigm is inal and that the progress of science takes place with recurrent destrucions and subsituions of concepts 23-25. For these situaions, the discourse on truth takes on an implicit tone of temporariness, of provisionality. Seen this way, the incommensurability not only compromises the assumpion that the process of choosing among theories takes place raionally, but also compromis-es the assumpion that changcompromis-es in scieniic theoricompromis-es occur in a progressive way 26.
Besides the mater of incommensurability one must also consider what the literature refers to as a “negoiaion process” through which the dominant consensus is established. In a negoiaion there is a choice between scieniic facts which are relevant to the extracion of conclusions (factual aspect), as well as a choice between the conclusions themselves (in-terpretaive aspect). Considering that both factual and interpretaive aspects of the negoiaion pro-cess are simultaneous, one can naturally idenify a circularity: at the same ime that the facts inluence the conclusions drawn from them, so too do the conclusions inluence the descripion of the facts 27.
And here again there is a detail that makes the mater more complex: the inluence of mere bi-ographical maters in the negoiaion process. The divergences among the conclusions of paricipants in the negoiaion can ulimately be atributed to the diferences in individual history, research ields and personal interest: Interests, poliics, power and authority perform, without a doubt, a signiicant role in scieniic life and its development 28.
In spite of the fact that at the intra-paradigm level the methodological rules are extensively shared by the members of a scieniic community – a result of the dogmaic way of knowledge transmission to
learning scienists – when considering inter-par-adigm maters, methodological rules turn into epistemic values 29. Kuhn does not actually complete-ly compromise the role performed by objecivity in science, but only a paricular philosophical image of scieniic objecivity, through the relocaion of the criterion of objecivity and truth in the context of scieniic pracice 30. Consequently, the use of such epistemic values in certain contexts may happen in a signiicantly divergent way, this divergence being the result of the diferent importance given to values which are someimes mutually conlicing.
Consistency, empirical adequacy, simplici-ty, explanatory power, predicive power, inter alia,
are criteria which might be valued diferently by diferent scienists, for there are no a priori
hierar-chies. This means that parallel to the consideraion of epistemic values there is also the consideraion of non-epistemic values through the inluence of idiosyncraic factors dependent upon individual biographies and paricular personality traits. The corollary is that every individual choice between compeing theories depends on a mixture of ob -jecive and sub-jecive factors, or on shared and individual criteria 31. To expaiate upon the process
through which a dominant paradigm is achieved, let us make clear that:
no paradigm which has emerged from possibiliies worthy of consideraion by the scieniic communi -ty has been able to ofer a plausible soluion to the absolute totality of the problems the world presents; and
compeing paradigms do not have idenical limita -ions when it comes to ofering plausible solu-ions to the problems the world presents.
Therefore the negoiaion process might be considered as the prioriizaion of problems that should not remain among those lacking plausible soluions. Naturally, it is in this situaion that the “totally external to science criteria” will gain crucial importance to the revoluionary quality in debates among paradigms 32.
Feyerabendian proposiions
Western civilizaion as a whole now values eiciency to an extent that occasionally makes ethical objec -ions seem ‘naïve’ and ‘unscieniic’. There are many similariies between this civilizaion and the ‘spirit of Auschwitz’ 33.
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A well-known criic of the pracice of acquiring knowledge through scieniic acivity, Feyerabend, through his relecions on the philosophy of science, presents us with a new thinking regarding the mo-daliies of poliical-administraive pracices in the scieniic ambit. Let us therefore move on to his impact on bioethical debates, looking at his epis-temology regarding fundamental assumpions of science and extracing consequences for the ethical management of the science and technology system.
The prominence achieved by Feyerabend probably derives from his defense of the thesis that science does not currently possess the quality of uniformity (and nor did it in the past). His studies revealed that science does not have just one vision of the world but instead exhibits a variety of ten-dencies and research philosophies. In one corner, there would be the “Aristotelian line”, represented by scienists concerned with avoiding exaggerated speculaions and restricing themselves to the facts, with experimental designs unequivocally indicaing one hypothesis among conlicing ones. In the op-posite corner, there would be the “Platonic line”, whose representaives feel encouraged to speculate and propose theories that interact with the facts in an indirect and highly complex way 34. However, in spite of the immeasurable diversity of world views in science, and a similar diversity of metaphysical bases, a signiicant porion of these views are em-pirically acceptable 35. In fact, his historical research towards a characterizaion of the scieniic method made him ubiquitously known as the proponent of the “anything goes” principle.
Feyerabend thus comes to defend the idea that if scienists’ aciviies were strictly oriented by methodologies in accordance with the ideas of objecivity – which emerges when a naion, a tribe or a civilizaion ideniies its way of life with the laws of the universe (physical or moral), and which becomes apparent when cultures with diferent objecive views come into confrontaion 36 – and
reason – which has its origins in the assumpion that there are standards for knowledge and standards for acions that are universally valid 37 – the knowledge we have today regarding nature simply would not have been achieved. Paradigmaic events in the his-tory of science, admired not only by scienists but also philosophers and laymen (for example Galileo Galilei’s contribuions), should not be seen as having been driven by objecivity or reason.
In this sense, the irst step towards the conse-quences of the relecion in the philosophy of science regarding the ethics in science and technology is to
disassociate scieniic endeavor from the image of a neutral iniiaive from a moral standpoint. The fact that science is devoid of raional and objecive meth-odology, and guided by evidence which is subject to historical and physiological inluences 38, invalidates
the belief that only epistemic values (such as con-sistency, empirical adequacy, simplicity, explanatory power and predicive power) inluence the inal re-sult of the process of generaing knowledge.
Another equally important step is to come to see scieniic endeavor as an instrument (more important in some areas, less in others) which guides and/or enables the unraveling of the most diverse pracical disorders, instead of approaching an ulimate truth. The incommensurability thesis quesions the raionality, which supposedly guides the process of choosing between divergent scieniic theories, and also quesions the supposed progres-sive feature when it comes to succession between scieniic theories 39. Furthermore, scieniic results, being predictable only when properly inserted in an experimental arrangement, provide to knowledge a feature, which is fundamentally contextual and spe-ciic to certain situaions 40.
Given that science is dependent upon the en-vironment in which it is conceived and developed, by linguisic inluences 41; devoid of standard au-to-correcion mechanisms 42 and standardizaion of progress 43; and equipped with mutually exclusive theories, which coexist having the same empirical basis or demonstraing incommensurability char-acterisics 44, it is not in tune with the convergent concepion of epistemic raionality. There is no way that specialists immersed in diferent cultures although it to develop, without limitaion whatso-ever, the ability to know the world, will coincidently arrive at the exact same belief regarding the world by the end of their journeys.
Besides, specialists’ abiliies do not exempt them from criicism: they do not possess all the knowledge concerning a speciic phenomenon but instead only that of a speciic ield; and indeed usually dedicate themselves to the study of only a limited group of characterisics of that ield, in accordance with their own personal interests 45. Because they are an interested party – waning a respectable posiion, a good salary and coninued funding for their paricular line of scieniic inves-igaion – wider society should not be exclusively subject to automaically accept whatever specialists indicate as being the right path to follow. Indeed, the generaion of consensus in the scieniic envi-ronment has much in common with the processes
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that precede the conclusion of poliical deals, not to menion other factors in the realm of economic and naional interests 46.
Science therefore ceases to have a special sta-tus; it is an undertaking marked by successes and
failures, consising of disinct approaches that only someimes achieve the inal result that was expect-ed and fervently desirexpect-ed 47. The most important point is that science, as Feyerabend had warned, is revealed as being incapable of disregarding what happens outside its borders. In this way, science will come to be seen as one among several tradiions for ataining knowledge of reality, which contribute to society moving closer to achieving its aspiraions.
So science will not have any special privilege bestowed on it, for nothing enitles a society or even a scieniic community to consider itself superior to any other tradiion. Every diferent tradiion may then enjoy equal rights of acknowledgement of their values and contribuions, as well as corresponding access to those agencies that make poliical deci-sions. This new proposed deiniion of a free society difers from the usual deiniion, in which a free so-ciety is one where its individuals enjoy equal rights to access posiions that were previously deined and restricted by a paricular tradiion, such as Western science and raionalism 48.
Discussion
Almost 40 years ago, Jonas alerted us to the fact that we should concern ourselves with inves-igaing the close relaion between theory and pracice in the way science was being conducted, and essenially in how it should be conducted: We shall then see that not only have the boundaries be-tween theory and pracice become blurred, but that the two are now fused in the very heart of science it-self, so that the ancient alibi of pure theory and with it the moral immunity it provided no longer hold 49.
This warning of the loss of the alibi which granted science moral immunity refers us to the quesion about whose task it is to evaluate the morality of the various possibiliies of scieniic aciviies.
So far we have learned that scienists do not possess intrinsic authority, seeing that the presup-posiions of scieniic neutrality and convergency in epistemic raionality have been made contestable by studies in the philosophy of science. It may be imely to note that even if scieniic endeavor were to grant its actors/representaives intrinsic authority – that is, if we could imagine even for a moment a
hypotheical epistemic scenario in which the presup-posiions of scieniic neutrality and the convergency in epistemic raionality were undisputed, irrefutable and valid ad eternum – the management of science
and technology, or even the government of a soci-ety, should sill not be exclusively centralized in the hands of scienists, as if they were platonic tutors:
Empiric evidences are important and necessary, ne-ver suicient. When deciding how much to sacriice to atain a goal, goods or an objecive in order to achieve a certain amount of another, we necessarily surpass anything that strictly scieniic knowledge may provide 50.
Beyond the argument about the insuicien-cy of scieniic knowledge – considering intrinsic and extrinsic limitaions – there are also other ar-guments that could be invoked in support of the paricipaion of society in the management of tech-noscience. A recurrent argument regards the origin of resources. Considering that the inancing of scien-iic research and technological development comes mainly from public funds, which is to say taxes col-lected from the general populaion, nothing would be more just than enabling the ciizen to paricipate in the process of decision-making concerning the allocaion of resources in technosciences. If the cii-zen is paying, let them also give their opinion about the beneits that will be sought and also about the harm that occasionally (considering risk analysis) will be done. If there is some kind of “joint sharing” of costs concerning investment, let there also be a joint sharing of possible posiive results arising from the research.
Naturally, from the point of view of the dem-ocraic management of science and technology, it would be unacceptable to allow social paricipaion only when we were strictly dealing with public in-vestments. Even though the cost of investments is not shared – and even though we are taking into ac-count research projects that are privately inanced – the posiive or negaive impacts of the great majority of technoscieniic systems (paricularly, biotechnoscieniic systems) are invariably felt by more than one social group. Furthermore, what to one group of people might appear to be the posiive impact of a paricular research acivity could actual-ly be negaive for another group. For example, the concepion of a new Geneically Modiied Organism might increase the producivity of a certain crop, boosing a famer’s proits, but at the same ime con-taminate the organic crops of neighboring farmers, thereby causing them inancial losses. Let`s keep in
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mind all the relecion symbolically represented by Bacon’s quote: “ipsa scienia potestas est”.
Perhaps the most important argument, how-ever, concerns the potenial gains arising from public involvement in the management of technoscience. The consideraion upon the desirability of strictly objecive evaluaions (if indeed they are possible) indicates that the subjecivity might be capable of contribuing to the evaluaion by plural commitees, so as to eventually achieve more saisfactory results. Although the paricipaion of laymen adds cer-tain inancial costs to the decision-making process, scieniic knowledge, as relevant as it may be con-sidered, remains instrumental. Its relevance derives from its signiicant contribuion to solving the most diverse problems, but from a moral standpoint it remains an instrument which should be used only in appropriate circumstances. Of equal importance to instrumental knowledge is speculaive knowl-edge, which makes signiicant contribuions to our understanding of the moral scenario, so that social paricipaion will give the decision-making process a real chance of maximizing the desirable beneits and minimizing the undesirable risks.
It is virtually a moral necessity for there to be close cooperaion between technoscienists and laymen whose communiies the technoscienists wish to study, change or improve. This is not the naive proposiion of replacing scieniic autonomy with a social heteronomy in science. A vast array of decisions concerning technoscieniic aciviies would remain in the sphere of autoregulaion, such as the development of approved projects or the discussions regarding theories and their diferent degrees of corroboraion. However, some of the decisions would take into account the posiion of not only technoscienists but also of laymen in tech-noscience – for example as to whether it would be acceptable to submit a community to certain risks (some known, some unknown) so as to possibly achieve a certain beneit.
Moving beyond the previous relecions in the philosophy of science, we get to the point of promoing an inversion of the roles performed by scieniic truth and by ethics, at least in speciic situaions. Relecing upon Molina and Rowland’s research on chloroluorocarbons (CFCs) for which they received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1995, Olivé reaches the conclusion that scieniic knowl-edge is capable of implying a moral responsibility, which is to say that in certain circumstances, having certain raionally-based beliefs or objecive knowl-edge automaically obliges the scienist to choose
between two or more possible courses of acion 51. However, truth as declared by science does not al-ways inluence the nature of ethics – in certain cases the situaion is exactly the opposite: Ethics, with all its weights and proposiions, inluences the very na -ture of truth.
At the same ime, moral conlicts oten lie at the heart of the most diverse dissensions, instead of being the soluion. And the previous consensus re-garding ethics in technoscieniic iniiaives, having been established by the widest possible paricipa-ion from various sectors of society, would create the most favorable condiions for technoscieniic development in harmony with the wishes of a given community.
Final consideraions
The study of the fundamental assumpions of techno-science, as relected by the philosophy of science, unequivocally reveals the indispensability of social paricipaion in decision-making process-es regarding techno-scieniic undertakings. When the assumpions about scieniic neutrality and the convergence on epistemic raionality – which form the legiimaing basis of epistemic authoritarian-ism – were contested, the inadequacy of scieniic knowledge for jusifying poliical decisions was re-vealed. For the management of the techno-scieniic system to be considered bioethical, the involvement of the communiies afected by technological devel-opments is indispensable.
This aricle does not aim to combat science. It would be uterly unrealisic to call for a moratori-um on investments in science and technology. The
increase in human life expectancy, for example, is suicient to demonstrate the value of scieniic and technological advances. However, one cannot lose sight of the fact that increasingly lethal biological weapons can be produced through exactly the same techniques for manipulaing living organisms that also allow the development of vaccines and medica-ions. And it is not simply a quesion of disinguishing between potenially beneicial and potenially ma-leicent research. Reality is not as simple as that. Beneits and detriments oten overlap in a complex way; beneits are immense and clear but detriments are someimes even bigger, and unpredictable.
A very good example of this (and also epis-temic authoritarianism, including clear cases of the suppression of scieniic dissonance) is the “sill hy-pothesis” of the Human Immunodeiciency Virus
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(HIV) originaing from the iniial research towards the development of an oral vaccine to stop polio 52. Ater World War II, when polio was considered one of the worst public health problems, three great scienists became involved with research towards mass immunizaion: Jonas Salk, Albert Sabin and Hilary Koprowski. According to this “sill hypoth-esis” (“sill” because it has not yet been properly scruinized), at least one type of Simian Immunode-iciency Virus was introduced in humans during the irst mass vaccinaion campaigns which took place between 1957 and 1959 in Central Africa, giving rise to HIV-1.
This aricle does not aim to overvalue the extreme opposite of the current situaion. Techno-sci-enists should be considered irreplaceable, since they possess the instrumental knowledge necessary so that the decision-making process is grounded in the most updated and precise informaion available, in the vanguard of techno-scieniic knowledge, on the very border between what is known and what is unknown. Nonetheless, the debates in the philosophy of science that dealt paricularly with sci-eniic neutrality and the convergence on epistemic raionality ofer signiicant arguments with which to contest these concepions, calling into quesion the adequacy of techno-scieniic knowledge to le-giimize and jusify decisions in the ambit of science and technology.
This aricle wishes, therefore, to take issue with the current modus operandi, which is
charac-terized by a kind of collecive paternalism because the techno-scieniic community, without the di-rect involvement of wider society, promotes its own regulaion. Once scieniic neutrality and the convergence on epistemic raionality are contest-ed, however, scieniic autonomy should cease to be total, and instead of techno-scieniic autoregu-laion there should be bioethics heteroreguautoregu-laion. Scieniic paternalism should be replaced by a sys-tem of collecive autonomy in which various actors paricipate in the management and inluence the decision-making process.
Even if at some point in the future those ar-guments in the philosophy of science that have contested scieniic neutrality and convergence on epistemic raionality come to be refuted, even if the scienists performing their research and devel-opment aciviies come to be considered neutral, objecive and raional, techno-scieniic paternalism would sill not be acceptable. The reasons would be the same ones which, as a general rule, condemn paternalism in other contexts, such as the fact that
the direct and indirect consequences of scieniic undertakings are not restricted to the techno-scien-iic community but can in fact afect the whole of society.
Scieniic endeavor has been a fantasic instru-ment for the advanceinstru-ment of human knowledge. And if we want science to remain so, it is impera-ive that it conducts a more vigorous dialogue with other forms of knowledge acquisiion. The defend-ers of epistemic authoritarianism and scienism actually perform a disservice to the scieniic and technological system itself. Debates in the philoso-phy of science have uncovered not only the limits of scieniic endeavor that compromise the credi-bility of scieniic and authoritarian views, but have also indicated a strategy that might make scieniic and technological successes more frequent. Such a strategy would consist of abandoning the monopoly of convicions and instead cooperaing closely with other forms of knowledge.
To say it as clearly as possible: there is no less scieniic aitude than assering that science is the only possible and imaginable way to explore the unknown and to reveal genuine knowledge. Sci-ence must be made more humane, in the sense of allowing subjecivity to inluence with transparency and posiivity the atempts of objecive expressions. Epistemic values, instead of having a veiled role, must be considered with clarity.
And in this process of the humanizaion of science, the inluence of science and technology de-velopment policies cannot be ignored. Government science and technology policies currently have a signiicant inluence on scieniic and technological development. Planning the allocaion of inancial resources – deciding which ields will receive big-ger and lonbig-ger-term investments, which will receive scarce and only short-term funding, and which will be overlooked enirely – is a fundamental stage in elaboraing a list of goals, beneits to be enjoyed, and negaive efects to be tolerated. From this aris-es the need to share with society the mandate, and equally the responsibiliies, of designing science and technology development policies.
And there are no reasons to be afraid. In the management of countries’ science and technology systems there is a world of riches to be gained from cooperaion between the philosophy of science and bioethics, as well as from acceping the indispens-ability of invesing in new research at the interface between these two ields.
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Aricle produced as part of postdoctoral research at the Program in Bioethics of the Universidade de Brasília, Brazil. All the extracts originally produced in Portuguese were translated by the authors.
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Paricipaion of the authors
Gabriele Cornelli oriented the irst author, guiding the concepion and design of the study. Márcio Rojas da Cruz undertook the analysis and prepared the aricle, which is part of his ongoing postdoctoral research.
Recebido: 11.11.2015 Revisado: 18. 1.2016 Aprovado: 20.1.2016
