History and Past Activities
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History and Past Activities |
Helena Siipi and Juha Räikkä
University of Turku, Finland
Genetic Democracy and Mystification of Genetechnologies
Ethical discussion about genetechnologies usually concentrates on their effects on ecosystems and human health. However, research and application of genetechnologies may also have social and psychological impacts. These impacts are studied in our on-going research project Genetic Democracy: Social and Ethical Implications of Genetically Modified Organisms. The aim of the paper is to present the Genetic Democracy project first in general and then with respect to some results in particular.
Mystification of genetechnology is typical in many public and academic debates. The term mystification refers both to unreasonable fears and unrealistic expectations related to genetically modified organisms (GMOs). In Genetic Democracy project we analyse three common forms of GMO mystification: genetic determinism, technological imperative, and views about unnaturalness of GMOs.
The particular results to be presented concern the issue of (un)naturalness. Different meanings of the term will be analysed and further used into revealing interesting equivocations in some common arguments for and against GMOs. The analysis will concern, for example, naturalness as a lack of human influence, naturalness as functional normality, naturalness as familiarity and naturalness as the moderate satisfaction of needs. The ethical relevance of these different forms of (un)naturalness will also be discussed.
Sociology of Science and Technology NETwork - last update: April 2006