Abstract
Through its convergence with a whole range of technologies developed in information science, biology, and cognitive science, nanotechnology reflects and shapes society. Because it has a tremendous capacity to transform our perceptions, practices, and representations of the future, it has political as well as economic and social impacts. Making the nanoworld more accessible by informing the public and introducing appropriate laws is an ethical imperative. Apart from education and incorporation in industrial processes and professions, this broadened access is a precondition for a proper public debate on the uses and also the limits of innovation, whenever the latter does not correspond to the general principles of responsibility and precaution. One aim here is to reflect upon the potential of nanotechnology in the context of the transhumanist agenda. It is essential to go beyond the traditional cost–benefit approach to an assessment based on the systemic nature of the risks induced by nanotechnology. The main goal of this chapter is to introduce the reader to this perspective.
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Notes
- 1.
L’homme est le seul être connu de nous qui puisse avoir une responsabilité. En pouvant l’avoir, il l’a.
- 2.
Convergent technologies at the nanoscale provide ways to combine components involving at least one nanoscale dimension in the observation, simulation, manipulation, and production of nano-objects, nanomaterials, or nanosystems, whether these components are specified by their physical, chemical, or biological properties, or by a combination of them.
- 3.
Decision of the European Court of Justice on 24 November 2011, prohibiting systematic filtering for Internet.
- 4.
This is in reference to the New Deal, which was the recovery plan launched by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1933 to take America out of the 1929 depression.
- 5.
NBIC is used in the reports of the United States National Science Foundation, while the term Converging Technologies for the European Knowledge Society (CTEKS) is used in reports by the high level group convened by the European Commission to examine the prospects for the new technology wave on the 2020 horizon.
- 6.
A legal term in France referring to the shared aim bringing together several physical or legal entities to create a company and share the profits or losses.
- 7.
An approach to the management of information that treats human attention as a scarce commodity, and applies economic theory to solve various information management problems.
- 8.
TOTEM is the acronym for theories and tools for distributed authoring of mobile mixed reality games.
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Roure, F. (2016). Societal Approach to Nanoscience and Nanotechnology: When Technology Reflects and Shapes Society. In: Lourtioz, JM., Lahmani, M., Dupas-Haeberlin, C., Hesto, P. (eds) Nanosciences and Nanotechnology. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-19360-1_17
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