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Ethics and Environmental Risk Assessment

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Food and Agricultural Biotechnology in Ethical Perspective

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Abstract

In its most common form, environmental risk assessment is an adaptation of consequentialist ethical theory. Hazards are identified as significant through careful articulation of the values (axiology) that determine why outcomes are considered to be bad, harmful or adverse, and exposure quantification is used to characterize risk as an expected value. Several leading examples of how this framework is operationalized in the characterization of environmental risks from agrifood biotechnology are discussed, including risks to biodiversity, weediness and acquired resistance to the effectiveness of pesticides. Epistemological uncertainties plague the quantification of expected values, however, and feed both public doubts and deeper controversy. As risk communication strives to assuage those doubts, an ironic cycle of mistrust emerges, even among those who apply rigorous standards of risk analysis: Assuming that others are less careful, they regard their contrary findings as evidence of error, rather than prompting a further check on the initial assessment. For anyone inclined to see the technology as risky, the alleged carelessness of analysts amplifies the evidence for risk.

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  1. Department of Philosophy, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, USA

    Paul B. Thompson

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Thompson, P.B. (2020). Ethics and Environmental Risk Assessment. In: Food and Agricultural Biotechnology in Ethical Perspective. The International Library of Environmental, Agricultural and Food Ethics, vol 32. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-61214-6_6

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