XIV Seminário Internacional de
FILOSOFIA E HISTÓRIA DA CIÊNCIA

nov.-dez. de 2007

Prof. Dr. Terry Shinn
Maison des Sciences de l’Homme, França
Pesquisador Visitante - FAPESP

Profiling nanoscience and nanotechnology
Sociological, ethnographic and philosophical investigations

Nanoscience and nanotechnology (NST) are today icons of a new form of science and technology, a 4th industrial revolution, fresh and massive initiatives by politicians and public policy, and the growth of new grass-root ethical activity and movement toward citizen involvement in science. Nanoscience and nanotechnology are the putative spawning ground for unprecedented disciplinary, organisational and epistemological combinations and initiatives. During this series of three lectures the diverse and complex origins, changing technological impulses, intellectual and epistemological practices, disciplinary and work relations, ethics and industrial implications of NST will be explored. NST is approached with reference to ideological, political, capitalistic, technological and narrowly cognitive components. An attempt will be made to discriminate between discursive and substantive features of this new domain of activity and learning. This series of lectures is underpinned by the hypothesis that NST is a bifurcated polarized system: at one extreme it is driven by powerful technology; at the other extreme, NST is animated by cultural forces of ideology, by entrepreneurial and political discourse on innovation and a new industrial revolution, and by growing citizen aspirations to become an integral part of the knowledge production process.

Lecture 1 – 30/11/2007 – Visions, instrumentation, culture. Origins and evolution of nanoscience
As a stabilized technical and cognitive activity and a structured community, nanoscience and nanotechnology (NST) only arose in the 1990s. However, many of the visions which became attached to NST, and which continue to contribute to its spread, began a decade or more earlier, and can be linked to new horizons in science learning. The exponential growth of NST in recent years similarly derives from favourable political intervention fuelled by changing relations between economic frustration, entrepreneurial strategy, emphasis on innovation, and broader cultural shifts in citizen/science relations.
Prior to the late 1980s, when the scanning tunnelling microscope became a proven detection, characterization and manipulation apparatus for objects of nano scale, reflection on sub-micro-scale engineering was largely speculative. Such reflection was nevertheless amply nourished by two key transformations in science: first, the growth of cognitive science and materials science, which opened a new intellectual and imaginary space for conceiving novel physical relations and material possibilities in the framework of cross disciplinarity; and second, the establishment of the computer which changed the face of technology, modified what counts as “experimentation” and recast epistemology. The visions of NST founders like Erik Drexler and Ralf Merkle are thus a combination of fantasy - yet fantasy directly informed and fuelled by the changing face of science and technology.
Nevertheless, the exponential growth in the quantity of research published in NST, standing at only hundreds of articles per year during the early 1990s and at almost 8000 in 2006, is directly attributable to technology – to the invention of the scanning tunnelling microscope and associated devices. NST is hence synonymous with instrumentation. The scanning tunnelling microscope and its like are derive from mastery over the quantum tunnelling effect, the Pizo-electric effect and computer control and computer-generated imaging. Public policy proved equally decisive. The 2000 US sponsored Nanoscience Initiative has pored several hundred million dollars into the new field, attracting hordes of researchers and NST projects. Public policy in Japan, Germany, Britain and France has likewise swiftly created inflated national NST communities. China today boasts the world’s largest NST research collective, and US and Chinese scientists each publish almost 40% of the domain’s annual research output.
Local: Prédio de Filosofia e Ciências Sociais - sala 8 - das 9h30 às 12h30.

Lecture 2 – 04/12/2007 – Cognitive components, technology, disciplinarity, enterprise
Nanoscience and nanotechnology have often been touted as radically different from all previous forms of scientific knowledge. This radical claim applies to NST’s disciplinary structure, the domain’s internal social communication and collaborative practices, its intellectual priorities and epistemology, its links with enterprise, and its dealings with extra-science groups and concerns. This lecture will explore each of these elements, comparing specific facets of NST with identical activities and structures for non-NST science. Only through comparison can one begin to establish a clear image of where NST constitutes something truly novel as opposed to a body of practice and learning similar to more erstwhile fields of science.
How do NST practitioners represent their research endeavours, disciplinary position and the proximity of nanoscience to nanotechnology, nanoscience to engineering, and nanoscience to enterprise, as well as their relative engagement in fundamental research and technology-related research; and how does their self-representation compare with the same elements for non-NST scientists? Comparison of cognitive research practice components for NST and non-NST practitioners, components like experimentation, characterization, sample preparation, instrumentation, methodology, technology, theory, engineering enterprise, etc, shows 1. that technology-related clusters prove more important in NST than non-NST research; 2. that a somewhat restricted cluster of components entailing characterization, sample preparation, instrumentation, methodology and technology are paramount in NST; and 3. that NST and non-NST are distinguished by inclusion of a broader range of components in non-NST than for NST, where the average relevance of components is less elevated than in NST. To what is this moderate differentiation due? It will be argued that one perceives here once again the centrality of instrumentation in NST. It will further be queried that with the standardisation of equipment and practice over time, some part of the cognitive component distinctiveness of NST will not eventually atrophy as NST becomes a “normal” science.
Comparative analysis similarly elucidates two additional features of NST. NST is overwhelmingly technology sensitive. Technological concerns prove far more important to NST researchers than to non-NST scientists in issues ranging from choice of research topic, methodology, selection of collaborators, decisions about instrument and so forth. What is intended by “technology” in NST? The response is very different from non-NST practitioners. By “technology” NST scientists specifically refer to fundamental technology likely to promote the advancement of pure research. This is technology in the strong sense of “technoscience”. Non-NST practitioners represent “technology” in a far broader sense, extending to applied technology, innovation and industry. The integration of technology in NST is further revealed by the relative degree of proximity NST scientists perceive between nanoscience and nanotechnology on the one hand, and by the gap they report between nanoscience and engineering or enterprise on the other hand.
In view of the massive hype linking NST to innovation, enterprise, to a new “industrial revolution” and to untold changes of civilization, how do NST academic practitioners describe their interaction with the world of business? Involvement in and even lesser forms of collaboration with enterprise appear to occur on a relatively small scale when measured against expectations and discourse. Most NST practitioners indicate that they neither own nor participate directly in firms or start-ups, nor do they serve as consultants. They similarly indicate that they rarely sponsor fellowship programs that combine academia with entrepreneurial exchange. An important mystery nevertheless persists here: numbers of NST scientists express sometimes vague, at other times rather specific, affinity toward business, or express the idea that NST research should and will become strongly connected to enterprise. In the absence of direct contact or participation with enterprise, what is the channel of information and communication? On another register, to what extent is the image of NST-enterprise dynamics a product of performative public policy or a desire to project a vision of a golden future?
This lecture closes with considerations about the interdisciplinary dynamics of NST. While there exist grounds for affirming that cognitive science and environment studies constitute cases of interdisciplinarity, what is the status of NST? Is the case in favour of cross disciplinarity here a strong one, and if so on what grounds? Arguments from different perspectives and based on various methods will be presented. It is in general safe to say that earlier enthusiasm about NST as interdisciplinary has begun to erode. Sophisticated measuring techniques point to inadequacies in former evaluation or to the existence of disciplinary organisation in some key domains of NST. What is the disciplinary future of NST – chemistry, material science, physics, other?
Local: Prédio de Filosofia e Ciências Sociais - sala 8 - das 9h30 às 12h30.

Lecture 3 – 07/12/2007 – Epistemological paths, political agendas and the “Forman Thesis”
Does NST mobilize a form of epistemology different from other domains of science? Nowotny (2001) and Gibbons (1994) argue that as a Mode 2 system of knowledge production, NST does exhibit divergent epistemological properties: 1. Theory is of little or no relevance. 2. Epistemology is ground on “robustness” – this implying rejection of “truth criteria” and emphasis on practical solutions to palpable socially defined problems. Does this portrayal fit?
Evidence on NST epistemology is unfortunately still incomplete and inconclusive. Some studies indeed indicate that the status of theory in NST is on a par with, or is slightly inferior to, the place of theory in non-NST fields. By contrast, for selected fields, like nano “biomotor” research, it appears that technology-based investigations become translated into highly innovative theoretical reflection. With reference to the so-called “robust epistemology” hypothesis, there is space for ample debate. First, study on robust epistemology is often too general, and there exist few (if any) rigorous case studies where the precise content and operation of robust thinking is elucidated for a specific case study. In the epistemology’s defence, in NST technology, instrumentation and the like are paramount. Problems often take a pragmatic turn. Effectiveness is frequently gauged in terms of successful concrete transformations or manipulations devoid of narrowly cognitive, abstract or universalising features. On the other hand, NST practitioners themselves specifically rank “knowledge” above “technology”, and they indicate that technology of a high level is geared to contribute to fundamental learning rather than to practical solutions for short-term concrete challenges.
Two additional features of NST are discussed here. The domain is putatively socially very heterogeneous where actors often circulate over considerable organisational and cognitive distances. What is the affect of acute mobility and elasticity on research organisation and on the form and function of boundaries within NST and between NST and beyond science’s social activities? Does NST vehicle an historically novel form of political and moral economy? In conjunction with this, is it the case, as sometimes proposed, that NST occasions emergence of novel relations between citizen groups and the knowledge production process? Ethical questions connected with biological and safety issues are setting in motion new categories of alliances between NST practitioners and grass-root citizen bodies.
The famous Forman Thesis (Forman 1971) attributes certain transformations of orientation and content of science to a cultural and ideological dis-sensus between society and the scientific community, where researchers recast their theoretical interpretation of matter and causality in order to align themselves with changed dominant social values, and thereby reacquire societal legitimacy. Forman thus hypothesizes culture’s impact on the focus and even the substance of scientific research, and seeks to demonstrate precisely how scientists go about re-establishing their revered place in the social order through reorganisation of their community and thought. It is perhaps worth asking if the appearance of certain configurations in NST, and unusual in science, may not indeed constitute a response on the part of one segment of the scientific community to changing values, priorities and alliances over the past 30 or 40 years which have effectively reshaped significant portions of contemporary culture.
Local: Prédio de Filosofia e Ciências Sociais - sala 8 - das 9h30 às 12h30.

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Organização:

Associação Filosófica Scientiæ Studia
Departamento de Filosofia - USP
Parque de Ciência e Tecnologia da USP