XXII Seminário Internacional de
FILOSOFIA E HISTÓRIA DA CIÊNCIA
On the interaction between science and ethical and social values: completing the model of this interaction, and seven new theses
Prof. Dr. Hugh Lacey
Professor Emeritus of Philosophy
Swarthmore College – EUA
Pesquisador Colaborador
Projeto Temático Fapesp 07/53867-0
Patrocínio
Projeto Temático Fapesp 07/53867-0
Departamento de Filosofia/FFLCH/USP
Associação Filosófica Scientiae Studia
Fapesp
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Background: I have argued (Lacey 1999, 2008, 2010) that there exist mutually reinforcing relations between the methodological strategies that are adopted in scientific research, and the ethical/social values held by investigators, and I have developed a model of how this functions in a way that avoids relativism, and that permits scientific results to be accepted in accordance with impartiality (objectivity). This model plays an important role in structuring the formulation of the proposal and implementation of the Projeto Temático Fapesp (2007/53867-0) da Equipe de Pesquisa da Associação Filosófica Scientiæ Studia, ‘Gênese e significado da tecnociência: das relações entre ciência, tecnologia e sociedade’, and discussions about it, and collaboration, with members of the PT have led to its clarification and stimulated its further developments.
In the introduction to Lacey (2010), I stated ten theses that summarize key features of this model. [See appendix 1.] These ten theses are principally concerned with the impact of values on the choice of methodological strategies. Since 2006 – in articles, talks, and previous seminars in the series, Seminários Internacionais de Filosofia e História da Ciência, of Fapesp Thematic Project – I have been principally looking in the other direction, at the way in which scientific research has impact in the realm of values, and specifically on its proper role in democratic deliberations on science and technoscientific policy. This has included reflections on how to conduct science so as contribute properly towards environmental sustainability and human well-being, and so that the responsibilities of scientists are adequately exercised. (All of this is consistent with maintaining the centrality of the ideal of impartiality in regulating scientific practices, and that the most fundamental responsibility of scientists is to further the long-standing ideals of the modern scientific tradition, which I have called impartiality and neutrality – holding the Precautionary Principle, e.g., is not opposed to maintaining these ideals of the scientific tradition.)
In this more recent work, I have addressed questions relating to applied science, especially concerning the legitimacy of applying innovative scientific discoveries in social practices. For dealing with these questions, the model that is articulated with the ten theses can be seen to be not sufficiently general. It needs to be complemented (and integrated) with further proposals for how values properly play a role in connection with justifying what I call ‘endorsements’, i.e., judgments that hypotheses (e.g., about risks) are sufficiently well supported to justify acting in ways that are informed by them, although they cannot (for various reasons) be accepted now in accordance with impartiality.
Program
The first 4 classes will be devoted to reviewing (and deepening) the initial developments of the model and introducing the fundamental concepts that are used in connection with it. Then the other 8 classes will deal systematically with later (and continuing) developments.
03/março/2011 – quinta-feira – Class 1 – Genesis of the model of the interaction between science and values
The aim of science; limitations of logical empiricist accounts of scientific methodology; the need for “strategies” in methodological deliberations; the ten theses.
17/março – quinta-feira – Class 2 – Impartiality, neutrality and autonomy
Reviewing current formulations of these notions.
24/março – quinta-feira – Class 3 – The values of technological progress and their connection with adopting ‘decontextualized strategies’
General analysis of values, value outlooks, and the various types of values; value outlooks that contain the values of technological progress; articulating the values of technological progress.
29/março – terça-feira – Class 4 – Presuppositions of the values of technological progress
Identifying these presuppositions, and exploring how to investigate them. Further implications of the model of the interaction of science and values.
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In the eight classes, listed below, I aim to put definitive order into and extend these more recent ideas. In the process, I will supplement the ten theses, some of which require revision, with several (provisionally, seven) new theses, and I will use examples from several areas of scientific research to illustrate the new theses. These areas will include the one I have used a lot, agricultural developments of transgenics and alternatives, such as agroecology, and also developments of nanotechnology and stem-cell research, and issues about pollution, global warming and food security. Further illustrations can be found in recent research conducted by recent postdoctoral fellows in the PT (or who have been oriented by members of the PT), who have extended the use of the model (with modifications) to studies of economic theory (Brena Fernandez), and of epidemiology and conflicts of interest in medical research (Nicolas Lepochier). I state the seven new theses in appendix 2 (Theses 11–17). I expect that their formulations will be improved, and perhaps revised, as the seminars are developed. In several seminars, my argument will include detailed engagements with ideas in recent books, especially Douglas (2009) and Mitchell (2009; see Lacey 2010b).
31/março – quinta-feira – Class 5 – Modifying some of the ten old theses
At least Theses 4 and 5 will be modified. Thesis 4 will be modified to reflect explicitly that DA-strategies include both reductionist and non-reductionist strategies. [Here, I will discuss material in Mitchell (2009), and ideas of the French biologist, Janine Guespin, presented in discussions of Forum Mundial Ciência e Democracia.] It is the virtually exclusive adoption of strategies that are both decontextualized and reductionist [DR strategies] that enters into mutually reinforcing relations with VTP, especially in contemporary forms of ‘science in the private interest’ (Krimsky 2003). The notions, ‘reductionist/non-reductionist’ and ‘contextualized/de-contextualized’, will be explained in detail. The modification, introduced her, does not lead to questioning the potential of various forms of non-decontextualized strategies, and their indispensability for inquiries on certain kinds of phenomena (e.g., in agroecology or risks with underlying socioeconomic mechanisms), especially those that are salient for people who adopt values that contest VTP. In addition, Thesis 5 will be modified in the light of the distinction between acceptance and endorsement of a theory, hypothesis, or knowledge claim (see Lacey 2008b).
07/abril – quinta-feira - Class 6 – The necessity of methodological pluralism
Arguments for Thesis 11 – develops arguments made in Lacey (2008c, 2010b; 2010e; 2010f). Attention will be given to the meaning of ‘technoscience’ and ‘technoscientific objects’ (building on discussions held during the XX Seminário Internacional de Filosofia e História da Ciência, Scientiae Studia/USP/FAPESP, August 23–27, 2010). Attention will also be given to questions about the relations between the natural and human (social) sciences, and to the kind of unity that methodological pluralism posits to exist between them. (This issue will recur repeatedly in the course of the seminars.)
12/abril – terça-feira – Class 7 – Endorsements: interplay of empirical research and ethical/social value judgments
Arguments for Thesis 12 – develops arguments made in Lacey (2008a, 2008c, 2010c, 2010d), and includes discussion of material in Douglas (2009); Intemann & Martín-Melo (2010).
14/abril – quinta-feira – Class 8 – Empirical evidence and value judgements in risk assessments
Arguments for Thesis 13 – more development of arguments in Lacey (2010e; 2010f), and further critical interaction with Douglas (2009). The model of the interplay of science and values, articulated with the original ten theses, does not illuminate the role that values properly play in connection with justifying endorsements. New proposals are needed to deal with this role played by values; these proposals complement (and can be integrated with) the original model.
26/abril – Terça-feira – Class 9 – Impartial inquiry
Arguments for Thesis 14. In earlier writings, I defined impartiality as a value or ideal that regulates the acceptance of scientific theories and claims to scientific knowledge. I will extend the notion of ‘impartiality’ to apply to certain kinds of scientific inquiries. Impartial judgments are produced in impartial inquiries; however, impartial inquiries may be conducted also in contexts where (at least in the short run) impartial judgments cannot be made. Here I will develop my initial attempts, made in Lacey (1010 e, 2010f).
05/maio – quinta-feira – Class 10 – Investigating empirically the space of outcomes and the space of alternatives of a technoscientific innovation
Arguments for Thesis 15. The notion of ‘space of outcomes’ comes from Mitchell (2009). Complementing it with the ‘space of alternatives’ is proposed in Lacey (2010b; 2010e). The notion of ‘space of alternatives’ is introduced in Lacey (2008a, 2010c). Here issues, connected with climate change and nanotechnology, will be discussed, based on (Lacey 2008c, 2010a), and the models deployed in climate research will be used to illustrate the idea of ‘space of outcomes’.
12/maio – quinta-feira – Class 11 – Neutrality, understood in terms of inclusivity, a necessary condition for impartial inquiry
Arguments for Thesis 16. This will include discussion of Krimsky (2003); Oliveira (2004; 2008), and build further on arguments in Lacey (2009c, 2010c, 2010e, 2010f).
26/maio – quinta-feira – Class 12 – The place of science in the world of values and lived experience
Arguments for Thesis 17, building on Lacey (2009a; 2009b).
09/junho – quinta-feira – Evaluation Class
Short bibliography of relevant works
Lacey, H. (1999) Is Science Value Free? Values and scientific understanding. London: Routledge.
_____. (2006) A Controvérsia sobre os Transgênicos: questões científicos e éticos. São Paulo: Editora Idéias e Letras.
_____. (2008) Valores e Atividade Científica 1. São Paulo: Associação Filosófica Scientiae Studia e Editora 34.
_____. (2010) Valores e Atividade Científica 2. São Paulo: Associação Filosófica Scientiae Studia e Editora 34.
_____. (2006) “O Princípio de Precaução e a autonomia da ciência”, Scientia Studia 4 (3): 373–392.
_____. (2007) “On the aims and responsibilities of science”, Principia 11: 45–62.
_____. (2008a) “Crescimento econômico, meio-ambiente e sustentabilidade social: a responsabilidade dos cientistas e a questão dos transgênicos”. In: G. Dupas (org.), Tensões entre Meio-ambiente e Crescimento Econômico, pp. 91–130. São Paulo: Editora UNESP.
_____. (2008b) “Aspectos cognitivos e sociais das práticas científicas”, Scientiae Studia 6 (1):86–93.
_____. (2008c) “Ciência, respeito à natureza e bem-estar humano”, Scientiae Studia 6 (3), 297–327.
_____. (2009a) “The interplay of scientific activity, worldviews and value outlooks,” Science & Education 18 (6–7): 839–860. [‘A interação da atividade científica, visões de mundo e perspectivas de valores’, in Eduardo Rodrigues da Cruz e Paulo Fernando Carneiro (eds), Teologia e Ciência/Tecnologia. São Paulo: Editora Paulinas (a sair).]
_____. (2009b) “O lugar da ciência no mundo dos valores e da experiência humana”, Scientiae Studia 7 (4), 681–701.
_____. (2009c) “La ética y el desarrollo de la nanotecnologia”, Realidad, Nº. 19: 78–90.
_____. (2010a) “Food crises and global warming: Critical Realism and the need to re-institutionalize science”, (co-author: M. I. Lacey) In: R. Bhaskar, et al. (org.) Interdisciplinarity and Climate Change. London: Routledge.
_____. (2010b) ‘Integrative pluralism’, essay review of S. D. Mitchell, Unsimple Truths, Studies in the History and Philosophy of Science (em prelo).
_____. (2010c) ‘The many cultures and the practices of science’, Fernando Tula Molina & Gustavo Giuliano (ed.), Culturas Científicas y Alternativas Tecnológicas. Buenos Aires: Mincyt (a sair).
_____. (2010d) ‘Qual é a o alcance da pesquisa científica?’, apresentacão ao VII congresso internacional da AFHIC, Canela, RGS, May 3–5, 2010.
_____. (2010e) “A imparcialidade e as responsabilidades dos cientistas”, apresentação ao IV Seminário de História e Filosofia da Ciência, Ilhéus, 17 a 20 de agosto de 2010.
_____. (2010f) ‘The responsibilities of scientists and the old ideal of the neutrality of science’, a ser apresentado no simpósio, ‘Values in Science and Public Policy: Building on Douglas's Science, Policy, and the Value-Free Ideal’, reunião do Philosophy of Science Association, Montreal, Quebec, 4 a 6 de novenbro, 2010.
Douglas, Heather E. (2009) Science, Policy, and the Value-Free Ideal. Pittsburgh: Universoty of Pittsburgh Press.
Intemann, K. & Melo-Martín, I. (2010) ‘Social values and evidentiary standards’, Biology and Philosophy 25 (2), 203–213.
Krimsky, S. (2003) Science in the Private Interest: Has the lure of profits corrupted biomedical research? Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.
Mitchell, Sandra D. (2009) Unsimple Truths: Science, complexity and policy. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Oliveira, M. B. (2004) ‘Desmercantilizar a tecnologia’, em B. de S. Santos (org.), Conhecimento prudente para uma vida decente: “Um discurso sobre as ciências” revistado. São Paulo: Cortez.
–– (2008) ‘Neutralidade da ciência, desencantamento do mundo e controle da natureza’, Scientiae Studia 6 (1), 97–116.
De modo a instruir o curso, o Prof. Lacey torna disponível os dois seguintes apêndices contendo as 17 teses referidas no programa do curso.
APPENDIX 1:
Dez teses sobre a interação entre ciência e valores éticos e sociais.
Primeira Tese: A ideia de que a ciência está livre de valores se entende melhor como uma combinação de três ideias: imparcialidade, neutralidade, e autonomia. Ela é bem representada pela tese: imparcialidade, neutralidade e autonomia são valores constitutivos das práticas e das instituições científicas – onde, entre outras coisas, a imparcialidade pressupõe uma distinção entre valores cognitivos e valores sociais (éticos e de outros tipos que não cognitivos), e neutralidade pressupõe a ausência de juízos de valor nas implicações lógicas das teorias científicas.
Segunda Tese: Só a imparcialidade pode ser sustentada sem ambiguidade. Simplificando, expressa o valor de se aceitar uma teoria de um domínio de fenômenos, se e somente se ela manifestar os valores cognitivos em grau elevado à luz de dados empíricos relevantes, e de rejeitar uma teoria se e somente se for inconsistente com outra teoria corretamente aceita — assim, não há um papel legítimo para valores sociais e éticos ao lado dos valores cognitivos quando se considera a aceitação de uma teoria. A autonomia não é um valor realizável; e neutralidade fica comprometida nas práticas científicas usuais, mas poderia manifestar-se mais se pesquisas científicas ocorressem dentro de um pluralismo de metodologias.
Terceira Tese: (a) A pesquisa científica é empreendida sempre sob um estratégia cujo papel principal é de, em primeiro lugar, prescrever restrições aos tipos de teorias (e de categorias que elas empregam) a serem consideradas e investigadas, o que leva à especificação das possibilidades que se pode identificar no curso da pesquisa, e, em segundo lugar, selecionar os tipos de dados empíricos que se busca e se relata, e quais os fenômenos e aspectos a serem observados e pesquisados. (b) O objetivo da ciência permite que sejam utilizadas com sucesso estratégias diferentes.
Quarta Tese: A ciência moderna tem se desenvolvido quase que exclusivamente sob um tipo especial de estratégias (que podem variar bastante) que eu chamo de estratégias da abordagem descontextualizada (estratégias-AD), sob as quais as teorias se restringem àquelas que representam fenômenos e enquadram possibilidades geráveis a partir de estrutura subjacente (e seus componentes), processo, interação e as leis que os governam (tipicamente expressas matematicamente). Representação dos fenômenos dessa maneira envolve a sua descontextualização: os fenômenos estão dissociados de quaisquer relações que possam ter com os arranjos sociais, com as vidas e a experiência humanas, de qualquer laço com a ação humana, com as qualidades sensíveis e os valores – de quaisquer possibilidades que eles poderiam obter em virtude de sua inserção em contextos particulares sociais, humanos e ecológicos. E os dados empíricos são apresentados usando categorias descritivas que geralmente são quantitativas e aplicáveis em virtude de medidas, uso de instrumentos e operações experimentais.
Quinta tese: A pesquisa científica – a investigação empírica sistemática produzindo resultados de acordo com a imparcialidade – pode ser empreendida sob estratégias não redutíveis a estratégias-AD.
Sexta Tese: (a) A adoção quase que exclusiva pela ciência moderna de estratégias-AD explica-se devido a (i) sua fecundidade e potencial de desenvolvimento praticamente ilimitado, (ii) sua adoção baseia-se numa relação mutuamente reforçadora com valores sociais que denomino dos valores do progresso tecnológico (VPT), e (iii) VPT prevalece em todos os países industrialmente avançados e se incorpora em suas instituições mais importantes. (b) Existem boas razões para o privilégio acordado às estratégias-AD na medida em que há boas razões para se sustentar a VPT.
Sétima Tese: Valores sociais podem fornecer forte razão para se adotar um tipo de estratégia específico: adotar estratégias tendo em vista relações mutuamente reforçadoras entre elas e compromissos com certos valores sociais. Na prática isso pode significar: adotar estratégias sob as quais se possam identificar sistematicamente certas possibilidades valorizadas e descobrir os meios de realizá-las, ou que potencialmente possam produzir resultados que, em suas aplicações promovam interesses definidos pelos valores em questão – tudo isto sujeito sempre à condição de que as estratégias sejam fecundas e de que os resultados tenham sido obtidos de acordo com a imparcialidade. Alem disso, deve-se reconhecer que se uma possibilidade não puder ser identificada por uma estratégia favorita, isso não serve como evidencia contra tal possibilidade.
Oitava Tese: O momento em que uma estratégia é adotada pode ser logicamente separado do da decisão de aceitar ou rejeitar uma teoria (de um domínio especifico de fenômenos), construída sob a estratégia, de modo que o compromisso com a imparcialidade pode ser mantido no ultimo momento, mesmo que valores sociais tenham papel legítimo no primeiro momento. Além disso, os valores sociais em jogo no primeiro momento podem ser os mesmos cuja promoção é servida num terceiro momento, o da aplicação do conhecimento cientifico.
Nona Tese: Tão forte é a garra das estratégias-AD na ciência moderna que às vezes não se percebe que podem haver possibilidades (em certos domínios de fenômenos, e.g. na agricultura) de interesse àqueles que contesta a VPT mas que não podem ser enquadradas sob as estratégias-AD, embora possam estar sob outros tipos de estratégias (e.g. estratégias agroecológicas).
Décima Tese: O objetivo da ciência é bem servido institucionalizando-se práticas científicas de modo que se possa implementar uma pluralidade de estratégias, vinculadas respectivamente com diferentes valores sociais. Isso também facilitaria uma maior manifestação da neutralidade, melhor atenção à valores suscitados por aplicações, e -- acima de tudo – o fortalecimento de instituições de participação democrática.
APPENDIX 2
Sete novas teses sobre a interação entre ciência e valores éticos e sociais
Thesis 11: Technoscientific innovation is characteristically informed by scientific knowledge that is confirmed using DR-strategies (strategies that are both decontextualized and reductionist). This kind of knowledge explains the efficacy of an innovation, but generally DR-strategies are insufficient for gaining and appraising all the knowledge claims that are relevant to the legitimacy of implementing an innovation. Technoscientific objects embody knowledge obtained using DR-strategies. They also embody VPT, and the values of capital and the market and, consequently, strategies not reducible to DR-ones are needed to investigate the benefits and risks of technoscientific implementations, and the alternatives that there may be to using them.
Thesis 12: Appraisals of the legitimacy of the implementation of a technoscientific innovation are implicated in ethical/social value judgments, but also they draw upon claims (about benefits, risks and alternatives) that are open to systematic empirical investigation. Typically, however, at least in the time frame actually available for making decisions about whether or not to implement an innovation, these claims are not (and cannot be) accepted in accordance with impartiality (precise predictions cannot be made concerning them, and precise estimations of the probability of outcomes cannot be calculated); they can only be endorsed, i.e., affirmed that it is legitimate to act in a manner informed by them, that they are sufficiently highly supported by available empirical data to warrant acting on the supposition that they are true (until such time as more relevant evidence may come available).
Thesis 13: Especially interesting issues arise in connection with endorsements of the presence or absence of serious risks occasioned by technoscientific innovations. Ethical/social values play several roles in deliberations about them, most notably in defining what should be considered ‘sufficiently high’ evidence to justify endorsing a hypotheses of the kind ‘there are no serious risks’. When one endorses the claim, ‘there are no risks’, one also endorses ‘the evidence that supports the claim is sufficiently strong that it is not necessary to take into account the consequences that would follow, if it were to inform action and policy, and if in fact it were false’. In general, the greater the moral seriousness of harm that is risked, the greater should be the probability that the harm really will not occur. Ethical/social values play a major role in determining the sufficiency of available empirical data to legitimate the endorsement; but values themselves are not evidence.
Thesis 14: Even in contexts where hypotheses can only be endorsed, and not accepted or rejected in accordance with impartiality, (what I call) impartial inquiry can and should be conducted, where inquiry is impartial, if the four questions, listed below, are treated in it – not necessarily to the satisfaction of all relevant parties, as they are when impartial judgments are accepted – in such a way that the interests of all relevant parties in obtaining empirical data are taken into account, where the claims of each party are subject to criticism with grounds in the strongest empirical evidence that can be obtained, and in the light of data considered relevant by the critics:
• What types of empirical data are relevant for confirming or disconfirming a hypothesis (P)?
Do the available data provide evidence for P sufficient to conclude that more research would be irrelevant – if not, what research would be relevant for obtaining additional data?
• Have attempts been made to obtain potentially relevant data, especially those that might lead to the rejection of P?
Have adequate responses been given to critics, and to the hypotheses that they have proposed for consideration, on the basis of empirical data, or have they simply been dismissed or ignored?
(Note that accepting a theory in accordance with impartiality is the outcome of engaging in impartial inquiry.)
Thesis 15: Impartial inquiry about risks should furnish empirically-grounded scenarios of the space of effects of the implementation of an innovation (and its actual contexts), including social/economic/political factors among the relevant ones; and so, it needs to deploy the variety of strategies (including non DR-ones) necessary to take this fact into account. In it, every potential effect, identified as a risk from the perspective of the value-outlook of any participant in the democratic discussion, should (in principle) be investigated, regardless of its hypothesized mechanisms, provided that it is theoretically or empirically plausible. And, in it, empirical research of the ‘space of effects’ should be carried out, not only for each proposed technoscientific innovation, but also for each of the potential alternatives proposed: the space of alternatives should also be explored empirically.
Thesis 16: In deliberations about the legitimacy of implementing technoscientific innovations, unless impartial investigation is carried out in a way that permits all the value-outlooks in play in the democratic discussion to be included and well represented, and therefore the variety of methodological strategies with mutually reinforcing relations with holding them respectively put to use, there is the great likelihood that endorsements will be misidentified as claims accepted in accordance with impartiality (although such misidentification is itself in discord with impartiality). Neutrality, understood in terms of inclusivity, is a presupposition of impartial inquiry – and, in addition, it (bolstered by methodological pluralism) is a necessary condition for science to be properly responsive to democratic interests and to be able to contribute to further them.
Thesis 17: Scientific practices – those in which scientific knowledge is proposed, confirmed and some of it applied – are socio-historical practices that take place in the world of human experience and value, carried out by human agents, whose actions are explicable in terms of their beliefs, perceptions, deliberations, desires and values. Scientific research, limited to the use of DR strategies, lacks the categories needed to understand its own rationality and the limits of its applicability, and those needed to articulate its moral character, leaving it open to be taken over so as to be of service predominantly to powerful (corporate and governmental) interests, regardless of their ethical merits. This has the consequences that science does not attend with high priority to possible harmful effects (environmental, social, human) of scientific applications, so that effects like global warming can be generated effectively without being noticed, until it is too late to stop them. Then, science is unable to anticipate social crises like those that are being confronted today (environmental, social, financial), or contribute much to address them – for investigation adequate to these ends must use non-DR strategies.
In the course of the seminars, I will produce a glossary of all the technical philosophical terms that I have introduced in the theses and my current version of the model. The current terminology and the symbolism used here are made clear in the theses stated in appendix 1.
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Organização:
Grupo Temático Estudos de Filosofia e História da
Ciência
Apoio Institucional:
USP e Fapesp
