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For an Ethics of Technology SPECIAL SECTION FOR AN ETHICS OF TECHNOLOGY enetic engineering and other modern intellectual perspective. In this view, science is a technologies have the potential to change A Science process of discovery based on quantitative obser­ the world. They can alter plants, animals, vations rationalized via causal mechanisms to the way human beings are made—the That either prove or disprove a formulated hypothesis. very structures of human life. This news There is no room in this process for human emo­ Gis not necessarily good, however. Given what his­ tion Ane\ no need to address philosophical and tory reveals to be a chronic myopia when predict­ Violates the ethical questions. This scientific perspective ing the negative consequences of scientific and represses a broader way of understanding reality, technological change, the idea of humans remak­ which scientists and philosophers historically ing the world may strike some people as frighten­ Established experienced with a certain awe and reverence. ing. Awe and reverence, as it happens, tend to ground Because of these fears, establishing limits to a respect for nature and provide the starting point technological Intervention has become a fust- Order of of an ethics of limits —an ethics that would order priority. The idea of relying on individual encourage science and technology while, at the human freedom and creativity alone no longer Reality same time, restraining scientific and technological makes any sense. Freedom and creativity are interventions that could radically alter or even important. But if they are the sole considerations destroy the awesome order of reality that is the guiding decisions about the direction of today's Could Prove source of both science anci ethics. technology, we are in grave danger. Human beings are unique in their ability to understand the order inherent in reality. Al­ SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY To Be though contemporary culture tends to see science The notion of an "ethics of limits" is a very diffi­ as the most important vehicle for human under cult concept for Americans—especially American Disastrous standing, it is, in fact, just one among many vehi­ scientists—to accept. Scientists typically insist on cles. Truly great scientists show that their under­ freedom from interference with their work in standing of reality transcends the coldly rational­ both pure science and its application to the BY JAMES F. istic. Such people become personally immersed in world. The idea of imposing limits on their work DRANE, PhD the reality with which they work. They exhibit in would be a tough sell. their work what could be described as an Many scientists today operate from a particular indwelling: an immersion in the reality with which they work. Their relationship with cosmol­ ogy or biology could, in some instances, be described as reverential, perhaps even mystical. Dr. Drane is Russell B. Roth But this dimension of science tends to be lost Professor of Bioetbies, P.dinboro for many of today's scientists. They seem inca­ University of Pennsylvania, pable of moving beyond the more banal tasks of Edinboro, PA. He is currently observing and measuring narrow aspects of the nt work on a book-length ver­ whole. These gatherers and counters of data con­ sion of the argument presented sider themselves scientists in the full sense of the here, Toward a More Humane Medicine: A Cath­ term. Indeed, they hold themselves up as models olic Bioethies. of what science means. And vet they ignore an 30 • JANUARY - FEBRUARY 2002 HEALTH PROGRESS SPECIAL SECTION l^\/ important aspect of their discipline: that is, the ate the use of their technological instruments. awe and the indwelling experienced by great sci­ Science and technology must, like other human entific geniuses. In doing so, they ignore the endeavors, be bound by ethical constraints. important distinction made by Francis Bacon Scientists and engineers can no more do whatever between "fact gatherers" and real scientists.1 they like than popes or presidents can. All human The great scientific geniuses were truly creative. activity has a moral dimension and is subject to They were tuned into the inner rationality .md moral constraints. Evil is possible. Ethics attempts established order of the universe and dwelt within to identify the evil .\nd to establish the constraints. it. They identified personally with what they were In doing so, it neither undermines science nor trying to understand. Their attitudes, intuitions, unnecessarily restrains technology. Required feelings, and aesthetic sensitivities were as much courses in the philosophy ind ethics of science are involved in their science as counting and fact gath­ appropriate for even' graduate program in science. ering* Their science involved their whole person, Yes, scientists must be free and allowed to be not just a capacity lor cold objectification.' creative. But they should also take into considera­ tion the fact that freedom and creativity derive THE NEED FOR SCIENTIFIC AND TECHNOLOGICAL LIMITS from respect for the broad rational order of reali­ Main of the intelligentsia just a generation ago ty itself. The great scientists have shown this were convinced that communism would eliminate respect and acted responsibly. Mediocre scientists human poverty and that penicillin would elimi­ (and worse) are the problem because they now nate infectious disease. We know what happened have access to powerful technological instru­ under communism—it extended the poverty it ments. In today's world, seemingly small techno­ claimed to eliminate. Antibiotics have failed to logical interventions can suddenly blossom into eradicate infectious disease, .md, what is worse, enormous disruptions. Such disruptions could their misuse has created dangerous resistant bac­ destroy the very conditions for life. terial strains. These (acts should make us think Consider, as an example, the highly publicized about untoward consequences, about the possi issue of genetically altered corn and the monarch bility of disaster—and about establishing ethical butterfly. The use of genetic technology to alter limits to technological interventions. basic foods—corn, wheat, and rice-has become Some contemporary scientists, shaped by a per­ common in recent years. The developers of this spective that emphasizes willpower and creativity, technology naturally claim that it is safe. are likely to interact with reality in a destructive Unfortunately, the dangers involved in altering wax. Because they have no personal regard for the basic crops may not become evident until the objects ot their study, they tend to intervene in alterations are beyond remedy. Genetically nature with hammer and tongs. Having done altered corn, which has proliferated widely, that, they may presume to reorganize the pieces appeared to produce pollen containing a natural according to their "creative instincts." They can insecticide that kills monarch butterfly caterpil­ remain narrowly focused because they have no lars. The natural structure of farming and food personal sensitivity for the broader order of production is delicate, indeed fragile. Another things. They can do brazen things to the natural genetically altered crop might conceivably wreck, world because they do not care about it personal­ not a population of butterflies, but some critical ly. Indeed, they may be more interested in fame component of the human food chain itself. md fortune than anything else. The experience of Genetically altered crops are not the only awe—which puts the importance of ,\n individual potential threat to continued human existence. in perspective—has been lost to such people. The Any number of new technologies generated by coherence and rationality of the larger reality contemporary science ,\nd engineering can create escape their notice .\nd concern. Nothing about instruments of mass destruction. Frightful evil is that broader cosmic reality might cause such peo­ not just what terrorists or rogue governments can ple to modify their personal ambitions or moder- do. Now even ordinary laboratory scientists and technicians can cause widespread destruction. * Albert Einstein was an example of the kind of scientist (The recent anthrax incident may have been the who has a broad, creative, almost mystical involvement work of a single laboratory scientist. I with his subject matter. TThis point was developed by Michael Polanyi, a great IDENTIFYING A BASIC ETHICAL PRINCIPLE FOR LIMITS scientist who, late in life, became a philosopher of sci­ How can science, so dependent on creativity and ence. See Polanyi. Personal Knowledge, University of freedom, be made subject to limits without Chicago Press. Chicago. 1962. undermining science itself? HEALTH PROGRESS JANUARY - FEBRUARY 2002 • 31 SPECIAL SECTION The ancient Greek philosophers distinguished olution in science MU\ technology, was radically between two levels of reality: ananke (fate), over optimistic. Nothing is impossible, thought the which human beings have no power; M\C\ techne, philosophers of the Enlightenment. Illness and all which is open to human intervention. Techne is other forms of human unhappiness would soon also the root of our English word technology, be eliminated. Reason was still important, as long which roughly means a system or set of skills for as it served will and freedom. In our own time, making changes. The ancient Greeks, a creative some scientists have come to see themselves as people, had an enthusiasm for changing things cocreators-God's partners, as it were, in the cre­ whenever possible. Aristotle could be said to have ation of reality. launched the quest for an ethics of technology, Stem cell research is (along with cloningi prob­ and he did so from what in Latin is referred to as ably the best-known Contemporary example of Recta ratio f'actibilium ("What reason requires what might be called "cocrcativc science." Such with regard to those things which we are able to research is performed, of course, on human w J do ). For him, what regulates the making of embryos. Cocreative scientists argue that the things is the practical intellect, or practical rea­ study of stem cells will reveal important insights son.
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