[tt] CHE glance: The debut issue of Nanoethics: A new journal

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A glance at the debut issue of Nanoethics: A new journal
http://chronicle.com/daily/2007/06/2007062701j.htm
Magazine & Journal Reader
Wednesday, June 27, 2007

Nanoethics is an emerging discipline with plenty of question marks,
writes John Weckert, a senior lecturer in information technology at
Charles Sturt University, in Australia, and the editor in chief of
this new publication. The journal, he says, will seek "to advance
the examination of ethical and social issues surrounding
nanotechnologies in a philosophically rigorous and scientifically
informed manner."

Many of the questions surrounding nanoethics are fundamental, he
writes. For instance, "Is there nanotechnology or are there
nanotechnologies? If there is a nanotechnology, what is it, and if
there are nanotechnologies, what is it that they all have in
common?" Nanoethics will focus on these types of uncertainties, says
Mr. Weckert, as well as on "the impacts or likely impacts of these
technologies."

There is an urgent need to confront many of the issues created by
nanotechnology, adds Mr. Weckert. "A good example is privacy," he
writes, "given the fact that nanotechnologies will enable more
sophisticated monitoring and surveillance technology."

Articles in the debut issue include an essay by Kristin
Shrader-Frechette on "nanotoxicology," or the study of the potential
threats that nanomaterials pose to human health and safety, and what
the government should do to make sure society has enough information
to give "free informed consent" to the use of these new technologies
and materials. Ms. Shrader-Frechette is a professor of philosophy
and biological sciences at the University of Notre Dame.

Other contributors include Deborah G. Johnson, a professor of
applied ethics at the University of Virginia, who writes about the
role that nanoethics can play in the development of nanotechnology,
and Robert Sparrow, a lecturer in human bioethics at Monash
University, in Australia, who looks at the "rhetorical
contradictions in enthusiasm for nanotechnology."

The [76]journal will appear three times a year online as well as in
print, and is available through the publisher Springer.

   --Jason M. Breslow
   _______________________________________________________________

Background articles from The Chronicle:
   * [77]National Science Foundation Promotes Research on Impact of
  Nanotechnology (10/21/2005)
   * [78]The Dark Side of Small (9/10/2004)
   * [79]Big Bucks for Tiny Technology (9/10/2004)

References

   76. http://www.springerlink.com/content/1871-4765
   77. http://chronicle.com/weekly/v52/i09/09a02701.htm
   78. http://chronicle.com/weekly/v51/i03/03a01201.htm
   79. http://chronicle.com/weekly/v51/i03/03a02601.htm