title: Facing up to Complexity: Implications for Our Social Experiments.
abstract: Biological systems are highly complex, and for this reason there is a considerable degree of uncertainty as to the consequences of making significant interventions into their workings. Since a number of new technologies are already impinging on living systems, including our bodies, many of us have become participants in large-scale "social experiments". I will discuss biological complexity and its relevance to the technologies that brought us BSE/vCJD and the controversy over GM foods. Then I will consider some of the complexities of our social dynamics, and argue for making a shift from using the precautionary principle to employing the approach of evaluating the introduction of new technologies by conceiving of them as social experiments.
authors.affiliation: Department of Philosophy, University of Central Florida, Orlando, FL, 32816-1352, USA. 2ronniehawkins@gmail.com.
authors.forename: Ronnie
authors.identifier: 0000-0003-3394-5759
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Hawkins
mesh_terms: D032984:Ethics, Research; D006801:Humans; D062069:Inventions / Q000941:ethics*; D015233:Models, Statistical; D012106:Research / Q000592:standards* / Q000639:trends; D012945:Social Values; D013597:Systems Analysis
keywords: Complexity theory; Genetically modified organisms (GMOs); Ibo van de Poel; Insertional mutagenesis; John Searle; Ontological subjectivity; Precautionary principle; Prion disease (BSE, vCJD); Reductionism; Social cage; Social construction; Social experiment; Substantially equivalent; Whistleblowing