This book systematically addresses the issue of assessing the normative nature of visions of emerging technologies in an epistemologically robust way. In the context of democratic governance of emerging technologies, not only it is important to reflect on technologies' moral significance, but also to address their emerging and future oriented character. The book proposes an original approach to deal with the issue of plausible ethical evaluation of new technologies. Taking its start from current debates about Technology Assessment, the proposed solution emerges as a combination of theoretical and methodological insights from the fields of Philosophy of Technology, Science and Technology Studies and a normative justification based on pragmatist ethics. The book's main contribution is to engage a diverse and interdisciplinary audience (ethicists, philosophers, social scientists, technology assessment researchers and practitioners) in a reflection concerning the epistemological challenges that are associated to the endeavour of appraising the moral significance of emerging technologies in the attempt of democratically governing them. It brings together concepts and methodologies from different disciplines and shows their synergy in applying them to two specific case studies of emerging biomedical technologies.

Proposes an original approach to deal with the issue of reliable ethical evaluation of new technologies Combines theoretical analysis and empirical work Addresses ethicists, philosophers, social scientists and technology assessment researchers who work within this field

Inhalt

PART 1.- Chapter 1: Democratic appraisals of future technologies: integrating ethics in Technology assessment.- 1.1 Appraising emerging technologies.- 1.2 From the myth to the history: the evolving social mandate of Technology Assessment.- 1.3 Institutional ethics of technology.- 1.3.1 Ethical bodies and the regulation of biomedical research.- 1.3.2 Normative evaluation of emerging technologies and advise to policy-makers.- 1.3.3 Outsourcing ethical reflection.- 1.4 Limitations in traditions assessing technologies.- 1.4.1 The normative deficit in TA.- 1.4.2 The technological and sociological deficit in institutional ethics.- 1.5 The need for integrating ethical inquiry in TA.- 1.6 Between grounding and exploring: the contribution of this study.- Chapter 2: Promises, expectations and visions: on appraising the plausibility of socio-technical futures.- 2.1 Expecting future science and technologies.- 2.2 The social construction of the future.- 2.3 The guiding normativity in technological visions.- 2.4 Beyond an instrumentalist view: technology and morality.- 2.5 Analyzing expectations' plausibility: a proposal.- 2.5.1 Desirability vs Plausibility.- 2.5.2 Breaking down the plausibility question.- 2.5.3 In search of plausibility.- 2.5.4 Three strategies to appraise plausible visions.- PART 2.- Chapter 3: The mechanism in the pill. From abstract images to detailed descriptions.- 3.1 Visions of promising technologies: the Nanopil.- 3.2 Promises of emerging artifacts.- 3.3 Rhetoric and black-boxes.- 3.4 A note on methods.- 3.5 The Nanopil: tales of an emerging object.- 3.5.1 From an idea to a project.- 3.5.2 An idealized system and its building-blocks.- 3.5.3 The functional components and their material conditions.- 3.6 From the lab details back to the big picture.- Appendix.- Chapter 4: The doctor in the pill. From technical details to social practices.- 4.1 Expectations of artifacts in use.- 4.2 (Fictive) scripts and actor-worlds.- 4.3 Research design.- 4.4 TheNanopill: tales of an emerging practice.- 4.4.1 Nanopil designers-world.- 4.4.2 Comparing actors' worlds: current screening practice and future trends.- 4.4.3 Users' preference and resistance.- 4. 5 Conclusions.- Chapter 5: The good in the pill. Assessing the plausibility of visions of desirable worlds.- 5.1 Visions of desirable worlds.- 5.2 Different expected artifacts and different values.- 5.3 Plurality of values among actors.- 5.4 Impacts of technologies and the moral landscape.- 5.4.1 Mediation.- 5.4.2 The co-production of technology and morality.- 5.5 Conclusion.- PART 3.- Chapter 6: Expecting diagnostics, diagnosing expectations. The plausibility framework in use.- 6.1 Immunosignatures and the healthcare revolution.- 6.2 Research design.- 6.3 Immunosignatures: a simple concept.- 6.3.1 Reconstructing the history of the concept.- 6.3.2 Concepts and components in research practice.- 6.3.3 Some conditions for ImSg to work.- 6.4 The expected context of use.- 6.4.1 The many applications of ImSg.- 6.4.2 Assessing and enriching fictive scripts from situated perspectives.- 6.5 Immunosignatures and a desirable world.- 6.5.1 Articulating moral connotations in different technological platforms.- 6.5.2 Stakeholders and normative divergence.- 6.5.3 The interactions between ImSg and morality.- 6.6 Discussion.- Appendix.- Chapter 7: Scenarios as grounded explorations.- Designing tools for discussing the desirability of emerging technologies.- 7.1 In search of a normative framework.- 7.1.2 Democratic deliberation as a normative ideal: a pragmatist approach.- 7.1.2 Triggering moral imagination.- 7.2 Scenarios as tools to foster moral imagination.- 7.3 Plausible scenarios for grounded explorations.- 7.4 Techno-moral vignettes and scenarios in action.- 7.4.1 Immunosignatures Workshop.- 7.4.2 Workshop on the Nanopil.- 7.5 Discussion.- References.- Appendix: Techno-ethical scenarios and techno-moral vignettes.- 1. Techno-ethical scenarios on Immunosignatures.- 2. Techno-moral vignettes on Nanopil.- Chapter 8: Building-blocks for ethical assessments of emerging technologies.- 8.1 Between grounding and exploring.- 8.2 Towards Ethical Assessments of Emerging Technologies.- 8.3 Ethical expertise? Interpreting and intervening.- 8.4 Open questions.- References.