Profil

Knowledge NBIC - Knowledge Politics and New Converging Technologies - A Social Science Perspective

The KNOWLEDGE NBIC project is a study into the knowledge and anticipated social consequences emerging from the NBIC fields, using a social scientific perspective. We propose to look into the patterns of NBIC knowledge production as well as the actual and potential use of and social resistance to such knowledge. In terms of knowledge production, our attention will focus on charting the institutional settings in which the NBIC fields (that is, the converging science and technology fields biotechnology, nanotechnology, information and cognitive science) are pursued and promoted.  With respect to the use of and resistance to this knowledge, we will be concerned in particular with the growing moral, political and economic pressure to regulate, to police or even forbid novel knowledge as well as technical devices emerging from NBIC technologies. The new convergence technologies can be expected to raise similar if not more accentuated concerns in that they promise an integration of biological reproductive processes, mental mechanisms of learning and information management at the nanoscale.