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Contentious Problems in Bioscience and Biotechnology: A Pilot Study of an Approach to Ethics Education

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Abstract

This manuscript describes a pilot study in ethics education employing a problem-based learning approach to the study of novel, complex, ethically fraught, unavoidably public, and unavoidably divisive policy problems, called “fractious problems,” in bioscience and biotechnology. Diverse graduate and professional students from four US institutions and disciplines spanning science, engineering, humanities, social science, law, and medicine analyzed fractious problems employing “navigational skills” tailored to the distinctive features of these problems. The students presented their results to policymakers, stakeholders, experts, and members of the public. This approach may provide a model for educating future bioscientists and bioengineers so that they can meaningfully contribute to the social understanding and resolution of challenging policy problems generated by their work.

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Notes

  1. Some aspects of the professional responsibility that we posit here are already recognized. The International Council for Science (ICSU 2010) notes the professional responsibility of scientists to communicate with the public about their work: “The effective communication of scientific results and viewpoints to the public is an important responsibility of the scientific community. This is particularly so for science that has been publicly funded.”

  2. For a detailed review and discussion of the development of professional ethics education for engineers prior to 2005, see Shuman et al. (2005).

  3. Wendy C. Newstetter, one of the pilot study’s research personnel, provided key assistance in operationalizing the navigational approach.

  4. NSF Award ID 0832912.

  5. NSF EESE SkillSET Drafting Team: Roberta M. Berry and Robert Kirkman with the assistance of Aaron D. Levine.

  6. Prior Assessment Instrument Research Team: Jason Borenstein,* Robert Kirkman,* and Julie Swann (*Members of the NSF EESE Project Team).

  7. For a discussion of the “navigational approach” in the context of health law courses, see Berry 2011b.

  8. For a discussion of the “navigational approach” in the context of global bioethics, see Berry 2011a.

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Acknowledgments

Funded by NSF Award ID 0832912. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations are those of the co-authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the NSF. We are grateful for the very helpful suggestions provided by anonymous reviewers.

Conflict of interest

All the authors are not aware of any financial or other conflicts of interest that would interfere with the objectivity of the views presented in this article.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Georgia Institute of Technology, School of Public Policy, 685 Cherry Street, Atlanta, GA, 30332-0345, USA

    Roberta M. Berry & Jason Borenstein

  2. Georgia Institute of Technology, School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, 777 Atlantic Drive, Atlanta, GA, 30332-0250, USA

    Robert J. Butera

Authors
  1. Roberta M. Berry
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  2. Jason Borenstein
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  3. Robert J. Butera
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Roberta M. Berry.

Appendices

These features are drawn from the discussion of fractious problems in Berry 2007 as developed and applied in NSF Award ID 0832912.

Appendix 1: Five Features of Fractious Problems

These features are drawn from the discussion of fractious problems in Berry 2007 as developed and applied in NSF Award ID 0832912.

Feature 1: Novelty

These problems are generated by rapid advances in science and technology; we have not encountered their like before nor arrived at broadly shared social understanding of them or stable policy resolutions for them.

Feature 2: Complexity

These problems are scientifically complex because they concern life, components of life forms, interventions in life and, in the case of synthetic biology, the creation of novel life forms. They are psychologically complex because they implicate our self-understanding, for example, as agents who are different in kind from the other constituents of our world. And they are socially complex because they implicate our understanding of ourselves as members of social groups.

Feature 3: Ethically Fraught

These problems evoke significant ethical concerns across diverse and sometimes conflicting religious and secular worldviews about, for example, ensoulment, free will, privacy, culpability, and “playing God.”

Feature 4: Unavoidably Public

These problems resist confinement to the purely private realm of individual choice because their subject matter concerns life and its components, interventions in life, the creation of life—all of which are potentially matters of concern to the political community and the subject of policymaking.

Feature 5: Unavoidably Divisive

The above four features render these problems unavoidably socially divisive. We will struggle to understand and address their novelty and their multiple levels of complexity. Our struggle will be compounded by their ethically fraught nature—these things matter to almost all of us across our diverse and sometimes conflicting worldviews. And we will not be able to avoid our disagreements due to the public nature of the problems, although we will also disagree about the dividing line between the public and private.

Appendix 2: The Six Navigational Skills

See also Berry 2011a, Appendix 1, relating navigational skills to the features of fractious problems.

Skill 1: Perspectives

Consider multiple and diverse perspectives on the problems: disciplinary, worldview, life experience.

Skill 2: Precedent

Consider historical analogies to similar or related problems, including past and current policy resolutions and their rationales.

Skill 3: Prediction

Consider the predicted future impacts of possible understandings and policy resolutions on all stakeholders.

Skill 4: Possibilities

Employ imagination and flexibility to expand the range of possible understandings and policy resolutions by brainstorming, reflection, role-playing, reference to literature, film, or other devices.

Skill 5: Persistence

Consider social understanding and policy resolutions as part of a dynamic, incremental, iterative, ongoing process requiring persistence in response to changed conditions and to feedback from previous choices.

Skill 6: Principles

Strive to identify limited, non-comprehensive consensus principles that capture shared understanding and policy resolutions adequate to a persistent process.

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Berry, R.M., Borenstein, J. & Butera, R.J. Contentious Problems in Bioscience and Biotechnology: A Pilot Study of an Approach to Ethics Education. Sci Eng Ethics 19, 653–668 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11948-012-9359-6

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