In the past few decades, the life sciences have been transformed into gigantic bio-technosciences, blurring the boundaries between science and technology, universities, entrepreneurial biotech companies, and Big Pharma. Knowledge has become intellectual property.
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The loss of scientific neutrality has become a much-discussed problem in the leading scientific journals. Commercial secrets cannot be shared. Researchers have been prosecuted for transferring biological samples from one academic laboratory to another. PhD students can work for months on a project only to stall as they run into a patent. Competition has weakened the co‑operative values of the academic research community. Refereeing research papers and grant applications, for example, presents new difficulties. How can neutrality be maintained when the commercial interests of the referee might conflict with those of the scientist being assessed?
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Today, intellectual property undermines communalism. Universalism has come under siege by what have been variously termed the new social justice and the new identity movements. Disinterestedness, as well, can no longer be guaranteed. Only organised scepticism remains; but with so much of technoscience shrouded by industrial secrecy (such that data cannot be shared and discussed openly), and with Big Pharma suppressing negative data from its drugs trials, this too is constrained.
The GLP aggregated and excerpted this blog/article to reflect the diversity of news, opinion, and analysis. Read full, original post: Prometheus Inc — Biotechnology and other life sciences promise to transform our health, identity, even our brains. Should we be worried?
