Great Timing: Nanotechnology and Public Perception
Not an article, but an essay: Hearts and minds and nanotechnology. Nature Nanotechnology 4, 136 (2009).
The timing of this piece’s publication, a week after I started my blog, could not have been more appropriate. In my first post I wrote, “writing… about nanotechnology will be of even greater importance as the science makes its way into everyday-use devices. Think about politicians: they practically live for uninformed demagoguery in exchange for votes.”
Now, this essay by Chris Toumey asserts that people’s opinions favoring/opposing nanotechnology are shaped heavily by their existing prejudices about science/technology and by their religious intensity. While earlier surveys suggested that the more people knew about nanotech the more likely they were to support it, the amount of knowledge people have or acquire is unlikely to overcome existing biases.
For those who expect that people will embrace nanotechnology when they learn about the science, the… message… is that scientific knowledge in our minds is a weak companion to the strong values and concerns in our hearts.
If nanotechnology is to work its way into our lives and effect positive changes, we cannot afford to get bogged down in debates like those assigning scientific merit to both intelligent design and evolution, as if they were opposite sides of the same coin. So what should you, the nanotech innovator who wants to change the world with your science, do in the face of these opinion hurdles? I have three ideas.
1. Frame discussions to highlight the real-world benefits and de-emphasize the technical detail. I had a friend who introduced me to others, half-jokingly, as an alchemist. A lay-person could easily perceive as “playing God” our ability to manipulate atoms and electrons. Who cares if people have been doing chemistry for several millenia? Fermenting sugar into alcohol is just brewing, no big deal, yields a fun product, and since it isn’t done by folks in white lab coats, doesn’t seem so scary. Another example: the modern computer is a product of nanoscale materials manipulation. The wires in a computer chip are sub-100 nm and no one has raised a major complaint about this fact. Why? Most people don’t know the intricacies of photolithography, and more importantly, the benefits of having the computer in their lives far outweigh any concerns about the power (of the mind) that drove the creation of this technology.
2. Exercise restraint. Someone comes up with a nanobot therapy that fixes DNA damaged by tanning. Assuming it doesn’t have negative side effects, this is a great development! But if this technique, applied on a grander scale, could turn a squirrel into a raccoon in one week, let’s not advertise this latter capability so much. While there isn’t a clear-cut list for what scientists should and shouldn’t do in their experiments, we should use our best judgment possible.
3. See idea #1. People fear the unknown? NOPE. People fear the things they think are scary. While a small minority is outspoken against the use of psychiatric drugs, Americans filled over 20 million prescriptions for Prozac in one year. How many of these patients truly understood these drugs’ molecular-level manipulation of chemicals in their brains? Perhaps they expressed some doubts when their physician issued the prescription, but in the end, the real-world benefit of happiness drove their decision to consume the drugs.
DISCLAIMER: I am not encouraging anyone in nanotech to be deceptive or to shield an invention’s harmful aspects from its users. Simply, people’s opinions are painted by existing biases stemming from their knowledge and values.
Religious apprehensions that developed earlier, in response to biotechnology, served as a template for reactions to nanotechnology. People for whom religion was not very important were more supportive of funding for nanotechnology. Once more, knowledge of nanotechnology had little influence.
So, nanotech innovators, we should go about our business quietly, researching and delivering sweet, useful products. The average person doesn’t care that we can harness quantum confinement or single-electron transport; they just want their device to be useful and safe. There’s no point in tooting our horns to the extent of birthing new concerns in the public’s mind.
