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Scientific Ethics

Scientific Ethics


This is quite a philosophical student. It can appeal to students who favour the sciences, or those who favour the humanities, or those who are general science skeptics looking to justify their views.

Before a student can study science, she must first understand and appreciate science. That is why studying the philosophy of science is so important for a young scientist. The philsophy of science is a very large and very dynamic field. This project will attempt to provide a good introduction into the ethics of science. This topic is a good one for any type of class, because it will attract students interested in the sciences, as well as students interested in the arts and general skeptics of science as well.

Many arguments over scientific ethics focus on whether science is objective or not, or just how objective science is or can be. My feeling is that this question is beside the point. If we can accept that science is not objective, we can ask the next question: What are the implications of our non-objective science?

To quickly demonstrate why science is not and cannot be objective, let us examine science. Science is conducted by scientists. Scientists are human beings who have feelings and preferences just like everyone else. To further complicate the issue, science is funded by organizations with money. Organizations with money often have their own preferences, and give their money to scientists in order to achieve a goal. Thus, even if scientists were completely objective, their funding is not. Even is the funding were provided without bias, the scientists are not objective. I would like to go even further than this and suggest that society itself sways the direction of science after the fact.

My point is that the direction of science and the use of scientific advancements is dictated by society. An example of this is the use of gunpowder in China and Europe. After its invention in China, gunpowder was traditionally used to make firecrackers. It was only when Europeans found gunpowder that it was used for weapons. In this case, the exact same invention was used for two distinct purposes by two different societies. So we must now ask the question: Is gunpowder good or bad? The answer depends on what you use it for. Using gunpowder for firecrackers can be seen as a good thing - It is used in celebrations and makes people happy. Gunpowder in guns is used to hurt people. You might say that gunpowder is bad simply because it has the potential to be used in a weapon. In this case I would like to bring forth another example; X-rays. X-rays help find broken bones and stop people from smuggling weapons onto airplanes. However, X-rays also helped us discover the structure of the atom, which led us to develop nuclear technologies. This brings forth another question: Overall, is nuclear energy good or bad? Does the ability to treat and diagnose countless medical ailments and produce energy much more cleanly and cheaper than with coal or oil outweigh the fact that we also have nuclear weapons and nuclear waste? Most questions like these become very complex very quickly and can act as a segue into the real question I want to tackle. Is science as a whole good or bad; should we continue with science, stop research altogether, or regulate our research? This question is much bigger than the previous questions, and I have developed some activities to help your students examine it.

Project 1:


1. Come up with three (or any other number) examples for each of the categories listed below:
  • A completely good scientific invention
  • A good invention with bad uses
  • A bad invention with good uses

    Depending on the level of your class, you may choose to try and define "good" and "bad" and examine the issue more deeply. I have come up with some examples for each category.


    Project 2:

    Write and essay dealing with one (or all) of the below topics:

    In light of all the possible negative outcomes of science and all the possible positive outcomes, should we:
  • Stop researching science?
  • Keep researching science and hope that the good science will outweigh the bad?
  • Regulate science and only investigate things which will be positive?

    This is a very complex question. We can neither continue scientific research unabated, nor can we just stop. We must regulate, but since lots of good discoveries can come from researching unrelated questions, how can we effectively regulate science?

    Here are some other examples of good and bad science: There are also many examples of science fixing the problems it created:
  • Bulletproof vest to prevent injury from guns.
  • Bacteria to detoxify the Love Canal
  • Bacteria to eat oil spills

    Related Sites


    Science doesn't kill people...
    Knowledge, Science and the Politics of Truth
    Ethical, Legal and Social Issues


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