Here at Foresight we like to present a balanced picture of nanotechnology, pushing for the benefits and heading off downsides. To do this, it’s necessary to discuss those nanotech downsides especially when someone asks about them. Earth & Sky asked me, and put the audio on the web: Upcoming, said Peterson, are issues of privacy… Continue reading Nanotechnology podcast: near, mid, and long term
Ralph Hermansson writes about nanotechnology safety in today’s San Francisco Chronicle. He had interviewed me for the piece: Bacteria-proof forks and knives. Pants that never get stains. Computer chips with a considerably better memory, making conventional chips seem almost senile. Sports equipment made of materials that are much harder yet more lightweight than today. Science… Continue reading Nanotechnology: Blobs, Shapes & Chunks must be treated differently
At one of the Accelerating Change conferences I saw Prof. Beth Noveck introduce for the first time her ideas on improving patents via peer review. Now, the nanotechnology field will be envious to hear that another field has been chosen to carry out the first pilot project — software, as reported in IEEE Spectrum: The… Continue reading Patent peer review: now software, soon nanotechnology?
The nanotechnology project over at The Wilson Center sent Steffen Foss Hansen, a PhD candidate visiting from his university in Denmark, here to Foresight to interview me for a policy project they are doing on nanotech regulation. Normally these kinds of things don’t seem very useful, but I have to make an exception for this… Continue reading Grueling nanotechnology policy interview pays off
The Bayh-Dole Act of 1980 in the U.S. gives patent rights for federally-funded research done in universities to the universities themselves, in effect. Many people regard this strategy as a succcess, and many countries around the world are copying it. But is this the best way to handle this publicly-funded intellectual property? After over 25… Continue reading Maximizing nanotechnology patent benefits
Nanowerk brings to our attention a resolution on nanotechnology by a labor group for food and agricultural workers claiming to represent 12 million people. It has a number of sections, but here’s an example: To demand that national and international patent offices, like the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), decline to register all patent applications… Continue reading Food workers worried about nanotechnology
The May/June Technology Review (free reg. req’d) features an essay by philosopher Roger Scruton attempting to examine the ethical issues of highly advanced technologies. While the focus is on biotech, nanotech is hinted at: …why cannot machines be produced as humans are now produced, by self-reproduction? Why not indeed. They could, in principle. Scruton makes… Continue reading Philosopher confused by longevity, nanotechnology
Keith Powers brings to our attention a claim that the German government has started collecting the chemical profiles of individuals, to be used for political purposes. From The Register in the UK: German police are compiling a Stasi-style “scent bank” database of potentially violent crusty protesters against global capitalism, according to reports. An article in… Continue reading Nanotechnology will read smell records
I tell audiences that the day is coming when nanotechnology will be able to tell what they ate or smoked. That day is coming closer, according to Nanowerk News: To this day, fingerprints are just the thing when a perpetrator needs to be arrested or a person needs to be identified. British scientists working with… Continue reading Nanotechnology for drug detection
Nanowerk reports on a new nanotechnology ethics database at IIT: NanoEthicsBank. Perhaps the most interesting aspect is their experiment with participatory tagging: In conjunction with the fixed subject terms used in the NanoEthicsBank, we are also developing an experimental “folksonomy” tagging system for the database. A folksonomy is a user-generated taxonomy that uses open-ended labels… Continue reading Participatory nanotechnology ethics: Join right in
