What is Science For?
The aim of iSEI is to observe and analyse the role and responsibilities of science and innovation and to evaluate possible or desirable changes in the way scientific advances are applied, regulated and managed in the 21st Century. A broad and important question underpinning this aim is, What is science for?
So what might science be for? Should it be for public good, for profit or for pure curiosity and are these incentives incompatible with each other? There are compelling reasons why science should be for public good:
- science can do good – we have powerful moral reasons to do good
- science is an institution that relies on public support – financial, political and personal
- science facilitates the progress of science itself
- some of the products of science are capable of causing harm, either deliberate or accidental, and the best defence is to ensure that practices are open to public scrutiny
By examining the differing incentives there are for pursuing science, we are looking at how these incentives relate to the purposes for which science is or may be used.