How can we steer technological developments in a desirable direction? - Ethics inaugural lecture at DCU
- 3 June 2009

How can we improve the ethical behaviour of our institutions? And how can we steer technological developments in a desirable direction? Two critical ethical challenges facing the world today, according to DCU's Director of the Institute of Ethics

Professor Bert Gordijn, Director of DCU's Institute of Ethics and a leading international expert in bioethics, spoke at his inaugural lecture today, urging us to be aware of the ethical challenges affecting us today as well as in the future.

The Institute of Ethics is the first institution of its kind in Ireland to be concerned with ethical issues across a wide range of disciplines, including business, technology, politics, media, healthcare and life sciences.

One of the current ethical challenges facing us is the problem of powerful institutions. Examples are religious organisations, corporations, healthcare organisations and the media. The development of power in these institutions has not always been accompanied by a similar development of ethics.

"What we see today is institutional power without adequate responsible behaviour and sufficient transparency. One of the challenges is to improve the ethical behaviour within our institutions", he said.

In his lecture, 'Ethics: current and future challenges', Professor Gordijn also argued that ethics should follow an anticipatory approach and address future developments. He addressed the problem of the explosive growth of technology. Technological developments should be steered in desirable directions. "The rapid growth of technology has created fundamentally new engineering capabilities, both in terms of our capacity to change the material world surrounding us as well as in terms of our power to technologically change ourselves as human beings", he said.

"30 years ago we believed mobile phones, iPods, email and the web were the stuff of science fiction. However, they are very real today, influencing our life significantly on a daily basis. What is science fiction today might be science fact tomorrow. Therefore, we should we be aware of the changes that are already on their way in geo-engineering and in the engineering of human beings and their implications for the planet and the future of human life", he said.

"Geo-engineering is the intervention in the environment on a global scale. It is being intensively discussed amongst scientists today. If we are not able to cut CO2 emissions through political means, geo-engineering will be increasingly considered as a means to prevent climatic calamity. However, these very same technologies are also ethically problematic. They might have terrible side effects. Could they cause conflicts over control and liabilities? Could they also be used as weapons of mass destruction", Professor Gordijn said.

Explosive growth applies also in the area of human enhancement technologies, technologies that are used for the optimization of traits of healthy individuals.

"Within medicine we are not only curing disease anymore: increasingly we are also improving characteristics of perfectly healthy people. This is evident in the increase of cosmetic surgery and dentistry, performance-enhancing sports medicine and developments in psychopharmacology. This development might trigger a one sided focus on technological fixes when it comes to self-improvement. It might also lead to a neglect of more traditional means of improving ourselves such as physical exercise and intellectual study. While we should not fear technological development, we must ensure the ethical dimension", he said.