Project Profile
Assessing the Implications of Emerging Technologies: A Graduate Research and Training Program
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Abstract
Technologies in areas such as ubiquitous computing, genetic engineering, and nanotechnologies are developing at extraordinary rates. Understanding of economic, security, environmental, and cultural implications of emerging technologies has not kept pace. Decision makers typically base strategies on unstated expectations regarding the nature and effects of technological change. Because forecasting errors… more »
Technologies in areas such as ubiquitous computing, genetic engineering, and nanotechnologies are developing at extraordinary rates. Understanding of economic, security, environmental, and cultural implications of emerging technologies has not kept pace. Decision makers typically base strategies on unstated expectations regarding the nature and effects of technological change. Because forecasting errors are endemic, analysts often rely on implicit assumptions to reduce their vulnerability to criticism. By contrast, this program explicitly identifies areas of uncertainty about effects of emerging technologies and develops strategies to mitigate uncertainty. Scientific and policy spheres typically come together after lines of conflict are drawn. Creators of technologies focus on immediate issues of development and application, while policy analysts assess the broader implications of technological change only after controversy has flared. By contrast, this program appraises knowledge when options are greater, interests are less entrenched, and policies are not yet locked into place.
This IGERT program trains graduate students to engage early and explicitly with the pervasive uncertainty that is often under recognized in technology assessment exercises. It features: (1) Trainees with Complementary Expertise, including engineers from the Technology and Policy Program, social scientists from Political Science, and humanists from the Science, Technology and Society Program; (2) Integrated Curriculum with three new core courses to develop methodological and substantive competencies in evaluating economic, security, environmental, societal, and ethical consequences of technical change; (3) Multidisciplinary Panels of faculty and students to develop and test methods used in training and set student research. The panels feature retrospective analysis of past emerging technologies and prospective analysis of nanotechnologies, ubiquitous computing, and genetic engineering, with a fourth technology to be selected later; and (4) IGERT Seminars to reinforce the panels and courses with intensive interaction among trainees, faculty and staff.
Intellectual Merit: The program seeks to generate knowledge in three domains. (1) Substantive: identify knowns and unknowns on implications of emergent technologies; and backcast to identify present actions to improve future responses, including targeting research to reduce uncertainty. (2) Procedural and institutional: identify constraints on use of emerging information on effects of current technologies; and foster adaptation to emerging information by public and private institutions. (3) Methodological: develop ways of integrating formal and qualitative methods; and for using research on past emergent technologies to improve responses to current emergent technologies.
Broader Impact: Methods and substantive findings will be distributed through graduate student placements, academic publications and conferences, and via MIT Congressional Staff Seminars on science and technology issues. In addition, government, business, and NGO participation in the project will serve to check on academic blindness, to enrich graduate education, and to engage the world beyond the academy. Senior staff from the Departments of State and Defense, EPA, the UN, Goldman Sachs, Ford Motor, AFL-CIO, and Environmental Defense have expressed interest in participating in panels and research groups.
IGERT is an NSF-wide program intended to meet the challenges of educating U.S. Ph.D. scientists and engineers with the interdisciplinary background, deep knowledge in a chosen discipline, and the technical, professional, and personal skills needed for the career demands of the future. The program is intended to catalyze a cultural change in graduate education by establishing innovative new models for graduate education and training in a fertile environment for collaborative research that transcends traditional disciplinary boundaries. In this sixth year of the program, awards are being made to institutions for programs that collectively span the areas of science and engineering supported by NSF. « less
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