Ebook: Presenting Futures

The ideas and imagery about the future that characterize nanotechnology today are shaped by multiple values and agendas which influence public investments,business strategies, infrastructure design, and public debate. Presenting Futures highlights a variety of ways that nanotechnology actors think about and seek to shape the future. It brings together social scientists, humanists, government officials, activist groups, designers, and public relations professionals into a multifaceted and at times conflicting dialogue through press releases, government reports, and advertisements taken from the front lines of the political discourse over nanotechnology, as well as original writings that situate nanotechnological futures within broader contexts. The chapters in this volume document various approaches to the future and how contemporary cultural conceptions about science, technology, and society are created and ultimately influence our own cognitive frames, social contests, and material practices.

More than a catalogue of visions, the Yearbook is designed to give social scientists, natural scientists, and the general public an opportunity to explore, reflect on, and ultimately critique these futures. In asking not so much what the future of nanotechnology may be, but rather how different social groups and organizations imagine and anticipate it, the Yearbook offers a series of starting points for exploring the role of the future in the present.

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The ideas and imagery about the future that characterize nanotechnology today are shaped by multiple values and agendas which influence public investments,business strategies, infrastructure design, and public debate. Presenting Futures highlights a variety of ways that nanotechnology actors think about and seek to shape the future. It brings together social scientists, humanists, government officials, activist groups, designers, and public relations professionals into a multifaceted and at times conflicting dialogue through press releases, government reports, and advertisements taken from the front lines of the political discourse over nanotechnology, as well as original writings that situate nanotechnological futures within broader contexts. The chapters in this volume document various approaches to the future and how contemporary cultural conceptions about science, technology, and society are created and ultimately influence our own cognitive frames, social contests, and material practices.

More than a catalogue of visions, the Yearbook is designed to give social scientists, natural scientists, and the general public an opportunity to explore, reflect on, and ultimately critique these futures. In asking not so much what the future of nanotechnology may be, but rather how different social groups and organizations imagine and anticipate it, the Yearbook offers a series of starting points for exploring the role of the future in the present.

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The ideas and imagery about the future that characterize nanotechnology today are shaped by multiple values and agendas which influence public investments,business strategies, infrastructure design, and public debate. Presenting Futures highlights a variety of ways that nanotechnology actors think about and seek to shape the future. It brings together social scientists, humanists, government officials, activist groups, designers, and public relations professionals into a multifaceted and at times conflicting dialogue through press releases, government reports, and advertisements taken from the front lines of the political discourse over nanotechnology, as well as original writings that situate nanotechnological futures within broader contexts. The chapters in this volume document various approaches to the future and how contemporary cultural conceptions about science, technology, and society are created and ultimately influence our own cognitive frames, social contests, and material practices.

More than a catalogue of visions, the Yearbook is designed to give social scientists, natural scientists, and the general public an opportunity to explore, reflect on, and ultimately critique these futures. In asking not so much what the future of nanotechnology may be, but rather how different social groups and organizations imagine and anticipate it, the Yearbook offers a series of starting points for exploring the role of the future in the present.

Content:
Front Matter....Pages I-XXVI
Nanotechnology: The Future Is Coming Sooner than You Think....Pages 1-21
The Workers’ Push to Democratize Nanotechnology....Pages 23-36
Thinking Longer Term about Technology....Pages 37-47
Constructive Technology Assessment and Socio-Technical Scenarios....Pages 49-70
Information and Imagination: How Lux Research Forecasts....Pages 71-89
Designing for the Future: Nanoscale Research Facilities....Pages 91-108
What Drives Public Acceptance of Nanotechnology?....Pages 109-116
Nanologue....Pages 117-122
Anticipating the Futures of Nanotechnology: Visionary Images as Means of Communication....Pages 123-142
Winners of Nano-Hazard Symbol Contest Announced atWorld Social Forum, Nairobi, Kenya....Pages 143-145
Your Children, Their Children…....Pages 147-148
Developing Plausible Nano-Enabled Products....Pages 149-155
Nanotechnologies for Tomorrow’s Society: A Case for Reflective Action Research in Flanders, Belgium....Pages 157-162
Communications in the Age of Nanotechnology....Pages 163-182
How Can Business Respond to the Technical, Social, and Commercial Uncertainties of Nanotechnology?....Pages 183-194
Manufactured Nanoparticle Health and Safety Disclosure [Draft Report]....Pages 195-200
A Framework for Responsible Nanotechnology....Pages 201-205
Contemplating the Implications of a Nanotechnology “Revolution”....Pages 207-213
Nanotechnology: Challenges and the Way Forward....Pages 215-225
Technology Assessment of Nanotechnology: Problems and Methods in Assessing Emerging Technologies....Pages 227-239
Science Fiction, Nano-Ethics, and the Moral Imagination....Pages 241-263
Back Matter....Pages 265-289
....Pages 291-302