Tag Archives: Synthetic Biology

CALL FOR PAPERS – Philosophy & Public Policy Quarterly, Editor Mark Sagoff

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The Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy, now at George Mason University, is relaunching its journal Philosophy and Public Policy Quarterly, published since 1981.  The journal seeks papers that address normative and conceptual dimensions of issues of importance and timeliness in public policy including those surrounding the environment, animals, the climate, environmental justice, ecofeminism, biological engineering, and so forth.

The editors favor articles that are fewer than 5,000 words and are written in a style that will appeal to a broadly informed public.  Short opinion pieces are welcome, as are longer essays that might serve as target articles for solicited responses.  Articles will be reviewed by the editors and outside referees and, if accepted, will be carefully edited for publication.

Please send manuscripts by email to ppp@gmu.edu.

CALL FOR PAPERS – Undergraduate Biomedical Ethics Symposium

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Western Michigan University
May 5, 2012
Hosted by University Center for the Humanities
2500 Knauss Hall

Biomedical ethics papers should be 3000 words (about 20 minutes presentation time) and prepared for blind review (name and identifying information should appear nowhere on the paper).  Attach your paper and separate cover page that contains name, address, phone number, e-mail address and school affiliation as a Word or PDF file to the e-mail.  The e-mail subject line should read “Undergraduate Biomedical ethics Paper Submission”

Submission deadline March 14, 2012.

Accepted authors will be notified by March 15th.  Papers not prepared for blind review will be rejected.  We respectfully request that we receive submissions only from those who plan to attend the conference if accepted.

Please e-mail submissions to ugbioethicswmu@gmail.com.

This Event is sponsored by the Center for the Study of Ethics in Society, the Department of Philosophy, the Medical Humanities Workgroup, and the University Center for the Humanities.

WORKSHOP – Ethical Issues in Engineering Biological and Ecological Systems

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Northeastern University 
Boston, MA
September 30-October 2

Biological and ecological problems are increasingly understood and approached from an engineering perspective. In environmental contexts this is exemplified in the discourses around geoengineering, designer ecosystems, and assisted colonization. In human health contexts it is exemplified in the discourses around synthetic biology, bionanotechnology, and human enhancement. This workshop brings together ethicists, philosophers, and other researchers working on ethical issues related to engineering complex biological and ecological systems. 

Program: http://www.northeastern.edu/ethics/workshop/program/

For more information about the workshop, and to register to attend, please visit the workshop website: http://www.northeastern.edu/ethics/workshop/

The workshop is sponsored by the Ethics Institute, the Department of Philosophy and Religion, and the NSF funded Nanotechnology and Society Research Group at Northeastern University.

CALL FOR COMMENTARY – Synthetic Biology

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This is the official solicitation for open peer commentaries for the Spring 2012 issue of Ethics, Policy, & Environment . For this next issue, 15.1, we have selected a Target Article by Paul Thompson (Michigan State) titled “Synthetic Biology Needs a Synthetic Bioethics.” In part the piece is a response to the President’s Commission Report on the Ethics of Synthetic Biology and Emerging Technologies. Here is the abstract:

Abstract: Recent developments in synthetic biology are described and characterized as moving the era of biotechnology into platform technologies. Platform technologies enable rapid and diffuse innovations and simultaneous product development in diffuse markets, often targeting sectors of the economy that have traditionally been thought to have little relationship to one another. In the case of synthetic biology, pharmaceutical and biofuel product development are occurring interactively. But the regulatory and ethical issues associated with these two applications share very little overlap. As such, there is some risk that focus on traditional medical applications, for which the ethical expertise is highly developed, will overshadow the ethical issues that arise in connection with land use and its attendant socio-economic consequences, especially in the developing world. The 2010 report of the Presidential Commission for the Study of Bioethics exhibits this tendency.

We are now soliciting approximately 5-10 open commentaries in response to this article.  Potential commentators will be invited to write short 750-1500 word responses which will be published simultaneously with the lead target article.

If you would like to be considered as a peer commentator for this article or for some future article, please contact our editorial assistant, Sarah Leshan Erskine (sarah.erskine@colorado.edu) as well as our managing editor, Michael Fortini (ethicspolicyenvironment@gmail.com), to have your name added to our list.   Please explain in the e-mail that you would like to be considered as a peer commentator, and specify if this particular article is one that may interest you, in which case, Sarah will send an advance version of the article back to you.

For this article, we would like to have you submit a short summary of your proposed Open Peer Commentary (no more than 150 words) by 5:00 pm, MST, Monday, August 29.  If your peer commentary is selected, you will then have until Monday, October 17, to submit your full commentary.

As usual, please also consider submitting a suitable article to EPE as a potential target or feature article.

Sincerely,
Benjamin Hale and Andrew Light
Co-editors

CALL FOR ABSTRACTS – Ethics in Engineering Biological & Ecological Systems

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Workshop in Applied Philosophy

Plant growing out of a test tubeBiological and ecological problems are increasingly understood and approached from an engineering perspective.  In environmental contexts this is exemplified in the discourses around geoengineering, designer ecosystems, and assisted colonization.  In human health contexts it is exemplified in the discourses around synthetic biology, bionanotechnology, and human enhancement.  This workshop will bring together ethicists, philosophers, and others working on issues related to engineering complex biological and ecological systems. The workshop is designed to provide speakers with constructive feedback from colleagues working on related issues.

Keynote Speakers:

  • Andrew Light (Associate Professor, George Mason University and Senior Fellow, Center for American Progress)
  • Inmaculada de Melo-Martin (Associate Professor of Public Health and Medical Ethics, Cornell Medical College)

The Workshop on Applied Philosophy is sponsored by the Department of Philosophy and Religion and the NSF funded Nanotechnology and Society Research Group at Northeastern University.

Deadlines:

 May 31, 2011: Deadline for submission of abstracts

Possible Paper Topics:
  • Evaluation of the engineering approach to environmental and human health issues
  • Ethical issues associated with particular environmental engineering practices or proposals—e.g. geoengineering, designer ecosystems, and re-wilding
  • Ethical issues associated with particular biological system engineering practices or proposals—e.g. synthetic biology, artificial life, and robust human enhancement.
  • The role of ethical considerations in policy and regulation regarding engineering biological and ecological systems (either in general or for particular areas, such as geoengineering or genetic enhancement)
  • Epistemological and decision theoretic issues that arise in the context of engineering ecological and biological systems

Submission Procedure:

 Submit abstracts of no more than 750 words to Ronald Sandler.  Abstracts will be reviewed by a program committee.  Those selected for the program will be asked to submit papers one month prior to the workshop, and papers will be made available on the workshop website.  Papers can be of any length, but speakers will be limited to twenty-five minutes to present their ideas, followed by thirty minutes of discussion.

Conference Date & Location

 Sept. 30 – Oct. 2, 2011
Northeastern University, Boston, MA

Website:

 http://www.northeastern.edu/ethics/

VIDEOCAST – Synthetic Biology & Biodiversity

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Bryan Norton, Distinguished Professor of Philosophy, Science, and Technology in the School of Public Policy, Georgia Institute of Technology made a presentation to the Presidential Commission on the Study of Bioethics at meetings on ethical issues associated with synthetic biology.  The Commission meetings were held at the University of Pennsylvania on September 13-14, 2010.