"Better Technologies with no Regret?" [23.10.2014]

The Society for the Study of Nanoscience and Emerging Technologies (S.NET) held its 6^th annual meeting at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology from 21 to 24 of September 2014.

The discussions at this year’s meeting hosted by the Institute for Technology Assessment and Systems Analysis (KIT-ITAS) were focused on the question "Better Technologies With No Regret?" The Society continues to be a major forum for scholars and practitioners from natural sciences, humanities and social sciences as well as for representatives of various societal groups, dealing with new and emerging science and technologies. The program of the meeting included more than 20 thematic sessions on the following topics:

Ethical, Legal and Societal Aspects of Emerging Technologies
Responsible Research and Innovation
Participation
Stakeholders
Acceptance
Visionary Technoscientific Practices.

Besides the thematic sessions, workshops on Do-it-yourself Biology/Biohacking and on Responsible Innovation and Lifecycle Assessment took place as well as the screening and plenary discussion of episodes of the film "Swerve" (director Z. Horton). In his opening keynote speech, Andrew Stirling addressed the issues of risk regulation, emphasizing, among other things, the need for a pluralistic stance towards progress. The keynote speech by Sarah Davies dealt with issues of public engagement.

A more detailed report on the conference will be published in the first issue of the journal "Technology Assessment – Theory and Practice" in 2015 and a volume of the S.NET book series will be dedicated to the Karlsruhe conference. The next S.NET conference will take place in Montreal (Canada) in the fall of 2015.