Let's Not take Americans for Granted

  Nigel M. de S. Cameron, Ph.D., Director
  Center on Nanotechnology and Society

In a disturbing poll on American attitudes toward science, Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) has come up with some numbers that will be found alarming or comforting, depending who reads them. But they are certainly interesting, and while few people know anything about nanotechnology (which makes polling them on it a somewhat hazardous enterprise), there would seem to be a much healthier (some would say less healthy) skepticism toward science and technology in general than many of us had assumed.

Why that is so is a fascinating subject in itself, although some of the specific questions raised in the poll may help supply the answer. Only 14% believe that embryonic stem cell research holds the greatest promise for treating disease; 59% oppose using "therapeutic cloning" to get stem cells; and while a substantial majority does not believe in evolution, only 15% consider that it should be the only approach to human origins taught in public schools. There is no question that public debate and, perhaps, disquiet on other science and technology issues will set the context for the social reception of developments in nanotechnology.

When the general question of public regard for science is raised, the results should have those dependent on public science funding, or markets for the products of new technology - which are of course the two sources of funding for the entire science and technology R and D apparatus - quaking in their boots. What does the public think of science? The VCU survey produces two key results.

While 85% consider that developments in science have helped to "make society better" (one wonders what the other 15% thought!), as many as 56% agree that "scientific research doesn't pay enough attention to the moral values of society," and, to underline how seriously this judgment is taken, 52% of those polled agreed with the potent statement that "scientific research has created as many problems for society as solutions."

As we probe the likely public response to aspects of research and development on the nanoscale, these polling numbers should give us pause for thought - whether we are ethicists, social scientists, researchers, or investors. Only a great national debate in which public confidence in this new kind of science is established will have a chance of building confidence in its products.

Nigel M. de S. Cameron, Ph.D., is the Director of the Center on Nanotechnology and Society and President of the Institute on Biotechnology and the Human Future.