From 367a7ad126cca0f9b8da1c45f465aa7fb9b785f8 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Natalia <nataliavazpur@gmail.com>
Date: Mon, 30 Sep 2024 15:31:36 +0000
Subject: [PATCH] more HP
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<div class="pagecontainer">
<div class="title2">
- <span>Education and Outreach</span>
+ <span>Human Practices</span>
</div>
<div class="pagebody">
<div class="pagenav">
@@ -25,18 +25,21 @@
<!-- 1 -->
<div class="h" id="one">
<div class="h1">Introduction</div>
- <p> At iGEM TU Delft, we recognize the importance of outreach and education within our project. Within the outreach team, our primary focus is on education, which we believe is an essential part for an effective outreach. We consider education on synthetic biology essential for a better understanding of the rapid changes occurring globally, where numerous synthetic biology solutions can help alleviate issues related to climate change, socioeconomics, and health. Currently, terms like GMO, biofuel, and biomarkers are becoming more common in the news; however, relatively few people fully understand these terms, leading to confusion and, in some extreme cases, fear among the general public.This hinders the acceptance of those solutions to global problems based on synthetic biology. To prevent this from happening, we believe that
- educating the general population to better understand these concepts, and therefore the implications of related solutions, is crucial.
- </p>
- <p> To promote education in synthetic biology, we have developed various activities tailored to different age groups. We believe that one of the best ways to educate the general population is from childhood and adolescence, to avoid them becoming adults who fear synthetic biology advancements. For this, we have prepared appropriate and differentiated educational packages for each activity, as programs that work for children are not suitable for teenagers nor for adults. We have given lectures at high schools, organized games in farms, and promoted learning through our social media channels.
- </p>
+ <p>In the Human Practises (HP) part of the project, our team aimed to assess the impact of our project on the world. We considered the environmental, social and economic impact. Since our idea is bold and revolutionary and uses synthetic biology in agriculture, it was very important to us to shape our design in a responsible way and think of all the potential risks in case our technology was to be implemented in society. Hence, we applied the notions of Value Sensitive Design and conducted stakeholder interviews.</p>
</div>
<!-- 2 -->
<div class="h" id="two">
<div class="h1">Our Responsible Innovation Approach</div>
+ <p>We started by using the Value-Sensitive Design (VSD) approach. [1] We chose this approach because it helped us <strong>to identify our project in relationship to problems and values and build a discourse around what these values mean between team members</strong> and stakeholders, and how to carry out a responsible approach. [1]This entailed thoroughly anticipating both positive and negative impacts of our project and thinking of security or ethical, social and legal problems created by its potential application. </p>
+ <p>The steps of our HP and Integrated HP approach, based on the VSD analysis, is shown in Figure 1. The VSD consists of three main phases namely conceptual, empirical and technical part. We applied these stages in our HP work. In the conceptual part we assessed who are the stakeholders impacted by our idea and what values are at relevance. This way, we gained a better understanding of whom to engage with and what questions we wanted to ask The empirical part consisted of reaching out to some of these stakeholders with different backgrounds, and to experts that could help us think about the different fields of impacts mentioned before. During the technical part we integrated all gathered information from the conceptual and empirical parts to minimise potential risks associated with our project and to come up with alternative approaches. This also meant that we had to make compromises between conflicting design choices. </p>
<div class="h2">Understanding the Problem</div>
- <p> Alongside our laboratory progress, we organized lectures at high schools. One of our team members, Roos Beijer, reached out to Dutch high schools, where the magic began. Through a presentation on synthetic biology, Roos taught high school students about endosymbiosis, cellular organization, and intracellular transport systems. She delivered the content in a dynamic and engaging way, ensuring that the students were involved and asked all sorts of questions. A week later, Roos repeated the lecture at another high school, once again captivating the students’ attention while entertaining and educating them.</p>
- </div>
+ <p>As we learned from the conversations with different stakeholders, defining to what problem our idea serves as a solution is very important from the aspect of responsible innovation. It was also the first step of our VSD analysis. This way we can emphasise the benefits and better communicate it to different stakeholders but also identify potential risks.</p>
+ <p>We are a team from the Netherlands and even though many of us are international students, we care about the environment we live in. In the Netherlands, pollution from reactive nitrogen deposition is a major problem and immediate action is needed in the short and long term to restore nature and allow new economic activities to be pursued.[2] We felt an obligation to find a solution that could help local people and the agricultural sector, a driving sector of the Netherlands.[3] A sustainable solution for agriculture is not only important locally but globally as well. There is growing global food demand by rising populations where agricultural productivity must be doubled by 2050 to feed the world.[4] However, sustainability in agriculture is already a problem, so the question is <strong>how can we achieve a drastic productivity increase sustainably?</strong> </p>
+ <p>We chose a synthetic biology approach to answer this question. We were looking for a solution that is environmentally and socially sustainable, that helps solve food security problems, is accessible and of course safe. This is a big task and at the beginning of our project we were wondering what if our idea is merely a <strong>techno-fix</strong>? This means that while a technology serves as a solution, it mostly addresses the (unwanted) effects, rather than the root of the problem. [5] This is the question where our Human Practices (HP) and Integrated Human Practices (IHP) journey started. </p>
+ <p>Done Scott describes philosophical and practical criticism of technological fixes in his article “ <strong> The Technological Fix Criticisms and the Agricultural Biotechnology Debate </strong>â€. [5] He summarizes that “The practical criticisms of technological fixes serve as a warning against the inherent dangers of addressing complex, multifaceted problems with narrowly conceived technological fixes. The philosophical criticisms seek to undermine a worldview that sees technological fixes as the primary means to advance civilization and social welfareâ€. To respond to the potential practical criticisms raised against our project, we clarify that we are aware that our solution might not solve the social and political challenges underlying nitrogen pollution and food security. But it can clearly serve as an extra option for different actors to use to tackle above mentioned challenges while giving more time to deal with the root problem. As Dr. <strong>Britte Bouchaut </strong> – who is an Assistant Professor at the Safety & Security Science group at TU Delft – mentioned in her presentation at the Dutch iGEM meet 2024 (organized by The Centre for Living Technologies and supported by iGEM WUR and iGEM TU/e)<strong> it is okay to design a techno-fix, if we think about the impact and the consequences of our technology </strong>. This way we can better avoid creating new problems by our technology. </p>
+ <p>Putting this into practice, we assessed the environmental and social impact of our synthetic biology idea, we talked with relevant stakeholders and implemented the information we learned in our project by making design choices based on the input we got and on our VSD analysis. (see IHP page).</p>
+ <p>Therefore, we believe that, although our idea can be regarded as a technological fix, it can serve as a great solution that was designed responsibly.</p>
+ </div>
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<div class="h" id="three">
<div class="h1">Value-Sensitive Design</div>
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