jhepburn's blog

The scientific and business community are still struggling to understand the global public rejection of genetically engineered (GE) foods, and with the growing discourse around the risks and disruptive impacts of nanotechnology, many are becoming increasingly worried that history is about to repeat itself.

Have you ever watched a child carefully taking apart their favourite toy, only to find that they can’t for the life of them put it back together again? It’s a phenomenon that’s as old as humpty dumpty and as old as the enlightenment.

The defining characteristic of an effective nano regulator will be the requirement the burden of proof be on proponents to demonstrate safety.

Any regulatory framework should ensure that:

●    all nano-materials and products are subjected to rigorous health and environmental impact assessment, including evidence based testing, prior to their release into the environment;

●    due to the radically altered characteristics of nano materials compared to their larger scale counterparts, nano materials should be assessed as new substances, even where the properties of larger scale counterparts are well-known;

Q. What is Nanotechnology?

A. It is a breathtaking area of scientific inquiry that is going to redefine life on earth. It is about working with the building blocks of matter - at a nano scale - one billionth of a meter? 

Q. What are the implications of Nantoechnology?

A. It is going to be the basis of the next industrial revolution.

Q. Is there any need for regulation of nanotechnology in order to manage the various health and environmental risks that have been identified by groups like the Royal Society?

A. Oh, well, you see, strictly speaking, Nanotechnology doesn't really exist... 

In the languate of politics, drivel, gobbledegook and nonsense abound.  Weasel words allow politicians and decisions makers to get out of the tighetest of corners and the language used to describe nanotechnology is no exception. To quote from George Orwell from his classic 'the politics of language', written in 1946 -  "This mixture of vagueness and sheer incompetence is the most marked characteristic of modern English prose, and especially of any kind of political writing. As soon as certain topics are raised, the concrete melts into the abstract and no one seems able to think of turns of
speech that are not hackneyed: prose consists less and less of words chosen for the sake of their meaning, and more and more of phrases tacked together like the sections of a prefabricated henhouse."