The Bioethics of Information: Intellectual Property and Global Science

Day: Saturday, April 22   Hour: 10:00 - 10:30 pm

By: Austin Dacey

Science is a collective enterprise. Scientific inquiry, knowledge production, and technological applications depend crucially on the free exchange of information, and therefore thrive in a legal environment in which research procedures and data are largely public and non-proprietary. However, recent trends in the data management and biological industries, and legal initiatives such as European Union Database Directive and the U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act are converging to challenge the collaborative ethos of science and undermine the global knowledge commons. This is especially important in the case of bioscience, which often impacts matters life and death, and for developing nations, whose access to resources severely limits their ability to pay for participation. In this way, a new fundamental bioethical issue has emerged alongside the contests over generic drugs and seed patenting affecting the South: equal open access to global bioscience. How can scientists and concerned citizens respond? What are the appropriate roles for national governments and transnational bodies such as the WTO and United Nations? This presentation explores these questions and considers whether humanist thought has distinctive contributions to make. <<Back to Conference program