Topic 4 - Science and technology

Candidates are expected to know the following;

• Experimentation (animals and humans) and the role of ethics in decision-making.
• Inventions and the role of ethics in the control of their use (e.g. nuclear inventions).
• Scientific and technological advances and decisions about who benefits.
• Human rights and the conflict with the use of technology, e.g. surveillance, data storage, cyber crime.
• A religious perspective on these issues in science and technology.

Issues arising 

• Should science be controlled by ethics, and, if so, which ethical system?
• Is it better for ethics to be reactive – to respond to new scientific ideas?
• Can a scientific discovery be 'undiscovered'?
• How far should society allow religion to control scientific and technological development?