An AAAS presentation at Boston showed a huge gap between U.S. and several European countries in terms of their opinion about whether "nanotechnology is morally acceptable. "In the US, only 29.5% of the respondents out of a sample of 1,050 gave affirmative answers, whereas the figures in UK, France, and Germany are well above 50%.
The primary researcher, Dietram Scheufele, attributed this difference to levels of religiosity. According to his analysis, Americans are relatively religious, compared with the countries mentioned. The negative relationship between religiosity and the moral issue involved in nanotechnology is even more conspicuous when more countries are taken into account.
There are criticism, of course, to this study. Some criticized about the question wording, while others suggested the ignorance of the science-skeptical nature of a post-modern society. Still others questioned the sample size being too small. In addition, knowledge or awareness of nanotechnology is thought to affect people's response to the "morality" question, although Scheufele has ruled out the possibility.
Many people may have the same question as I do about what makes nanotechnology morally-loaded? The author mentioned that the "playing god" element embedded in the development of nanotechnology, similar to that in stem cell research or biotechnology, is where the morality issue kicked in. So the question becomes: do people's attitudes toward other controversial technology affect their attitudes toward nanotechnology? Is there a underlying attitudinal "factor" that transcends different types of technologies? In other words, is it possible that people don't know much about nanotechnology, but their past experiences with biotechnology, cloning, or stem cell research step up as "heuristics" that provides mental guidances for them with respect to their attitudes toward nanotechnology?
I personally find these questions intriguing and think somebody should investigate them someday.
More readings:
Two-thirds of Americans think nanotechnology is morally unacceptable -- wait, what?, by Engadget.com
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