With great power comes great responsibility: why ‘safe enough’ is not good enough in debates on new gene technologies

New genomic techniques (NGTs) are powerful technologies with the potential to change how we relate to our food, food producers, and natural environment. Their use may afect the practices and values our societies are built on. Like many countries, the EU is currently revisiting its GMO legislation to accommodate the emergence of NGTs. We argue that assessing such technologies according to whether they are ‘safe enough’ will not create the public trust necessary for societal acceptance. To avoid past mistakes of under- or miscommunication about possible impacts, we need open, transparent, and inclusive societal debate on the nature of the science of gene (editing) technologies, on how to use them, and whether they contribute to sustainable solutions to societal and environmental challenges. To be trustworthy, GMO regulation must demonstrate the authorities’ ability to manage the scientifc, socio-economic, environmental, and ethical complexities and uncertainties associated with NGTs. Regulators and authorities should give equal attention to the refexive and the emotional aspects of trust and make room for honest public and stakeholder inclusion processes. The European Group of Ethics in Science and Technology’s recent report on the Ethics of Genome Editing (2021) is important in calling attention to a series of fundamental issues that ought to be included in debates on the regulation and use of NGTs to ensure public trust in these technologies and in regulating authorities. With the great power of NGTs comes great responsibility, and the way forward must be grounded in responsible research, innovation, and regulation

Semantics without truth

The human capacity for language is beyond doubt a very special ability and this thesis aims at shedding light on this ability by investigating the semantic basis for a theory of interpretation. Such a theory seeks to understand how a hearer understands what is meant by an utterance. Pragmatics plays an important role in accounting for a variety of topics relevant to communication – for instance, context of utterance, speaker’s communicative intentions, implicatures and inference, to mention but a few – but in this thesis it is the specific significance of semantics for a theory of interpretation that will be elaborated and defended. Semantics is fundamental, or so I shall argue, if we want to account for the special features of language that ground our human ability to convey complex thoughts and information across radically different contexts, a feature that is absolutely crucial for our rational nature. I start out from a suggestion by Kent Bach that we can reserve a specific semantic role for a reconsidered version of Paul Grice’s notion of what is said. In the discussion I also defend his claim that saying does not entail meaning, something that in turn justifies his notion of what is said not to be identified with the proposition expressed or what is meant by an utterance. Yet, Bach’s use of ‘semantic context’ to determine indexical expressions are found wanting. I argue that since we have no good reason for letting contextual considerations into the semantic notion of what is said, given its explanatory purpose, the theoretical significance of what is said in addition to sentence meaning is minor. In due course I defend a notion of semantics that concerns only the stabile features of language, namely the level of meaning that is the same for a sentence every time it is uttered and in every context of use. One of Bach’s main claims is that semantics is non-propositional and I defend that claim by showing how sentences that contain context-sensitive expressions often fail to express a proposition. I also take this a bit further and propose an even stronger argument against truth-conditional semantics, which is based on the observation that there are complete declarative sentences that nonetheless fail to semantically express a proposition. If I am right, we should give up truth-conditional semantics. Instead of trying to specify propositional meaning I suggest that we restrict our aim, as semanticist, to specify how the words and the grammar work together to restrict the available interpretations

Anne Conway og revitaliseringen av naturen: Conways miljøetikk som et alternativ til Aristoteles og Spinoza

I den økofeministiske klassikeren The Death of Nature: Women, Ecology and the Scientific Revolution (1980) fremhever Carolyn Merchant måten Anne Conway (1631–1679) kritiserer det dominerende mekanistiske natursynet ved å hevde at alt i naturen er fylt med liv. For i Conways verk Principles of the most Ancient and Modern Philosophy (1690) finner vi et natursyn hvor «den anorganiske naturen», slik som jord, stein og fjell, har liv og derfor må behandles på en god måte. Vi søker å vise at Conways posisjon faller mellom Aristoteles’ og Spinozas, da hun på den ene siden er enig med Spinoza i at hele naturen har liv, mens hun på den andre siden opererer, i likhet med Aristoteles, med et hierarki i skaperverket mellom mennesker, dyr, planter og stein. Conway har slik vært betydningsfull for fremveksten av en miljøetikk som skiller seg fra både pliktetikken og utilitarismen, samtidig som den representerer et alternativ til det dominerende dualistiske natursynet. Likevel er det spenningsfylt hvordan økofeminismen skal forholde seg til Conways hierarkiske tenkning, da miljøfilosofien generelt, og økofeminismen i særdeleshet, har vært opptatt av å bryte med antroposentriske forutsetninger

Teknologi, natur og litteratur: Deiktisk diskurs hos Vetlesen og Borgmann

I The Denial of Nature (2015) argumenterer Arne Johan Vetlesen for at litteratur og poesi, av den typen den amerikanske filosofen Albert Borgmann karakteriserer som deiktisk diskurs, fremviser naturens iboende verdi. Ifølge Vetlesen tilbyr deiktisk diskurs en pre-teoretisk tilnærming til naturen som den filosofiske debatten siden kan baseres på. Artikkelen viser at selv om både Vetlesen og Borgmann anser deiktisk diskurs å være et alternativ til en teknologisk forståelse, hvor naturen bare fremstår som et middel til våre mål, er deres syn på hva dette alternativet består i forskjellige. Vi deler Vetlesens bekymring om at miljøetikken står fast i spørsmålet om hvorvidt naturen har iboende verdi og er enig i at Borgmanns tilnærming er et godt alternativ. Vi argumenterer likevel for at deiktisk diskurs ikke viser naturens iboende verdi. Gjennom deiktisk diskurs fremstår naturen snarere som betydningsfull i lys av våre praksiser

Lack of association between cystatin C and different coronary atherosclerotic manifestations

<p>Cystatin C (CysC) is known to be related to cardiovascular disease (CVD), including the presence and severity of coronary artery disease (CAD) and future clinical events. In this study, the association between CysC levels and (1) coronary artery calcification (CAC) in asymptomatic individuals from the general population as well as (2) different subgroups of patients with suspected or definite acute myocardial infarction (MI) was investigated. CysC levels were measured in serum from asymptomatic individuals as part of a screening study for CAC using non-contrast cardiac CT scan (<i>N</i> = 1039) as well as in subgroups of hospitalized patients with a suspected MI (<i>N</i> = 769). CysC was not associated with CAC in asymptomatic individuals after adjusting for relevant risk factors. No difference in CysC levels was observed between patients with type 1 MI (1.07 mg/L) and patients with normal troponin (with or without prior CAD: 1.14 and 1.01 mg/L, respectively). However, patients with type 2 MI and patient subgroups with elevated troponin but without MI had significantly higher CysC levels (1.24, 1.23 and 1.31 mg/L), even after adjusting for other risk factors. CysC was not associated with CAC in middle-aged asymptomatic individuals from the general population. Furthermore, CysC levels were found to be significantly lower in patients with type 1 MI compared to patients with type 2 MI and patients with elevated troponins but without MI. Thus, in two independent and clinically different populations, no association between CysC and coronary atherosclerotic manifestations could be demonstrated.</p