Setting The Nanotechnology Research Agenda: Medical Research Versus Energy Research

The subject matter of applied ethics most commonly comes from problems raised by a particular technology or activity. Computer ethics has focussed on problems raised by computer technology while much of the subject matter of medical ethics is found in medical practices. Much of this is reactive, though not in a pejorative sense. Problems arise and applied ethicists attempt to find solutions; they react to those problems. Computer technology, for example, has enabled new levels of monitoring and surveillance, which raise problems of personal privacy, which rightly, have been much discussed. But not all applied ethics is reactive or ethics last (Moor and Weckert, 2004) and this is particularly true for the ethics of nanotechnology, or nanoethics.