Designing Dialogue; meaningful engagement in the context of responsible innovation

Keywords: Moral Reflection, Technological Innovation, Art-based and Playful Engagement

How can art, design, and play contribute to a reflection on the social and moral implications of technological innovation?

Emerging technologies disrupt ways of understanding and ordering the world so that deep-rooted categories have to be rethought (person/thing; alive/dead; autonomy/control; natural/artificial) and they raise basic questions about our identity, integrity and dignity. Supporting the promotion of public engagement with technological innovation and the integration of imaginative and emotional knowledge, we investigated deliberation on synthetic biology, nanotechnology and reproductive technology; using respectively the ‘Frame Reflection Lab’ (a Card-based game in combination with video-narratives), two playful multi-stakeholder dialogues, and ‘Reprodutopia’ (a speculative design fertility clinic).

Other partners: Next Nature Network (amongst others)

Involved researchers: Anouk Heltzel, Joyce Nabuurs, Willemine Willems, Frank Kupper, Wieke Betten, Jantien Schuijer, Marjoleine vd Meij

Researcher link: https://vuweb.vu.nl/en/about-vu/research-institutes/athena-institute