University and the risk society

Abstract

The social order of the new modernity is often referred to as “risk society.” The growing complexity of the new modernity generates hazards and insecurities at unprecedented pace and level of severity. This necessitates a more informed discourse on the underlying sociological and ethical principles within universities as part of the curriculum and with universities as a collective agent of the risk society. This paper addresses the role, responsibility, and tasks of science and universities in providing solutions to control such hazards and insecurities in a “risk society.” We identify three distinct fields. First, we examine how the inherent limits caused by the probabilistic nature of natural laws impacts the work of scientists assessing and forecasting risks. Scientists, when determining risks, often use the Bayesian approach as a surrogate for knowledge. We argue that these conditions often limit the ability of scientists to forecast precisely risk events. We then discuss methods for assessing complex systems with statistical or soft modeling approaches and examine their limits in drawing conclusions from the results of such an investigation. For this, we will highlight a number of examples drawn from the field of chemometrics and engineering science: the inherent type I and type II errors of statistical testing methods as well as the application of soft modeling approaches and conventionalism as an alternative for physical models. We argue that when applying such models scientist should consider the underlying ethical concerns and declare them when reporting the results of their assessment. Failure to declare those ethical concerns may influence validity and reliability of their results. In the third part, we examine the communication between the scientist and the broader public, often laypersons, which are exposed to certain types of risks. Scientists and universities, given their specialization and expertise, play an important role in ensuring transparent communication about research programs that are a concern to public health. The principle of transparency also calls for the disclosure of any potential conflict of interest that researchers and universities may have. This holds particularly true when considering the changing opinion of society towards science's apparent “monopoly on truth”.

Keywords:

• ethics
• science
• universities
• code of conduct
• risk management
• risk prevention

Notes

1. See definition of “applied ethics”. http://www.iep.utm.edu/ap-ethic/ (accessed on 20 March 2014).

2. See definition of “Meta-ethics”. http://www.iep.utm.edu/metaethi/ (accessed on 25 March 2014).