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Activist Science and Technology Education pp 99–111Cite as

From Promoting the Techno-sciences to Activism – A Variety of Objectives Involved in the Teaching of SSIs

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Part of the book series: Cultural Studies of Science Education ((CSSE,volume 9))

Abstract

The educational trend referred to as Socio-Scientific Issues (SSIs) is gradually spreading internationally. It involves decisions in fields of science (and technology) that have controversial impacts on societies (Kolsto SD, Int J Sci Educ 23:877–901, 2001; Sadler TD, Chambers FW, Zeidler DL, Int J Sci Educ 26(4):387–410, 2004; Zeidler DL, Walker K, Ackett W, Simmons M, Sci Educ 27:771–783, 2002). A parallel can be drawn here with the educational school of thought known as ‘Science-Technology-Society’ (STS). However, SSIs are not always introduced into schools in the form of an issue or a controversy; nor are they systematically related to current events. In the literature on the teaching of SSIs we can observe very different objectives. There are many different dimensions to the concept of an SSI. Similarly there is a variation in the extent to which teachers ‘heat up’ or ‘cool down’ these issues.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    The concept of technosciences aims to bridge the gap between science and technology due to the need to think scientific discoveries and technological inventions in the same social context in order to account for their strong interactions. The term was introduced in the 1970s by the Belgian philosopher Gilbert Hottois. It has become commonplace in the 1990s. It was used by the philosopher Hans Jonas and the sociologist Bruno Latour.

    Two characteristics of technosciences are generally highlighted: operability and circularity between knowledge and instruments. Technosciences not only observe the real, but use it, modify it. Circularity means that sciences produce technologies which in turn produce knowledge. Using the term technosciences can highlight an emerging phenomenon: from modern sciences have gradually emerged technosciences by which our perceptual abilities and possibilities of action on the real were significantly increased.

  2. 2.

    Some scholars claim that fields like physics and chemistry generate more reliable and valid claims, often because of their reliance on quantitative data, which they consider ‘harder’ – or more stable – than qualitative data often used in so-called ‘softer’ fields of investigation, such as sociology.

  3. 3.

    Bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), commonly known as mad cow disease, is a fatal neurodegenerative disease (encephalopathy) in cattle that causes a spongy degeneration in the brain and spinal cord. The disease may be transmitted to human beings by eating food contaminated with the brain, spinal cord or digestive tract of infected carcasses. In humans, it is known as new variant Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease (vCJD or nvCJD), and by October 2009, it had killed 166 people in the United Kingdom. But the statistics are controversial.

  4. 4.

    I refer both to the importance of education in the humanities and to humanistic education in reference to the tradition of the Renaissance. In this tradition, humanism aims for the emergence of educated and fully accountable individuals.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Ecole Nationale de Formation Agronomique, BP 22687, 31326, Castanet-Tolosan Cedex, France

    Laurence Simonneaux

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  1. Laurence Simonneaux
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Correspondence to Laurence Simonneaux .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada

    John Bencze

  2. Faculty of Education and Department of Science and Technology Studies, York University, Toronto, ON, Canada

    Steve Alsop

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Simonneaux, L. (2014). From Promoting the Techno-sciences to Activism – A Variety of Objectives Involved in the Teaching of SSIs. In: Bencze, J., Alsop, S. (eds) Activist Science and Technology Education. Cultural Studies of Science Education, vol 9. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-4360-1_6

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