An Investigation Of Societal Impacts And Strategies For The Development Of NBIC Converging Technologies

It is known that the most rapid and potential technological fields are nanotechnology, biotechnology, information technology, and new humane technologies based in cognitive science, whose combination, converging technologies integrated from the nanoscale could determine the steps of next technological revolution. About eighty scientific leaders, industry experts, and policy makers across a range of fields in US have contributed to develop a vision for the potential to improve human capabilities through the convergence of the four technologies in December, 2001. Since then, NBIC converging technologies have drawn much attention of many nations in the world, thereby even being listed in the development priority areas of the science and technology policy framework in countries, such as the US and the European Union countries. As a consequence, it will be valuable and practicable to analyze and explore this technological phenomenon and its societal impacts for improving the technological development and social progress in the future.There are 5 chapters in this thesis. It begins with the trace of the evolution of technology in historical perspective, following the analysis of the interaction between technology and society theoretically. In Chapter Two, after a brief overview of the general implications of converging technologies, NBIC converging technologies, as the outcome in a new trend, have been put forward and explored systematically. Chapter Three focuses on the main societal impacts which NBIC converging technologies will bring about from the positive parts and the negative as well. Consequently, the development strategies in the United States, European Union and India have been demonstrated in Chapter Four, so as to provide appropriate models for our own policy design. In the last chapter, after the scrutiny of the advantages and disadvantages for the development of NBIC converging technologies in the background of China, recommendations have been raised, that is, the efficient introduction and development of converging new technologies will require the supports from governments, science and technology research facilities and business models, as well as solutions for preparing the popularization and education of science and technology and platforms for facilitating communication and source sharing.