Course PM

BBT010 Ethics in biotechnology lp1, 2020 HT20 (7.5 hp)

The course is offered by the department of Biology and Biological Engineering in collaboration with the department of Technology Management and Economics

The course PM can be downloaded here.

Teachers and examiners:

Calle:  Carl Johan Franzén  (BIO)          franzen@chalmers.se          772 3808

Heidi: Heidi Carmen Howard (LU / BIO)

Karl:    Karl de Fine Licht  (TME)            karl.definelicht@chalmers.se

Guest lecturers:

Henrik Aronsson henrik.aronsson@bioenv.gu.se

Yvonne Nygård yvonne.nygard@chalmers.se

Johanna Andersson johanna.andersson2@chalmers.se

Matty Janssen mathias.janssen@chalmers.se

Course purpose

Aim

Biotechnology has enormous potential for improving human health and providing sustainable solutions for providing nutrition, energy and chemicals to society. At the same time, many of these technologies interact with basic processes of life, may affect the personal integrity of individuals, and may have unclear effects on the environment. A problem is that technological innovation and its effects are hard to predict in detail, so decisions will have to be made under uncertainty.

The course aims to develop the students' understanding of ethical aspects that appear when biotechnologies are developed and applied. Students learn a systematic and nuanced way to reason around and to reach well-founded answers to questions regarding how society and individuals should act during the development and application of different technologies. The main emphasis is on the analysis of a number of cases by, among others, theories in normative ethics. Additionally, the course aims at making students aware of laws and rules that regulate biotechnical research and development activities.

 

Course-specific prerequisites

Biochemistry, cell and molecular biology, and microbiology corresponding to a bachelor's degree in biotechnology, bioengineering, or similar.

 

Organisation and teaching modes

The course is organized in the form of lectures, seminars and group work.

Lectures are not compulsory but students are expected to be present.

Seminars and group work on Wednesday afternoons are compulsory. Most of the practical learning is expected to take place during the seminars, when students discuss specific cases in study groups and develop their analysis and argumentation skills. Study groups will be assigned by the teachers.

If a compulsory seminar is missed, students will be given an individual assignment on the same topic.

 

Schedule

TimeEdit

Detailed course schedule

See here

Course literature

The course literature consists of handouts, on-line videos, scientific articles and book chapters referred to during the course. Links and documents will be posted in a "Module" on the course homepage.

To avoid illegal copying, students must download required articles via the E-journals and E-books available at the Chalmers library homepage: http://www.lib.chalmers.se/.

 

Course design

The course is organized in the form of lectures, seminars and group work.

Lectures are not compulsory but students are expected to be present.

Seminars and group work on Wednesday afternoons are compulsory. Most of the practical learning is expected to take place during the seminars, when students discuss specific cases in study groups and develop their analysis and argumentation skills. Study groups will be assigned by the teachers.

If a compulsory seminar is missed, the student will be given an individual assignment on the same topic.

 

Changes made since the last occasion

• Additional experienced teacher Heidi Howard
• Updated order of lectures and seminars.
• Updated content of some lectures and seminars.
• List of literature, web resources and other sources of information has been updated.
• Literature and other sources have been included in the schedule

 

Learning objectives and syllabus

After completion of this course, the student should be able to:

• identify and critically discuss ethical issues that occur in biotechnology, orally and in writing in English;
• adequately apply basic moral philosophical theories and concepts on existing ethical problems;
• assess the validity and relevance of arguments that are used in the debate on ethics and biotechnology, argue for different standpoints and take position in a well-founded and transparent way;
• account for generally accepted and generic policies and guidelines for research ethics and professional ethics;
• in a nuanced way reflect on her/his professional role from an ethical perspective;
• account for laws, statutes and established routines that regulate experimental and industrial use of biological samples, animals and humans.

Study plan

 

Examination

Students must submit two assignments, consisting of ethical analyses in the form of essays on a specific biotechnological topic, and on a topic within the scope of the professional role in research and engineering. These essays should be written by groups of four to six students, assigned by the teachers. Students will be provided with feed-back by the teachers on these texts and the ethical analyses therein.

For each assignment, each student is also required to submit an individual peer review of a text written by another group. Detailed instructions and an evaluation form will be given with the assignments. 

Grading is based on a final take home exam. The take-home exam must be written individually, that is, all forms of communication, collaboration and discussion on the take home exam questions are prohibited. The exam consists of two parts. The first part is an essay on an ethical problem relevant to a given topic within biotechnology. The second part is a multiple choice test on rules, regulations and academic (mis-)conduct.

Students are allowed to use all sources of information when writing the essay and doing the multiple choice test, except discussing, in any mode, the exam with anyone except the teachers. Plagiarism is strictly forbidden; all essays will be assessed for plagiarism. All sources of information used in the essay must be adequately referred to.

To pass the course, students must answer at least 75% of the multiple choice questions correctly, and provide an adequate essay. Differentiation between grades 3, 4 and 5 will be done based purely on the essay.

Assessment criteria for the essay and expected style and format will be explained during the course.

The take home exam and quiz will be handed out on Wednesday, October 21, and must be submitted by 17.00 on Friday, November 30.