READING	NAME	AGENDA ITEM
Nanotechnology and the Developing World: Will Nanotechnology Overcome Poverty or Widen Disparities? Noela Invernizzi_ Guillermo Foladori	Heather Lautman	“Your wardrobe, for example, could be reduced to one single article. The item of clothing you have will react to changes in temperature, rainfall, snow, sun, et., keeping the body at the programmed temperature. Furthermore, it will repel sweat and dust…it would stop bacteria or viruses from penetrating it… your clothes would have healing effects.” If this were ever to happen, wouldn’t we be hurting ourselves? Our bodies not needing to develop, just our technology; messing up completely evolution. Also, I feel like this is powerful rhetoric: the author puts forth this futuristic product, an exaggeration in order to widen the gap between what someone poor could not obtain, and what the rich could.
	Charlie Senness	I don't think nanotechnology will be the answer to poverty just as GMOs wasn't. I have a hard time believing that developing countries will be able to get their hands on any kind of nanotechnology that could help their situation before they are left even further in the dust. New technology will always go the countries that can pay for it, both as a service/product, but also in the development stage.
	Alex Lamparski	This article seems to put on paper the very argument debated in class last Monday, "In this way, identifying potentially useful scientific technologies for the developing world must become part of a much larger and inclusive social technology if gains are to be actualized in poorer countries." The conclusion is also very insightful, stating that nanotechnology is a new frontier with many unknowns.
	Sarah Petzold	"could be seen as harmful because poor countries have abundant labor, and, in many cases, land and natural resources. In this way, nanotechnology may cause displacements and disruptions in the economies of poorer nations." I feel that this is the most likely of senarios. From what we had discussed Monday, and what the other new technologies have not done to help the poorer countries nanotechnology will just create more problems. "The lawsuit, which the South African government won, showed total insensibility to human rights on the part of the pharmaceutical corporations." Section IV was a very nice segment that really demonstrated and concluded the article and problems that were discussed in class that will crop up with new technologies and their effect on the developing countries.
	Daniel SchafferSocial Dimensions of Nanotechnology Discussion Agenda - Google Docs	What if nanotechnology could become packaged and distributed like coke and pepsi? Obviously, it may be difficult to find a Sam's club to buy bulk in developing nations, and the pop pipelines may not reach as far as I think they do. However, if the solutions to water purification or disease prevention are as simple and inexpensive as scientists imply, they could be manufactured and distributed to wherever they need to go using the existing methods of distribution we rely on for our soda.



Kelty, C., Lounsbury, M., Colvin, V., and Yavuz, C. (2008f). Towards open source nano: Arsenic removal and alternative models of technology transfer. JAI Advances in the Study of Entrepreneurship, Innovation,and Economic Growth.	Molly Danskin	“In the FOSS model, such activities are often handled in a distributed fashion by the users themselves, under the theory that 'given enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow' ” Does this then make it easier to worry about toxicity of nanoparticles because everyone is looking out for them, or harder?
http://www.online.mba.net/tcc/documents/TII1_2008_Lounsbury_et_al.pdf	Adam Neisius	The increasing prevalence of TTO's and their focus on production of profit is likely further reinforcing the current trend of highly competitive, short term research projects with a focus on profit instead of longer term research projects or projects focused on highly hypothetical or base science. Some areas of research have already been cast aside by private groups and are currently the purview of academia only. Will this increasing profit focus of academic research lead to even further abadonment of "less profitable" research areas? If so what can be done about it?
	James Johnston	It was rather surprising that the authors never mentioned the potential impacts that Open Source Nanotechnology might have on regulation. With the ability for millions or even billions of people to reproduce experminents that could be considered either layman or scientific and that might not have not gone through critical evaluation for toxicity or ethical consideration opens up the potential for a pandora's box scenario. While upstream feed back would be easier and hind sight regulation would be far more expediant. Is finding out emprically that a certain chemical, procress, or machine created by OS-nano might be hazardous acceptable? Also how would one go about trying to regulate and make sure applications from OS-nano are less risque?





Eglash, Ron. “Indigenous Nanotechnology”	Tracy Breslin	Reading about the nanotechnology that was found in the wootz, Maya blue pigment, obsidian blades, and quartz, made me think of the discussion we had last class about whether we should be forcing our technology on the third world. This shows that all cultures have their own way of doing things and we shouldn't try to change that.
	Andrew Nelson	On the bottom page 5 it talks about how many blacks who are well educated are accused of "acting white" by their black peers. I feel that with this last historic election we should talk about what the future holds (in terms of education) and if anything will change in how education is looked at by some minorities.
	Christine O'Rourke	"Research by many scholars indicates that some of the statistically poor record of achievement and participation in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) disciplines by African American, Latino, and Native American youth can be attributed to cultural barriers." Besides race I was wondering if gender also played a role in the statistics. Just by looking at this school we can see that the fields of science,technology,engineering and math are mostly male dominated, so how much does gender play? Could it be a bigger part then race?
	Andrew Starr	I was impressed by old products that incidently used modern technology. How do scientists use these occurances to find out new things that could potentially be developed?
	Mike Pennisi	"Preliminary evaluations with minority students indicate statistically significant increase in math achievement, attitudes towards math, and attitudes toward technology-based careers (Eglash et al 2006)." Were any benefits of CSTD's noted among non-minority students?
	Grant Boucher	The article attributes poor STEM performance to genetic and cultural determinism, or self-fulfilling prophecies. Isn't using cultural connections to raise interest in STEM only enacting a positive self-fulfilling prophecy? I think giving students a pep-talk about how awesome science is and telling them it's in their blood to be great scientists is bound to get a group fired up about the field. This is made apparent by the fact that CSDT's showed an increase in math achievement and interest, but the students were not particularly drawn to the CSDT associated with their heritage.
	Joyce Chow	The article mentions that CSDTs were able to increase minorities' "math achievement, attitudes towards math, and attitudes toward technology-based careers." I think this applies to everyone, not just minorities. I often find didactic information easier to understand when examples are given that I can relate to or have an interest in.
	Galen Frechette	I think that the stories that go with the CSDTs is what makes the CSDTs effective. They provide doorways through which students can get into the subject matter and develop motivation for participation/involvement in learning.
	Andrew Cunningham	Has our ability to create products decreased over the years? Are we blinded by the new technology that we don't see the things of the past that are better? (flint example)
	Jason Bernardo	Why would the incorporation of technologies from past cultures interest minority students in nanotechnology? Even if it's somehow tied to their ancestors, what connections would they feel to those people? Would this kind of teaching simply work on everyone in all different areas of science?
	Andrew Krushelnyski	What I have trouble understanding is how the public and scientists in general don't get excited about the fact that nanotechnology has been around for many years. Also the fact that the people who were using that nanotechnology really didnt even realize it. After reading this article I immediately start to think what if we could harness this knowledge of integrating nanotubes in paint and make it last for hundreds of years or make new flashlights out of quartz crystals. I guess in general does anyone really believe that if a regular person of society read this, wouldnt you think that they would become extremely excited about nanotechnology simply by reading about examples that have been aroud for hundreds of years.
	Matt Naples	When does nano-artifacts become labeled as nanotechnology? Does nanotechnology exist as a science if one does not know they are working on it?
	Grant Kovach	"As a flat sheet the weave resembles the structure of graphite; rolled into a cylinder it resembles a nanotube." I find it hard to say that the native people of Africa weaving baskets were practicing nanotechnology. Just because the structure resembles that of a nanotube doesn't make it nanotechnology.