Practicing narrative virtue ethics of technology in research and innovation

This dissertation develops a novel approach for practising ethics in research and innovation, \ncalled narrative virtue ethics of technology. \nThe increasing speed of technological developments in fields such as AI, robotics, \nbiomedicine, and nanotechnologies, calls for proactive ethical reflection on the impacts of \ntechnologies. As a response, myriad methods for practising ethics in research and innovation \nhave been developed. The first part of this research reviews existing methods and analyses \nhow they deal with the anticipation of ethical issues of emerging technologies, the shaping of \nethical design practices, and the evaluation of ethical impacts of existing technologies. This is \nfollowed by a critical discussion of the existing methods, outlining their shortcomings and \noffering recommendations for improvements. \nSubsequently, a novel philosophical approach is developed that offers responses to the \nrecommendations. This approach synthesises insights from work on virtue ethics by \nMacIntyre and Vallor with Ricoeur’s philosophical hermeneutics. Ricoeur’s narrative theory \nis used to construct an account of how technologies mediate people’s experience and \nunderstanding of the social world, centring on the hermeneutic concepts of textuality, \nliteracy, temporality, and distancing. Accordingly, virtue ethics and the approach of narrative \ntechnologies are integrated into an account of technical practice that is linked with Ricoeur’s \nnotion of the ethical aim as the good life, with and for others, in just institutions. \nFinally, the philosophical approach is translated into a concrete method consisting of three \nphases that offer ways for analysing technical practices, evaluating them, and developing a \nbroad set of prescriptions, including the use of an ethical oath, civic education and \ndemocratic decision-making in research and innovation practices. To demonstrate how this \nmethod could be practically used, a concrete tool is developed and evaluated in practice: the \nEthics Canvas. This is a collaborative tool that enables researchers to discuss the ethical \nimpacts of their work.