To genotype or phenotype for drug and food safety? Exiting the technology echo chambers

Abstract

Scholars throughout history have argued there is nothing more important than understanding and explaining the world that we live in. Both scientists and social scientists share this motivation. Yet, they employ different tools and viewpoints. Scientists and technology experts tend to focus on ‘‘doing science’’ and related questions, such as ‘‘which knowledge is being produced?’’ Social and political science scholars ask questions relating to ‘‘how we do science.’’ Such differences in the types of knowledges that are produced and sought after also create values that differ between scientists and social scientists. Scientists might value, for example, which technology and biomarker are available for cancer precision medicine, whereas social scientists would like to know the epistemology of scientific knowledge: how do we know what we know? Who is funding and producing biomarker knowledge, and to what ends?