Abstract
Synthetic biology, a field that aims to “make biology easier to engineer,” is routinely described as leading to an increase in the “dual-use” threat, i.e., the potential for the same scientific research to be “used” for peaceful purposes or “misused” for warfare or terrorism. Fears have been expressed that the “de-skilling” of biology, combined with online access to the genomic DNA sequences of pathogenic organisms and the reduction in price for DNA synthesis, will make biology increasingly accessible to people operating outside well-equipped professional research laboratories, including people with malevolent intentions. The emergence of do-it-yourself (DIY) biology communities and of the student iGEM competition has come to epitomize this supposed trend toward greater ease of access and the associated potential threat from rogue actors. In this article, we identify five “myths” that permeate discussions about synthetic biology and biosecurity, and argue that they embody misleading assumptions about both synthetic biology and bioterrorism. We demonstrate how these myths are challenged by more realistic understandings of the scientific research currently being conducted in both professional and DIY laboratories, and by an analysis of historical cases of bioterrorism. We show that the importance of tacit knowledge is commonly overlooked in the dominant narrative: the focus is on access to biological materials and digital information, rather than on human practices and institutional dimensions. As a result, public discourse on synthetic biology and biosecurity tends to portray speculative scenarios about the future as realities in the present or the near future, when this is not warranted. We suggest that these “myths” play an important role in defining synthetic biology as a “promissory” field of research and as an “emerging technology” in need of governance.
Highlights
A dominant narrative has emerged in policy arenas, in which advances in the biosciences are seen to make biology easier and more accessible, and this is presumed to increase the so-called “dual-use” threat, i.e., the potential for the same scientific research to be “used” for peaceful purposes or “misused” for warfare or terrorism
We examine the way in which the biosecurity threat posed by synthetic biology has been framed within the dominant narrative that permeates scientific and policy arenas
We have identified a number of assumptions that underlie policy discourse on the biosecurity threat posed by synthetic biology
Summary
A dominant narrative has emerged in policy arenas, in which advances in the biosciences are seen to make biology easier and more accessible, and this is presumed to increase the so-called “dual-use” threat, i.e., the potential for the same scientific research to be “used” for peaceful purposes or “misused” for warfare or terrorism. Sonia Ben Ouagrham-Gormley and Kathleen Vogel have argued, on the basis on their in-depth analysis of the US and Soviet biowarfare programs, that there are important intangible barriers to the proliferation of biological weapons [3,4,5] These authors show how tacit knowledge has been marginalized in assessments of the dual-use threat of biotechnologies in the twenty-first century. Revill and Jefferson [9] have drawn on Collins’ classification to explore the importance of tacit knowledge in the practice of synthetic biology and the conduct of bioweapons programs. Myth 1: synthetic biology is de-skilling biology and making it easier for terrorists to exploit advances in the biosciences;
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