Neutrality in Science and Technology

With regard to value neutrality a distinction should be made between the antecedent values that motivate the realization of science and technology, and the value that science and technology have once they are realized. Claims about neutrality and antecedent values focus on the value judgments that motivate scientific and technological activity: Science or technology is neutral with respect to a set of values if its processes and products are not informed by those values. Claims about the value of science and technology once realized focus on the consequences of scientific and technological activity and the value of those consequences. In this context those who make claims about neutralism assert that scientific and technological activities merely create possibilities but do not cause any specific possibilities to be realized. To actualize any of those possibilities, other events beyond science (the investigation of phenomena) and technology (the creation of specific objects, or "artifacts") are needed, and those other events are not conditioned, required, or determined by science or technology. On this view, the value neutrality of science and technology is a product of their causal neutrality, of their not being sufficient in themselves to bring about either good or bad consequences.

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