This chapter focuses on the governance of dual-use research in neuroscience in the EU. At a time when many countries are making unprecedented investments in the field of neuroscience, which sometimes are described as the 'gold rush' or 'golden age' of neuroscience, the European Commission has been supporting neuroscience – or brain research as it is sometimes called – via its research and innovation FP. In the FP7 that lasted from 2007–2013, the Commission invested €3.1 billion in neuroscience. In the first five years (until November 2018) of the following Horizon 2020 programme, a similar sum of €3.2 billion was invested (European Commission 2019a). This funding supports a number of neuroscience research projects included within the Future and Emerging Technologies (FET) programme.
The increasing use of information and communication technologies (ICTs) to help facilitate neuroscience adds a new level of complexity to the question of how ethical issues of such research can be identified and addressed. Current research ethics practice, based on ethics reviews by institutional review boards (IRB) and underpinned by ethical principlism, has been widely criticized. In this article, we develop an alternative way of approaching ethics in neuro-ICT research, based on discourse ethics, which implements Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) through dialogues. We draw on our work in Ethics Support, using the Human Brain Project (HBP) as empirical evidence of the viability of this approach. ; Author Contributions: BS led the development of the ethics support work package and processes, wrote the first draft of the article and coordinated the contributions. SA worked on legal review and data protection and was part of the ethics check process. BF led the data governance and was involved in compliance management. MG led the ethics rapporteur programme and the PORE process. WK led the ethics compliance process. IU led the ethics awareness work. All authors worked closely together on the work described in the article. All have contributed to the text related to their area of expertise and contributed to the overall article, including through reviews and revision of earlier drafts. Funding: This project/research has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 Framework Programme for Research and Innovation under the Specific Grant Agreement No. 720270 (HBP SGA1); No. 785907 (Human Brain Project SGA2) and under the Framework Partnership Agreement No. 650003 (HBP FPA). ; Human Brain Project
The interdisciplinary field of neurorobotics looks to neuroscience to overcome the limitations of modern robotics technology, to robotics to advance our understanding of the neural system's inner workings, and to information technology to develop tools that support those complementary endeavours. The development of these technologies is still at an early stage, which makes them an ideal candidate for proactive and anticipatory ethical reflection. This article explains the current state of neurorobotics development within the Human Brain Project, originating from a close collaboration between the scientific and technical experts who drive neurorobotics innovation, and the humanities and social sciences scholars who provide contextualising and reflective capabilities. This article discusses some of the ethical issues which can reasonably be expected. On this basis, the article explores possible gaps identified within this collaborative, ethical reflection that calls for attention to ensure that the development of neurorobotics is ethically sound and socially acceptable and desirable. ; European Union's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Framework Programme 720270 785907 945539
Drawing on more than eight years working to implement Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) in the Human Brain Project, a large EU-funded research project that brings together neuroscience, computing, social sciences, and the humanities, and one of the largest investments in RRI in one project, this article offers insights on RRI and explores its possible future. We focus on the question of how RRI can have long-lasting impact and persist beyond the time horizon of funded projects. For this purpose, we suggest the concept of 'responsibility by design' which is intended to encapsulate the idea of embedding RRI in research and innovation in a way that makes it part of the fabric of the resulting outcomes, in our case, a distributed European Research Infrastructure. ; European Union's Horizon 2020 Framework Programme for Research and Innovation 720270 785907 945539 650003 ; Versión publicada - versión final del editor
