Team:HZAU-China/Humanities

Beyond Artificial Evolution

--An exploration of “other” implications of our project

Overview

In this page we first explain the relationship between synthetic biology and artificial evolution-a term we came to define—and where our project stand in this picture; then, we explored the ethical, aesthetic and semiotic dimensions of our project in relation to synthetic biology itself.

Ethics

In the ethics part, we explored why most ethical concerns of synthetic biology even exist. We employed a top-down thinking style that reduced the reasons into a simple one of fear and doubt, and explored the psychological reasons of the specific fear and doubt that are related to synthetic biology, drawing support from psychoanalytic schools of thought.

Aesthetics

In the aesthetics part, we explored one of the greatest features of our project: the adventurous and intricate design: our Bio Brick is a Rubik's Cube at your command speaking of functionality. Imagine the possibilities of using a Rubik's Cube to build your building!

Semiotics

In the semiotics part, we explored the metaphysical meaning of the word iGEM in the context of Runic alphabet, the Elder Futhark, and discovered that by interpreting one letter differently, it translates smoothly into a description of our project, too.

Preface: Artificial Evolution

What is it, how it relates to synthetic biology and our project

By artificial evolution people normally mean something either very simple, as when peasants select the cabbage seeds for next year's crossbreed, a practice long existed before Darwin's age[1]; or something somehow nebulous, involving complex design of circuits, algorithms, and a lot of computing[2]. The former has secured its place in the genetics textbooks and we shall leave it there; the latter still gives us plenty of spaces for fathoming so that's where we'll start.

Back in 2012, Masami Hagiya and Ibuki Kawamata did a simplification of Channon's approaches to synthetic biology as described in figure 1 below. They generalized the ultimate goal of synthetic biology as "encapsulated complex systems"[3], which is the (theoretical) direction our project is looking at from a faraway distance (in practice).

Figure 1. Where is Synthetic Biology Going?---the "ultimate destination"