According to the symposium, “Outlaw Biology” is when non-scientists participate in the world of science by experimenting, questioning, reevaluating, re-designing, and modifying preconceived ideas and established laws/standards in scientific practices. This, it is maintained, has at times provided additional incentives for research and has dramatically altered the ways in which scientists operate.
Public participation, here, refers to the DIY (do-it-yourself) model being today increasingly applied in scientific research amongst scientists and science-enthusiasts alike. They (the symposium) proposed three types of participants that are increasingly changing the meaning of public participation as we know it: Outlaws, Hackers, and Victorian Gentlemen.
Outlaws: are independent experimenters of science. They look at the world from the outside, seeing what is there and what could be, and propose somewhat unprecedented hybrids. Hackers: are collective innovators and work in group. They are a kind of subculture that together find ways of re-purposing, skewing, and modifying initial ideas and functions of systems. They think of new types of engineering processes for new solutions. Victorian Gentlemen: hold the knowledge that is needed to switch perspectives of preconceived ideas in science.
This paper outlines three prevailing characteristics: Outlaw Biology is “before the law” and therefore cannot be illegal, but instead provokes, impresses, and frightens; Outlaw Biology is the result of Big Bio (or its child); and Outlaw Biology is changing the notion of “public participation” — it is an inclusive view of scientific practices wherein the public is engaged in the process of discovery and innovation.
“An Outlaw Biology?”
The fear in DIY Bio is that non-specialized practitioners may either discover something plausible or negatively affect biological research. Here comes the ethical question of what counts as innovation in science? and who holds the rights to innovate? Who is considered legitimate? “A lot of people got into the business to do good. […] But everyone wants a piece of the life sciences, and that has transformed the institutions of science and engineering.”
The paper maintains that Outlaws are not only a kind of public participation, but participation for the public (“populism”). Outlaws are pro-active; they question science and act through a moral understanding of what is ethically necessary to investigate, demystify and reconfigure. In addition, Outlaws have a certain independence (individualization), which emphasizes the potential being and the ability to outsmart science and innovate individually. For Gaymon Bennet, Outlaws influence a powerful individualism, as opposed to social activism; in this sense they can be egotistic visionaries.
“Which public, whose participation?”
Participation has a number of connotations attached to it: buying, doing, engaging, using, making, etc. The question posed in this paper is: Why are people eager to participate in science and engineering endeavors? And what are the consequences of their participation on social, ethical, and moral standards? “Do we need a new language for new hybrid forms of science-making?” Clearly this draws a re-definition of what was once understood as public participation and what those words now connote.
“Creativity breeds creativity.”
The symposium defines Big Bio as “a land of promises and revenues” for outlaws, hackers, and Victorian gentlemen, within which “cheap […] DNA synthesis” exist, making scientific ventures increasingly open-sourced (DIY Bio). Their final notice is that the meaning of public participation, when it comes to citizens engaging in science and engineering, proves that “creativity breeds creativity”; which is to say that when one innovates, new fields of research are born and new discoveries amount from there on.