Q: "How will you stop Nanotechnology becoming another farce like GM food?"

Ian Sample, The Guardian, April 28, 2005
:

"Responses from three candidates for the UK Science Minister job during the recent election campaign:


A: 'You can't prevent it, and when we get people talking about grey goo it makes it more difficult, but it is articulating a very genuine fear and misunderstanding of what it is all about. It goes back to science education in schools and to the media having a responsibility to expose these arguments and explore them so the public can understand them. Nanotechnology has the most wonderful potential for not only human economic gain, but for human health as well, for the delivery of designer drugs which would benefit an enormous number of people, yet people are frightened of it. It's an everyday thing, nanotechnology. It has been going on for decades. It's not something to be frightened of, it's something to understand and be positive about.' Robert Key


A: 'Early on in the development of technology, you need a dialogue between scientists and the public, which really looks at whether there are any ethical, safety, health or environmental problems which might arise, so you can look at the regulatory environment and see whether it's capable of dealing with the new technology or whether changes need to be made. With nanotechnology, we asked the Royal Society and Royal Academy of Engineering to produce a report on whether there were any implications and we've now responded to that. We're drawing up a programme of research to check out whether there are any problems in one or two of the areas where we just don't know enough.' David Sainsbury


A: 'There's a role for government and opinion leaders to take issue with people, even if they are the heir to the throne. The idea of grey goo h"