Newsletter. March - June 2012

FGB Newsletter. Spring at the Bassetti Foundation: March - June 2012

Index

1. Artisans and design, new names at work
a. Interview with Stefano Micelli
b. Piero Bassetti's Lesson at the Domus Academy, master in business design

2. The Bassetti Foundation at the Public Communication of Science and Technology Conference

3. Geni a nudo. Ripensare l'uomo nel XXI secolo: presentation seminar of the book by Nowotny and Testa, held at the Bassetti Foundation

4. Jonathan Hankins: four months of articles from the US

5. Neuroscience at Padova. Report, photos and video

 

1. Artisans and design, new names at work

The success experienced by the 2011 Bassetti Foundation project entitled milano design, Achieving the improbable has lead us to work upon an idea that grew out of the experience: working towards the emergence of a forward looking artisan sector.

The new importance that the word Artisan is taking on in the US, as the definition of someone that we would have called Craftsman, is symptomatic of a change in the relationship between ways of working and ways of living. Pushed forward by new technologies and challenged by economic crisis, we are looking for that "reason composed of work and intelligence" that Carlo Cattaneo attributed the wealth of the nation to, and that he himself stimulated with the journal «Il Politecnico» and the organization 'la Società d'incoraggiamento d'Arti e mestieri', (Society for the Promotion of Arts and Crafts).

Upon this question our website published a discussion [2] between the author of the book Futuro Artigiano, Stefano Micelli (Professor of Economics and Management at the Università Ca' Foscari and Director of the Venice International University) and Veronica Trevisan of Globus et Locus

A modern training system has the responsibility to promote these reflections. In March Piero Bassetti delivered a lesson to the students of the Master in Business Design at the Domus Academy. From the dialogue with the students (from across the globe) it emerged that the inheritancee of the great Milanese Designers partners the new forms of interaction design: towards a shared responsibility for innovation that immerses the designer, ever more knowingly, in the life of polis.
The FGB website hosts a video of the lesson and a gallery of photos [3] (both produced by Tommaso Correale).

 

2. The Bassetti Foundation at the Public Communication of Science and Technology Conference

In April in Florence the Bassetti Foundation sponsored a session at the Public Communication of Science and Technology Conference (PCST 2012). Scientists, scientific institutions faculty, researchers and journalists participated in this international conference. The Bassetti Foundation chose to focus debate upon the passage of the individual responsibility of the communicator to the responsibility of the systems that uphold innovation (social media and open science).

PCST on our site:

- review [4] by Margherita Fronte
- video [5] of the FGB sponsored session
- the panelists' papers
Alexander Gerber: From Responsibility of Communicatione to responsibility in STC [6]
Ann Grand: "It feels like the right thing to do": ethical perspectives of open science [7]
- contributions in other panels by FGB fellowship winners
Patricia Ríos Cabello: Architecture and public science communication [8]
Saima Siddiqui et alii: The potential role of science communication in Pakistan [9]
- Angela Simone interview with Massimiano Bucchi [10]
- two articles by Angela Simone - Primavera accademica? [11] and Opening European Science [12] which analyzes the development of open science in the US and the UE.

 

3. Geni a nudo. Ripensare l'uomo nel XXI secolo: presentation seminar of the book by Nowotny and Testa, at the Bassetti Foundation

On 4th of June we hosted Giuseppe Testa, Director of the Stem Cell Epigenetic Laboratories at the European Institute of Oncology and author with Helga Nowotny of Geni a nudo. Ripensare l'uomo nel XXI secolo.
The seminar was introduced by Piero Bassetti and moderated by Margherita Fronte, and the following distinguished guests took part: Gianluca Bocchi (Philosopher of Science and the History of Ideas at the University of Bergamo), Michele Di Francesco (Head of Faculty of Philosophy and Professor of Logic and the Philosophy of Science at the University of life and Health San Raffaele), Giuseppe Longo (Emerit Professor of the Theory of information at the University of Tireste), Sebastiano Maffettone (Professor of Philosophy at the LUISS Guido Carli, where he is head of the faculty of Political Science and directs the Center for Ethics and Global Politics) and Adriano Pessina (Professor of Moral Philosophy at the Catholic University of Milan).
The FGB website hosts a review of the discussion [13] written by Margherita Fronte, a video [14] of the seminar and a gallery of photographs [15] (produced by Tommaso Correale).

 

4. Jonathan Hankins: articles from the US

Jonathan Hankins has published a host of original contributions on the Foundation website about his State-side observations. The posts relate to academic debates that he participated in and interviews with exponents from the Universities, NGO's, the worlds of art and US politics. See the following:

March:
- Sustainable Food Provisioning, Technology or Trust? [16]
- Layers of Uncertainty [17]
- A Research Strategy for Engineered Nanotechnology [18]
- Nano-pollutants and a Research Strategy [19]

April:
- Safeguarding Venice, the Mose project [20]
- A conversation with Pallavi Phartyal Parts 1 and 2 [21]
- More medical Patent Problems [22]
- International Conference in Paris [23]

May:
- Who's Responsible? The Bassetti Foundation at EASA [24]
- 28 Seeds, a review of the event [25]
- The Responsibility of Communication Parts 1 and 2 (translation) [26]
- 23andMe, Architectures for life. Parts 1, 2 and 3 [27]

June:
- Launch of the UCS Center for Science and Democracy [28]
- Sequencing the Genome of Unborn Babies [29]

 

5. Neuroscience in Padova. Report, foto e video

Tommaso Correale followed and engineered the streaming of the fourth edition of the International Scientific Convention of Neuroethics (Padova, 9-11 May 2012) that this year took the theme neuroscience, between explanations of life and care of the mind. The organizer Andrea Lavazza also produced a report for the Bassetti Foundation website [30]:

Video:
first day [31]
second [32]
poster session [33]
third [34]
photos [35]

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