Padraig Murphy - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Padraig Murphy

JCOM, journal of science communication, Jul 12, 2022

The latest in a growing number of edited volumes that take science communication as a phenomenon ... more The latest in a growing number of edited volumes that take science communication as a phenomenon to be explored through science cultures is a rich book full of theoretical and methodological rigour. There are 17 chapters included here from 33 authors across 16 different countries containing selected paper contributions from the 2018 Science & You conference in Beijing jointly organised by the Chinese National Academy of Innovation Strategy and the University of Lorraine, France. With an opening address by Massimiano Bucchi, chapters are arranged thematically, with emphasis on the roles of institutions, state and media in the social dynamics and public understandings of science and technology across global cultures.

Does the middle of the road always need to have one placed in danger of being, rather tediously a... more Does the middle of the road always need to have one placed in danger of being, rather tediously and slowly, run over by a minibus full of mediocrity? Must we always hyperventilate ourselves towards the extremes looking for revolution? Unfashionable though it may be, in this paper I want to revise (bring back, if you will) some version of Giddens's Third Way. And back is 'back'. The speculative turn onto the natural sciences and our knowledge of 'nature', has moved us mid-way between correlationism (Meillassoux, 2009) and speculation on the-thing-in-itself. In Dorsality, David Wills brilliantly watches his and others' backs, the splendor in that turn at the edge (but patently not a move back to language, “[a] primary technological system” (p14)). Heidegger wants us to be patient, wait for an event, an occurrence, even while Adrian Johnston (2014) joins Zizek and Badiou in their fear of political and ideological stasis guided helpfully by the structural status ...

In general, first year science students follow a programme of lectures, tutorials and laboratorie... more In general, first year science students follow a programme of lectures, tutorials and laboratories in the science and mathematics disciplines, without any consideration of the social or ethical issues of science from the humanities and social science perspectives. In this project, a first year cohort of science students participated in a twelve week module, where they were required, by working in small groups (4-5 people), to tackle a sequence of problems which addressed a broad spectrum of scientific concepts and issues. In particular, an interdisciplinary team of colleagues from the Schools of Chemical Sciences, Physical Science, and Communications developed a problem scenario to engage students in the complex socio- scientific issue of screening embryos for genetic disease. The objective of this problem was to enable students to gain an appreciation of the diversity of opinion, develop a better understanding of ethical issues in real-world situations, and to develop a perspective...

Developing Standards in Research on Science …, 2005

ABSTRACT: Since Darwin, knowledge about biology has, for many, had a diminishing effect on ideas ... more ABSTRACT: Since Darwin, knowledge about biology has, for many, had a diminishing effect on ideas of identity and humanity's place in the world. In recent years biotechnology has raised further public concerns about'playing God'and'interfering with life.'School biology ...

oecd.org

... School of Communications, Dublin City University, Glasnevin, Dublin 9, IRELAND +353 1 7007703... more ... School of Communications, Dublin City University, Glasnevin, Dublin 9, IRELAND +353 1 7007703padraig.murphy@dcu.ie Page 2. OECD Working Party on Nanotechnology Workshop on Public Engagement Delft, 30th - 31st October 2008 SCHOOL OF Outline ...

The Irish Review, 2011

ABSTRACT Draft Version of Murphy, P.2011 Anticipatory Governance: can we imagine a future scienti... more ABSTRACT Draft Version of Murphy, P.2011 Anticipatory Governance: can we imagine a future scientific Ireland? Irish Review, 43, pp37-48 Prediction is very difficult, especially of the future. Niels Bohr These days, people seek knowledge, not wisdom. Knowledge is of the past, wisdom is of the future. Vernon Cooper Introduction: anticipating sustainable science futures

Murphy, Padraig (2011) Anticipatory governance: can we imagine a future scientific Ireland? The Irish Review, 43 . pp. 37-48. ISSN 0790-7850, Aug 1, 2011

Introduction: anticipating sustainable science futures It would be a difficult task to reverse Ir... more Introduction: anticipating sustainable science futures It would be a difficult task to reverse Irish people's passion for history and focus instead on the future. And perhaps we should not even try. But in this moment in Irish history, future uncertainties must at least have parity with the past in our collective imaginings. We can certainly use the past, to paraphrase Pascal, as a means to future goals. But there needs to be more effort made to scope out what the future can do for us. Our imagining of the future is almost always technological. How long do you think you will live? What will the 22 nd century be like? There is a future technological narrative for Irish policy too, that involves ICT, the biosciences and nanotechnology. Recession or not, the Irish Government intends to keep focusing on these key technologies, with particular emphasis on innovation, for a 'smart' or 'green' economy. The Government spent approximately €4.5 billion on science and technology between 1995 and 2005, with a sharp increase since the founding of Science Foundation Ireland in 2000 1. The new European Commissioner for Science, Technology and Innovation Maire Geoghegan-Quinn has strongly indicated her determination to match European research excellence with entrepreneurship since taking up office in November 2009. The Strategy for Science, Technology and Innovation (SSTI) set out the roadmap (ibid.). Now, the task of 'translating', commercialising this research within society. Everything must change. Innovation, we presume, means everything changing. (How unproblematically we use this word, innovation.). But this translation is predicated on an over-simplistic linear model of 'lab to market'. Not all these technologies have been easily translated in other societies; bio-and nanosciences are particularly divisive. How do we manage the process from research to product development differently, so that patenting is not the central objective and there is some sense, or indeed many senses, of sustainability? What about the risks these technologies bring? Can there be a sense of shared responsibility for science, with public input to public scientific expertise? And indeed can there be transparency, so that these actions are seen to be done? Can we really imagine what impact science will have on a future Ireland? At this stage, it must be emphasised that prediction or futurism is not under discussion. Of primary interest is technology assessment, that is, evaluating the social acceptance of emerging and future technologies by invoking futures. It is not what might happen in the future but what devices and practices are needed to use the future as a place of social action in the present. Multiple potential futures can be created and negotiated, options opened and choices brought to you by CORE View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk

Energy Research & Social Science

Journal of Science Communication

Since early 2020, communicating risks associated with COVID-19 and providing safety advice have b... more Since early 2020, communicating risks associated with COVID-19 and providing safety advice have been top priorities for health agencies and governments. With an increase in employees working remotely following the global spread of coronavirus coupled with increasingly sophisticated marketing strategies, global brands unsurprisingly engaged consumers and publics by acknowledging the crisis that engulfed the world. An increase in online marketing was observed in an already existing trend online where hybrids of consumer, brand and product-as-object interacted as equals, using contemporary informal codes of social media discourse and often using irony and humour. However, this paper critically assesses how such important communication responsibilities about coronavirus were taken up by private companies. Online and social media outputs were analysed through a lens of anthropomorphising and posthuman brands. A typology of brand strategies was developed based on engagement and how COVID-...

Journal of Science Communication

The devastating effects of COVID-19 and the speed of both the scientific and medical response and... more The devastating effects of COVID-19 and the speed of both the scientific and medical response and the public information requirements about frontline healthcare work, medical advances and policy and compliance measures has necessitated an intensity of science communication never seen before. This JCOM special issue — the first of two parts — looks at the challenges of communicating COVID-19 and coronavirus in the early spread of the disease in 2020. Here we present papers from across the world that demonstrate the scale of this challenge.

Environmental Communication

This paper responds to Schaffer et al.'s (2016) call for greater clarity about the application of... more This paper responds to Schaffer et al.'s (2016) call for greater clarity about the application of theory and method in research on mediated communication about climate-change. Specifically, it identifies conceptual and methodological challenges for researching visual representations of climate change. We suggest current research is impeded by a lack of methodological explication and an unclear relationship between theories of visual meaning and the application of social science methods such as content analysis and frame analysis. As a first step towards addressing these issues, we review existing research to identify the methodological procedures that require explication in order to support the replication of studies and the comparison of findings. We then draw on the seminal work of Roland Barthes' (1967, 1977) to examine how theories of visual meaning may be integrated into socialscientific research methods. Specifically, we demonstrate how Barthes' concepts of denotation, connotation and mythology may be related to research concerns about the selection of visual content, the classification of image frames, audience responses, and analyses of ideological meaning. The conclusion highlights further possibilities for developing a robust form of visual analysis that meets the standards of social scientific research while addressing the fundamental insights about visual meaning derived from cultural theories of meaning.

Critical Discourse Studies

On 28 October 2012, Savita Halappanavar, an Indian woman living in Ireland, died in hospital whil... more On 28 October 2012, Savita Halappanavar, an Indian woman living in Ireland, died in hospital while under medical care for a miscarrying pregnancy. According to her husband, her repeated requests for an abortion were ignored because of the presence of a foetal heartbeat. Ms Halappanavar's death was a critical event in the process leading to a referendum on 25 May 2018, when the Irish electorate voted to repeal the Eighth Amendment of the Constitution, removing the constitutional ban on abortion. The name Savita has become indelibly linked to the changing course of abortion politics, so it is timely to reassess the role of the media in shaping the parameters of the debate about the impact of her death on the issue. This study presents a frame analysis of Irish newspapers in the weeks following her death, mapping the political, medical, legal and socio-ethical discourses, as well as the related contemporaneous events that set the agenda for the type of debate that was to follow. It identifies four media frames: Public Tragedy, Political Opportunity, Abortion Legacy and Maternal Health. Our central argument is that the overall effect of media framing provided much face-saving for politicians in the way that the legislative issue was viewed through a conservative party-political lens, despite public outrage.

Nature nanotechnology, Jan 6, 2017

Public perceptions of nanotechnology are shaped by sound in surprising ways. Our analysis of the ... more Public perceptions of nanotechnology are shaped by sound in surprising ways. Our analysis of the audiovisual techniques employed by nanotechnology stakeholders shows that well-chosen sounds can help to win public trust, create value and convey the weird reality of objects on the nanoscale.

Comprehensive Nanoscience and Technology, 2011

Nanotechnology talk is moving out of its comfort zone of scientific discourse. As new products go... more Nanotechnology talk is moving out of its comfort zone of scientific discourse. As new products go to market and national and international organizations roll out public engagement programs on nanotechnology to discuss environmental and health issues, various sectors of the public are beginning to discuss what all the fuss is about. Non-Governmental Organizations have long since reacted; however, now the social sciences have begun to study the cultural phenomenon of nanotechnology, thus extending discourses and opening out nanotechnology to whole new social dimensions. We report here on these social dimensions and their new constructed imaginings, each of which is evident in the ways in which discourses around nanotechnology intersects with the economy, ecology, health, governance, and imagined futures. We conclude that there needs to be more than just an 'environmental, legal and social implications', or 'ELSI', sideshow within nanotechnology. The collective public imaginings of nanotechnology include tangles of science and science fiction, local enterprise and global transformation, all looking forward towards a sustainable future, while looking back on past debates about science and nature. Nanotechnology is already very much embedded in the social fabric of our life and times. 6.145.1

Encyclopedia of Nanoscience and Society, 2010

JCOM, journal of science communication, Jul 12, 2022

The latest in a growing number of edited volumes that take science communication as a phenomenon ... more The latest in a growing number of edited volumes that take science communication as a phenomenon to be explored through science cultures is a rich book full of theoretical and methodological rigour. There are 17 chapters included here from 33 authors across 16 different countries containing selected paper contributions from the 2018 Science & You conference in Beijing jointly organised by the Chinese National Academy of Innovation Strategy and the University of Lorraine, France. With an opening address by Massimiano Bucchi, chapters are arranged thematically, with emphasis on the roles of institutions, state and media in the social dynamics and public understandings of science and technology across global cultures.

Does the middle of the road always need to have one placed in danger of being, rather tediously a... more Does the middle of the road always need to have one placed in danger of being, rather tediously and slowly, run over by a minibus full of mediocrity? Must we always hyperventilate ourselves towards the extremes looking for revolution? Unfashionable though it may be, in this paper I want to revise (bring back, if you will) some version of Giddens's Third Way. And back is 'back'. The speculative turn onto the natural sciences and our knowledge of 'nature', has moved us mid-way between correlationism (Meillassoux, 2009) and speculation on the-thing-in-itself. In Dorsality, David Wills brilliantly watches his and others' backs, the splendor in that turn at the edge (but patently not a move back to language, “[a] primary technological system” (p14)). Heidegger wants us to be patient, wait for an event, an occurrence, even while Adrian Johnston (2014) joins Zizek and Badiou in their fear of political and ideological stasis guided helpfully by the structural status ...

In general, first year science students follow a programme of lectures, tutorials and laboratorie... more In general, first year science students follow a programme of lectures, tutorials and laboratories in the science and mathematics disciplines, without any consideration of the social or ethical issues of science from the humanities and social science perspectives. In this project, a first year cohort of science students participated in a twelve week module, where they were required, by working in small groups (4-5 people), to tackle a sequence of problems which addressed a broad spectrum of scientific concepts and issues. In particular, an interdisciplinary team of colleagues from the Schools of Chemical Sciences, Physical Science, and Communications developed a problem scenario to engage students in the complex socio- scientific issue of screening embryos for genetic disease. The objective of this problem was to enable students to gain an appreciation of the diversity of opinion, develop a better understanding of ethical issues in real-world situations, and to develop a perspective...

Developing Standards in Research on Science …, 2005

ABSTRACT: Since Darwin, knowledge about biology has, for many, had a diminishing effect on ideas ... more ABSTRACT: Since Darwin, knowledge about biology has, for many, had a diminishing effect on ideas of identity and humanity's place in the world. In recent years biotechnology has raised further public concerns about'playing God'and'interfering with life.'School biology ...

oecd.org

... School of Communications, Dublin City University, Glasnevin, Dublin 9, IRELAND +353 1 7007703... more ... School of Communications, Dublin City University, Glasnevin, Dublin 9, IRELAND +353 1 7007703padraig.murphy@dcu.ie Page 2. OECD Working Party on Nanotechnology Workshop on Public Engagement Delft, 30th - 31st October 2008 SCHOOL OF Outline ...

The Irish Review, 2011

ABSTRACT Draft Version of Murphy, P.2011 Anticipatory Governance: can we imagine a future scienti... more ABSTRACT Draft Version of Murphy, P.2011 Anticipatory Governance: can we imagine a future scientific Ireland? Irish Review, 43, pp37-48 Prediction is very difficult, especially of the future. Niels Bohr These days, people seek knowledge, not wisdom. Knowledge is of the past, wisdom is of the future. Vernon Cooper Introduction: anticipating sustainable science futures

Murphy, Padraig (2011) Anticipatory governance: can we imagine a future scientific Ireland? The Irish Review, 43 . pp. 37-48. ISSN 0790-7850, Aug 1, 2011

Introduction: anticipating sustainable science futures It would be a difficult task to reverse Ir... more Introduction: anticipating sustainable science futures It would be a difficult task to reverse Irish people's passion for history and focus instead on the future. And perhaps we should not even try. But in this moment in Irish history, future uncertainties must at least have parity with the past in our collective imaginings. We can certainly use the past, to paraphrase Pascal, as a means to future goals. But there needs to be more effort made to scope out what the future can do for us. Our imagining of the future is almost always technological. How long do you think you will live? What will the 22 nd century be like? There is a future technological narrative for Irish policy too, that involves ICT, the biosciences and nanotechnology. Recession or not, the Irish Government intends to keep focusing on these key technologies, with particular emphasis on innovation, for a 'smart' or 'green' economy. The Government spent approximately €4.5 billion on science and technology between 1995 and 2005, with a sharp increase since the founding of Science Foundation Ireland in 2000 1. The new European Commissioner for Science, Technology and Innovation Maire Geoghegan-Quinn has strongly indicated her determination to match European research excellence with entrepreneurship since taking up office in November 2009. The Strategy for Science, Technology and Innovation (SSTI) set out the roadmap (ibid.). Now, the task of 'translating', commercialising this research within society. Everything must change. Innovation, we presume, means everything changing. (How unproblematically we use this word, innovation.). But this translation is predicated on an over-simplistic linear model of 'lab to market'. Not all these technologies have been easily translated in other societies; bio-and nanosciences are particularly divisive. How do we manage the process from research to product development differently, so that patenting is not the central objective and there is some sense, or indeed many senses, of sustainability? What about the risks these technologies bring? Can there be a sense of shared responsibility for science, with public input to public scientific expertise? And indeed can there be transparency, so that these actions are seen to be done? Can we really imagine what impact science will have on a future Ireland? At this stage, it must be emphasised that prediction or futurism is not under discussion. Of primary interest is technology assessment, that is, evaluating the social acceptance of emerging and future technologies by invoking futures. It is not what might happen in the future but what devices and practices are needed to use the future as a place of social action in the present. Multiple potential futures can be created and negotiated, options opened and choices brought to you by CORE View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk

Energy Research & Social Science

Journal of Science Communication

Since early 2020, communicating risks associated with COVID-19 and providing safety advice have b... more Since early 2020, communicating risks associated with COVID-19 and providing safety advice have been top priorities for health agencies and governments. With an increase in employees working remotely following the global spread of coronavirus coupled with increasingly sophisticated marketing strategies, global brands unsurprisingly engaged consumers and publics by acknowledging the crisis that engulfed the world. An increase in online marketing was observed in an already existing trend online where hybrids of consumer, brand and product-as-object interacted as equals, using contemporary informal codes of social media discourse and often using irony and humour. However, this paper critically assesses how such important communication responsibilities about coronavirus were taken up by private companies. Online and social media outputs were analysed through a lens of anthropomorphising and posthuman brands. A typology of brand strategies was developed based on engagement and how COVID-...

Journal of Science Communication

The devastating effects of COVID-19 and the speed of both the scientific and medical response and... more The devastating effects of COVID-19 and the speed of both the scientific and medical response and the public information requirements about frontline healthcare work, medical advances and policy and compliance measures has necessitated an intensity of science communication never seen before. This JCOM special issue — the first of two parts — looks at the challenges of communicating COVID-19 and coronavirus in the early spread of the disease in 2020. Here we present papers from across the world that demonstrate the scale of this challenge.

Environmental Communication

This paper responds to Schaffer et al.'s (2016) call for greater clarity about the application of... more This paper responds to Schaffer et al.'s (2016) call for greater clarity about the application of theory and method in research on mediated communication about climate-change. Specifically, it identifies conceptual and methodological challenges for researching visual representations of climate change. We suggest current research is impeded by a lack of methodological explication and an unclear relationship between theories of visual meaning and the application of social science methods such as content analysis and frame analysis. As a first step towards addressing these issues, we review existing research to identify the methodological procedures that require explication in order to support the replication of studies and the comparison of findings. We then draw on the seminal work of Roland Barthes' (1967, 1977) to examine how theories of visual meaning may be integrated into socialscientific research methods. Specifically, we demonstrate how Barthes' concepts of denotation, connotation and mythology may be related to research concerns about the selection of visual content, the classification of image frames, audience responses, and analyses of ideological meaning. The conclusion highlights further possibilities for developing a robust form of visual analysis that meets the standards of social scientific research while addressing the fundamental insights about visual meaning derived from cultural theories of meaning.

Critical Discourse Studies

On 28 October 2012, Savita Halappanavar, an Indian woman living in Ireland, died in hospital whil... more On 28 October 2012, Savita Halappanavar, an Indian woman living in Ireland, died in hospital while under medical care for a miscarrying pregnancy. According to her husband, her repeated requests for an abortion were ignored because of the presence of a foetal heartbeat. Ms Halappanavar's death was a critical event in the process leading to a referendum on 25 May 2018, when the Irish electorate voted to repeal the Eighth Amendment of the Constitution, removing the constitutional ban on abortion. The name Savita has become indelibly linked to the changing course of abortion politics, so it is timely to reassess the role of the media in shaping the parameters of the debate about the impact of her death on the issue. This study presents a frame analysis of Irish newspapers in the weeks following her death, mapping the political, medical, legal and socio-ethical discourses, as well as the related contemporaneous events that set the agenda for the type of debate that was to follow. It identifies four media frames: Public Tragedy, Political Opportunity, Abortion Legacy and Maternal Health. Our central argument is that the overall effect of media framing provided much face-saving for politicians in the way that the legislative issue was viewed through a conservative party-political lens, despite public outrage.

Nature nanotechnology, Jan 6, 2017

Public perceptions of nanotechnology are shaped by sound in surprising ways. Our analysis of the ... more Public perceptions of nanotechnology are shaped by sound in surprising ways. Our analysis of the audiovisual techniques employed by nanotechnology stakeholders shows that well-chosen sounds can help to win public trust, create value and convey the weird reality of objects on the nanoscale.

Comprehensive Nanoscience and Technology, 2011

Nanotechnology talk is moving out of its comfort zone of scientific discourse. As new products go... more Nanotechnology talk is moving out of its comfort zone of scientific discourse. As new products go to market and national and international organizations roll out public engagement programs on nanotechnology to discuss environmental and health issues, various sectors of the public are beginning to discuss what all the fuss is about. Non-Governmental Organizations have long since reacted; however, now the social sciences have begun to study the cultural phenomenon of nanotechnology, thus extending discourses and opening out nanotechnology to whole new social dimensions. We report here on these social dimensions and their new constructed imaginings, each of which is evident in the ways in which discourses around nanotechnology intersects with the economy, ecology, health, governance, and imagined futures. We conclude that there needs to be more than just an 'environmental, legal and social implications', or 'ELSI', sideshow within nanotechnology. The collective public imaginings of nanotechnology include tangles of science and science fiction, local enterprise and global transformation, all looking forward towards a sustainable future, while looking back on past debates about science and nature. Nanotechnology is already very much embedded in the social fabric of our life and times. 6.145.1

Encyclopedia of Nanoscience and Society, 2010