(translation of the German 1892 edition) **Part 4**

**Public Perception of Biomedicine** 

180 Biomedicine

Wolff J. (1986). The Law of Bone Remodeling. Berlin Heidelberg New York: Springer, 1986

**8** 

*CSIC Spain* 

**Crossings on Public Perception of Biomedicine:** 

In recent years, there has been an increasing advance in various disciplines such as genetics, biotechnology or information technology. There is almost unanimous agreement that the generation and application of scientific and technological knowledge is playing a key role in the improvement of quality of life in society, productive modernization, and the insertion of some countries on the global stage. However, these rapid changes are also having serious effects, leading to discussions about their current or future use and their social, ethical

Universal scientific knowledge and its recent development have been enabling a technoeconomic universality. But questions have also been raised about the deepening of social inequalities and the asymmetrical appropriations of knowledge. At the same time, our societies have experienced major political development that has opened up all areas of public policy to social scrutiny and citizen participation. Despite this, science and technology are still perceived as something distant by some citizens. Still, intense activity in the area of scientific communication and popularization in the last decade may be changing that perception. That is why it is necessary to open public policies on science and technology to the sensitivities and opinions of the people who are affected and interested, to facilitate the practical viability of innovation and depth in the democratization of the systems. The studies of public perception of science and technology are taking a leading role in these

As we saw earlier (Pérez Sedeño and Miranda Suárez, 2008), studies on the public perception of science and technology originate in the Anglo-Saxon world, with the movements *Scientific Literacy* and *Public Understanding of Science*. The first is a North American movement that seeks to measure the degree of scientific literacy in society, designing surveys where basic scientific questions are asked about well-established facts. That is, questions about content are posed, without taking into account the complexity of the scientific activity. But science isn't only knowledge in the sense of 'information' about facts and pieces of information; of extreme importance are procedures, processes and the nature of the knowledge according to the subjects and techniques applied, as well as the social

implications. To date, these changes have also modified our environment.

**1. Introduction** 

aspects.

values in which they are expressed.

**Spain and the European Indicators** 

Eulalia Pérez Sedeño and María José Miranda Suárez
