“Leapin’ Lizards, Mr. Science”: Old Reflections on the New Archaeology (and Musings on Anthropology, Art, Bioethics, and Medicine)

A Perspective on the Educational Psychological Value of Jurassic Park and Similar Films for Bioethics Discussions

“…The Jurassic Park series is selected for analysis because of its substantial material and long-standing popularity, as evidenced by its longevity and influence in the popular consciousness in the United States. It has been evaluated for its bioethics discussion potential by Rich (2015), but that discussion did not focus on the K-12 context or teacher educators but, rather, a general conceptual discussion within the scientific community. Bioethics discussion have become increasingly important, but there is a gap in the literature on the topic for K-12 discussion, especially as it relates to popular movies (Russell and Waters, 2017;Simonson, 2002).…”

“…13). In a scholarly editorial published in the journal Bioethical Inquiry, Rich (2015) argued for the importance of asking critical questions about the current and potential use of high technology when it "becomes involved, and-in Crichton-like Jurassic Park (1990) fashion-does our focus on the 'how can we' tend to overshadow the 'whether we should'" (p. 532). In other words, the issue of reanimating the recovered DNA of an extinct species-such as dinosaurs-is a bioethics question that is tacitly implied in these films.…”

“…Entertainment films have been a way to prompt discussion among the general public and students about various social studies issues (Considine and Baker, 2006;Smithikrai, 2016;Russell and Waters, 2017). The subgenre of genetic engineering adventure can be a useful starting point for bioethics discussions in classrooms (Rich, 2015). One such issue is bioethics, which is addressed by anthropologists, scientists, and psychologists, among others.…”