Labour Provenance as a Lens to Reveal More-Than-Human Ecologies in Biological Design and HCI

Research Background and Issues

What problems or challenges did the authors identify?

• Current methods integrating living biological design with HCI (Human-Computer Interaction) tend to obscure the role of other organisms in the technological and design processes, leading to design practices that inadequately consider the ecological contributions of non-human entities.
• Biological and technological processes in laboratories are often standardized or commodified, neglecting the role of organisms in value production and raising potential ethical concerns.
• Although biological design claims to be sustainable, it may replicate the unsustainable patterns of traditional design and production, or even exacerbate the exploitation of biological labor.

Why is this issue important?

• With the rapid advancement of biotechnology, the manipulation of life forms has become increasingly sophisticated. However, the excessive abstraction of these processes overlooks the contributions of non-human organisms to experiments or technological outcomes, as well as the ethical and ecological implications they carry.
• A clearer identification and understanding of the labor contributions of organisms in these processes can promote more ethical design practices and help avoid implicit exploitation.

Research Motivation and Related Work

1. Motivation:
   • To call for an expanded consideration of the non-human world in biological design, especially in identifying the various forms of biological labor within complex experimental and design processes.
   • To provide a new framework for discussing ecological and ethical issues in current biological design and HCI research.
2. Related Work:
   • Biological design in the HCI field has increasingly focused on emerging concepts such as "microbial-HCI" and "living interfaces." However, existing theoretical frameworks primarily emphasize technical performance, neglecting the complex ecological value and ethical significance of non-human biological labor.
   • Cross-disciplinary applications of "labor theory" have been preliminarily explored in the past, but its critical analysis in biological design and experiments remains limited.

Solutions

What methods or solutions did the authors propose?

1. Labor Provenance Method:
   • Through "Labor Provenance," the authors analyze the contributions of non-human organisms in experiments and systematically describe their roles in biological design using a framework of "five types of more-than-human laborers."
2. Laboratory Workshop Method:
   • The authors designed and evaluated a three-step workshop to help researchers identify biological labor in experiments, assign labor roles, and reflect on ways to promote biological well-being.

What is innovative about this solution?

• Expansion of Ecological Perspectives: The approach extends traditional laboratory practices beyond a focus on so-called "primary experimental organisms" to include the entire hidden ecological network, encompassing the multi-layered contributions of microbes, animals, plants, and viruses.
• Application of Labor Theory: The authors redefine traditional notions of labor by viewing biological processes such as metabolism, resistance behaviors, and environmental support as forms of labor.
• Development of Novel Workshops: The workshops guide researchers to focus on the "work environment" and "well-being" of non-human organisms, offering a reflective pathway for creating multi-species symbiotic systems.

What are the implementation steps? What key techniques were used?

1. Case Study:
   • The authors used experiments involving yeast and human cell fusion as a core case, meticulously tracing the sources of tools and materials at each step of the experiment.
   • Systematic "provenance tracing": The analysis revealed the extensive involvement of non-human organisms, including the sources of DNA components and culture media.
2. Building an Analytical Framework:
   • Based on experimental results and literature analysis, the authors developed five categories of biological "laborer" roles:
     • Primary Biological Laborers: Such as yeast and human cells, directly involved in core tasks.
     • Specialized Skilled Laborers: Providers of gene fragments, fluorescent markers, etc.
     • Tool Laborers: Tools that control other organisms (e.g., enzymes).
     • Support and Sustenance Laborers: Sources of nutrients and conducive environments.
     • Feedback and Evaluation Laborers: Organisms used to validate or debug experimental results.
3. Workshop Design:
   • Activity 1: Participants identify and document the organisms involved in experiments and their sources.
   • Activity 2: Define the labor roles of non-human organisms and assign them anthropomorphic job titles.
   • Activity 3: Reflect on how to improve the well-being of these "invisible workers."

Research Outcomes

What specific outcomes were achieved?

1. Analytical Contributions:
   • The study clarified the roles of non-human organisms in biological design beyond "primary experimental organisms" and highlighted their complex labor relationships.
2. Framework Development:
   • The authors proposed and validated the "laborer types" framework, which can be applied to analyze the roles of various organisms in design processes and experiments.
3. Ethical Discussions:
   • The study guided participants in discussing how to transform traditional experiments and biological design into more conscious multi-species collaborations.

How does it compare to existing solutions? What are its advantages?

• While most current research focuses on the specific uses or functions of organisms, this study emphasizes their labor significance and ecological connections, significantly broadening the understanding of design practices.
• The study provides practical tools (e.g., workshop templates) to encourage reflection among scientists and designers, which is not adequately addressed in existing overly technical frameworks.

What were the experimental or evaluation results?

• Workshop Experiment:
  • The workshop method was tested, and participants generally became more aware of the importance of "forgotten organisms" in experiments.
  • Assigning specific roles to organisms (e.g., referring to viruses as "material couriers" or microbes as "production engineers") sparked extensive discussions.
• Ecological Reflection:
  • The study emphasized the embeddedness of technological production within ecological networks and revealed the "labor costs" of non-human life in laboratory practices and commodification trends.

Limitations and Future Directions

1. Limitations:
   • Defining the "labor" of specific organisms is challenging, and participants varied in their receptiveness to ethical discussions, particularly regarding lower-order organisms like microbes.
   • The study's scale was small, and the evaluation only assessed short-term changes in participants' attitudes, making it difficult to gauge long-term impacts.
2. Future Directions:
   • Improve the workshop format to explore how to balance academic progress with multi-species ethics more deeply.
   • Extend the labor provenance theory to non-laboratory environments and investigate the potential impacts of generative AI on non-human labor.
   • Draw inspiration from other cultural and ethical frameworks (e.g., Japanese animal memorial rituals) to further expand reflection and practice.

In summary, this study employs a novel perspective to analyze labor relationships in biological design, offering significant ethical and practical frameworks for the HCI and multi-species design fields. Additionally, the workshop method provides designers and scientists with actionable reflective tools, holding substantial value for advancing sustainability and ethical standards in future design practices.