Dilemas éticos envolvendo a produção de armas nucleares em um jogo didático

Abstract

This research involves the production of a didactic game that articulates studies on Science, Technology, Society and Environment (STSE) and History and Philosophy of Science (HPS). This game addresses the history of Nuclear Physics in the period of World War II, focusing on ethical issues experienced by scientists involved in the events of the process of creating nuclear weapons. The ethical dilemmas experienced by the scientists were proposed for the students, an action that can contribute to STSE education, because they deal with issues of great social relevance. In this sense, ethics and education STSE show a possible potential in the formation of a critical citizen who aims to contribute to the environment in which he is part. The game is inserted in a didactic sequence composed of seven classes. The main objective of this research was to develop and assist the critical argumentation of physics students, on the ethical dilemmas involving the actions of physicists in the creation of nuclear weapons, based on the categorization of their arguments and visions according to the ethical theories of moral philosophy. Initially, this proposal was designed for the second year of high school, but can be easily adapted to any level of education. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, we adapted the didactic intervention to be used remotely, transforming the game that was to be played in the classroom into a computer game, we also had to change our audience, becoming students of higher education degree in Physics. The data collection tools were: questionnaires, teacher's notebook, recording of on-line meetings. The analyses of the work sought to find evidence of ethical currents, such as utilitarian ethics, deontological ethics and/or ethics of virtues, based on the arguments of the students involving attitudes and moral dilemmas involving scientists involved in the history of Nuclear Physics. As the main result of this research we obtained that the students behaved in a vision focused on utilitarian pacifism. Another result shows that the students' postures didn't change much in this punctual intervention, but it contributed to the development in the elaboration of arguments and quality debates, with the use of concrete examples about events in the history of Nuclear Physics. This research changed my view on teaching practice and the contents to be worked on in the classroom, because before, the main motivation was to pass on scientific concepts of traditional teaching. With the realization of this research I was able to have an expansion of current research in physics/science teaching, learning about strategies and methodologies to be used in the classroom and about discussions involving actions to improve teaching, besides being able to contribute to the training of my students, making them become more critical and manage to relate the concepts and contents of the classroom with their daily lives.