C H A P T E R E I G H T
The Deeply Intertwined Promise and Peril of GNR
We are being propelled into this new century with no plan, no control, no brakes....The only realistic
alternative I see is relinquishment: to limit development of the technologies that are too dangerous,
by limiting our pursuit of certain kinds of knowledge.
—B
ILL
J
OY
,
"W
HY
T
HE
F
UTURE
D
OESN
'
T
N
EED
U
S
"
Environmentalists must now grapple squarely with the idea of a world that has enough wealth and
enough technological capability, and should not pursue more.
—B
ILL
M
C
K
IBBEN
,
E
NVIRONMENTALIST
W
HO
F
IRST
W
ROTE
A
BOUT
G
LOBAL
W
ARMING
1
Progress might have been all right once, but it has gone on too long.
—O
GDEN
N
ASH
(1902–1971)
In the late 1960s I was transformed into a radical environmental activist. A
rag-tag group of activists
and I sailed a leaky old halibut boat across the North Pacific to block the last hydrogen bomb tests
under President Nixon. In the process I co-founded Greenpeace....Environmentalists were often able
to produce arguments that sounded reasonable, while doing good deeds like saving whales and
making the air and water cleaner. But now the chickens have come home to roost. The
environmentalists' campaign against biotechnology in general, and genetic engineering in particular,
has clearly exposed their intellectual and moral bankruptcy. By adopting a zero tolerance policy
toward a technology with so many potential benefits for humankind and the
environment, they ...
have alienated themselves from scientists, intellectuals, and internationalists. It seems inevitable that
the media and the public will, in time, see the insanity of their position.
—P
ATRICK
M
OORE
I think that ... flight from and hatred of technology is self-defeating. The Buddha rests quite as
comfortably in the circuits of a digital computer and the gears of a cycle
transmission as he does at
the top of a mountain or in the petals of a flower. To think otherwise is to demean the Buddha—
which is to demean oneself.
—R
OBERT
M.
P
IRSIG
,
Z
EN AND THE
A
RT OF
M
OTORCYCLE
M
AINTENANCE
onsider these articles we'd rather not see available on the Web:
Impress Your Enemies: How to Build Your Own Atomic Bomb from Readily Available Materials
2
How to Modify the Influenza Virus in Your College Laboratory to Release Snake Venom
C
Ten Easy Modifications to the
E. coli
Virus
How to Modify Smallpox to Counteract the Smallpox Vaccine
Build Your Own Chemical Weapons from Materials Available on the Internet
How
to Build a Pilotless, Self-Guiding, Low-Flying Airplane Using a Low-Cost Aircraft, GPS, and a
Notebook Computer
Or, how about the following:
The Genomes of Ten Leading Pathogens
The Floor Plans of Leading Skyscrapers
The Layout of U.S. Nuclear Reactors
The Hundred Top Vulnerabilities of Modern Society
The Top Ten Vulnerabilities of the Internet Personal Health Information on One Hundred Million Americans
The Customer Lists of Top Pornography Sites
Anyone posting the first item above is almost certain to
get a quick visit from the FBI, as did Nate Ciccolo, a
fifteen-year-old high school student, in March 2000. For a school science project he built a papier-mâché model of an
atomic bomb that turned out to be disturbingly accurate. In the ensuing media storm Ciccolo told ABC News,
"Someone just sort of mentioned, you know, you can go on the Internet now and get information. And I, sort of, wasn't
exactly up to date on things. Try it. I went on there and a couple of clicks and I was right there.
3
Of course Ciccolo didn't possess the key ingredient, plutonium, nor did he have
any intention of acquiring it, but
the report created shock waves in the media, not to mention among the authorities who worry about nuclear
proliferation.
Ciccolo had reported finding 563 Web pages on atomic-bomb designs, and the publicity resulted in an urgent
effort to remove them. Unfortunately, trying to get rid of information on the Internet is akin to trying to sweep
back the
ocean with a broom. Some of the sites continue to be easily accessible today. I won't provide any URLs in this book,
but they are not hard to find.
Although the article titles above are fictitious, one can find extensive information on the Internet about all of these
topics.
4
The Web is an extraordinary research tool. In my own experience, research that used to require a half day at
the library can now be accomplished typically in a couple of minutes or less.
This has enormous and obvious benefits for advancing beneficial technologies, but it can
also empower those
whose values are inimical to the mainstream of society. So are we in danger? The answer is clearly yes. How much
danger, and what to do about it, are the subjects of this chapter.
My urgent concern with this issue dates back at least a couple of decades. When I wrote
Do'stlaringiz bilan baham: 
