Gray Goo

[bascule]

How concerned are you about GNR Bascule? You seem to be fairly optomistic and, at least, more concerned about nukes as a risk than GNR.

 

Optimistic as I may sound, I know that accelerating change will bring with it the knowledge of a whole new assortment of ways to destroy ourselves.

 

I'm fairly convinced that if we don't manage to get Eric Drexler's proposed nanotech shield up quickly, we will run into a grey goo situation before too long...

[Sisyphus]

I still think the most dangerous threat to our existence is anti-intellectualism, probably as a result of religion. Last time it resulted in a dark age that lasted hundreds of years. Now the stakes are higher, because we've already used up so much of our readily accessible natural resources. If our civilization falls, it's quite possible that another won't be able to rise on our bones.

[Pangloss]

I still think the most dangerous threat to our existence is anti-intellectualism, probably as a result of religion. Last time it resulted in a dark age that lasted hundreds of years. Now the stakes are higher, because we've already used up so much of our readily accessible natural resources. If our civilization falls, it's quite possible that another won't be able to rise on our bones.

 

Oh boy... I hate to belittle your point, because I think the danger you describe is a valid concern in theory, but I think we're in far more danger from people who THINK we're facing an immediate threat on that basis and intend to do something to stop that perceived threat (like wiping out all vestiges of religion from any aspect of our society, which I don't mean to imply is anything that you have suggested at all). Using buzzwords and catchphrases like "the stakes are higher" and "dark ages" and "civilization falls" just underscore a closed-minded attitude rather than an open, attentive and receptive mind. We hear this sort of thing a lot these days (coming equally from both ends of the spectrum). And I think it's every bit as dangerous as what you're talking about.

 

Put another way, what I'm talking about could be described as "ideological reactionarianism". It's dangerous. It's popular. And it's growing more so every day.

 

Evidence that this is the case may be found in the way that the above position can't be supported by anything more substantial than straw men and refutable, situational examples. The overall fabric of society is just fine. That doesn't mean we shouldn't be paying attention and ready for situations like the one you describe, but "the most dangerous threat to our existence? Whew, I don't see that at all.

[Pangloss]

By the way....

 

How many web sites are there out there where ideological right wingers can gather and chat about what bugs them?

 

How many web sites are there out there where ideological left wingers can gather and chat about what bugs them?

 

Now....

 

How many web sites are there out there where moderates and centrists can gather and chat about what bugs them?

 

What does THAT say about current threats to society?

[bascule]

Using buzzwords and catchphrases like "the stakes are higher" and "dark ages" and "civilization falls" just underscore a closed-minded attitude rather than an open, attentive and receptive mind.

 

Ordinarily I'd agree with you. I've certainly argued the "civilization falls" bit against the peak oil people...

 

But what's really happening here is that knowledge is getting more and more dangerous.

 

Nuclear weapons pose an existential risk, but how practical is it for your average joe to acquire enough uranium/uranium ore (and mill it), convert it to uranium hexafluoride in ultracentrifuges, cast it back into solid, weapons grade form in the shape of the implosion lens of a bomb core (not exactly public knowledge, although certainly something someone with enough know-how could figure out for themselves), and arm it with enough conventional charges to initiate a nuclear blast? Given that only about 10 nations have actually managed to arm themselves, I think we can agree: not very practical.

 

But as nanotechnology becomes a hot item and we see, for example, university students begin to become trained to create whatever nanorobots they can conceive of, how hard does it become for someone to build a self-replicating monster that gobbles up all matter it comes in contact with in order to build copies of itself?

 

I see the same potential in genetic engineering of viruses. For example:

 

http://www.ph.ucla.edu/epi/bioter/specterdeadliersmallpox.html

 

In early 2001, a group of researchers in Australia surprised and scared pox virus experts when they reported that they'd put the interleukin-4 gene, the gene that controls immune responses, into the mousepox virus and found that it made mousepox into a killer virus in naturally immune mice and deadly even to some vaccinated mice. (Mousepox is related to smallpox but can't infect people.)

 

If this particular gene made mousepox vaccine-resistant, then there is the frightening possibility that the gene could be added to the smallpox virus, making it vaccine-resistant -- a super variola. The interleukin-4 gene is one of the most commonly studied genes. Thousands of scientific papers have been written about it and it can be readily purchased on the Internet by scientists. (The gene typically comes as a pinch of dried bacteria in a small brown glass bottle.)

 

Few people realize how straightforward it is to put a gene into a virus. Genetic engineering of viruses, for peaceful research, has become routine and standardized. The cost of supplies for creating a strain of engineered virus for an experiment can be less than $1,000, and it can be done on a laboratory countertop that's three feet long.

 

Pox viruses are among the easiest viruses to engineer in the lab because they readily accept foreign genes. The first engineering of a pox virus was done more than 20 years ago. There is little doubt that Iraqi biologists know how to do it. Smallpox could probably be genetically engineered in a couple of rooms in a small facility with relatively simple safety precautions, and it might be very hard for inspectors to find it or prove what was going on. A nation that has clandestine stocks of smallpox might thereby be able to make a strain that would do an end run around the American stockpile of the vaccine, with severe consequences.

 

What's really happening is the barrier-of-entry for a single person to destroy the entire world and/or wipe out the human species is growing lower and lower with each passing year.

[Sisyphus]

Oh boy... I hate to belittle your point' date=' because I think the danger you describe is a valid concern in theory, but I think we're in far more danger from people who THINK we're facing an immediate threat on that basis and intend to do something to stop that perceived threat (like wiping out all vestiges of religion from any aspect of our society, which I don't mean to imply is anything that [i']you[/i] have suggested at all). Using buzzwords and catchphrases like "the stakes are higher" and "dark ages" and "civilization falls" just underscore a closed-minded attitude rather than an open, attentive and receptive mind. We hear this sort of thing a lot these days (coming equally from both ends of the spectrum). And I think it's every bit as dangerous as what you're talking about.

 

Put another way, what I'm talking about could be described as "ideological reactionarianism". It's dangerous. It's popular. And it's growing more so every day.

 

Evidence that this is the case may be found in the way that the above position can't be supported by anything more substantial than straw men and refutable, situational examples. The overall fabric of society is just fine. That doesn't mean we shouldn't be paying attention and ready for situations like the one you describe, but "the most dangerous threat to our existence? Whew, I don't see that at all.

 

Nukes and such, taken as individual threats, all seem unlikely to me. What I do see, however, beyond the anecdotal, are statistics that reveal startling ignorance in the population at large, and more and more anti-intellectual rhetoric in politicians (which is anecdotal, but then again, they use what people respond to). I didn't mean to imply that it's animminent threat. Just that it's likely to happen, at some point, because cultural values change. Last time, the stabilizing, sophisticated power of the day, Rome, grew weak and was overthrown, and the philosophies of the day became dominated by Christianity, which shunned material things (i.e., science). Hence, hundreds of years of extreme political instability and ignorance. I see no reason whatsoever that such a thing won't happen again, and if it does, then yes, the stakes are higher, because a rennaissance will be far more difficult next time, because our readily availible resources are mostly consumed, and due to globalization there wouldn't be other civilizations, like Islam or China, to carry the torch, as it were. It's got nothing to do with "catchphrases," and it's not any kind of "reactionism," because there is no "reaction:" I have no idea what to do about it. Certainly something like trying to eradicate religion would be extremely counterproductive. Thus, I really wish you would explain to me what's so "dangerous" about my thinking.

[Pangloss]

I actually tend to agree with you about the threat of nukes. I also agree that we're under more "threat" (for lack of a less aggressive and demanding term) from social issues and how we deal with them. The ignorance of the population is a serious concern, and what's also a serious concern is how we deal with that ignorance.

 

I often make comparisons with Rome myself, and I don't think there's "anything dangerous about your thinking", per se. My concern is more along the lines of the way our society often reacts to issues in general.

 

Let me be specific. Rome's acceptance of Christianity wasn't a trigger for its downfall, as you suggest. It was a symptom of a larger problem and the result of the long decay of authority and lack of constitutional protections. I agree that the rejection of science in the middle ages was a negative factor, but it also produced the modern moral society which you benefit from every day.

 

So drawing a comparison like that is counter-productive, because it ignores or downplays very obvious, well-accepted parameters that are not easily dismissed at all. You're throwing out the baby with the bathwater in order to support a position that, in a nutshell, Bush and his religious zealot cronies are trying to rule the world (or whatever).

 

It's even worse -- your belief may even be true. But you haven't proferred anything (that can't be easily refuted) to support it.

 

So my point, in the end, is not that your ideological position is invalid -- it's your opinion, and more power to you. It's that that kind of dismissive, reactionary viewpoint is as equally dangerous on the larger scale (i.e. when a lot of people agree with it in spite of whatever reality may be) is every bit as dangerous as the things you fear.

 

Put another way, whether the mob is hell bent on burning christians, or hell bent on burning scientists, what really is the difference?