Will the Burgeoning Bioeconomy be a force for Order or for Disorder?
Jaime Metzl on the Superconvergence of our era of integrated challenges
Advanced biotech (CRISPR gene editing, gene drives, personalized medicine) could be the most Disordering technology ever invented. Techniques like gene drives could help us eradicate malaria by sterilising mosquitoes, but could they also spell the end of humanity (by unleashing unintended consequences)? Or release a new pandemic – think COVID-19 which was likely caused by a lab lead of a man-made super virus – into the population?
While biotech offers the potential to revolutionise everything, no one has yet proposed any coherent regulations over this domain. Seeking to learn more about advances in Biotech and how they interact with AI, globalization, and climate change Alex and I are joined by Jamie Metzl. Jamie is the author of Superconvergence, and Founder and Chair of the global social movement, OneShared.World. Jaime and I discuss the vast opportunities and profound threats that emanate from biotech.
Listen here. I put forth a more socially conservative vision that we need to learn from our collective past, what I call the ‘French-peasant’ approach, while Jaime poopoos that approach advancing more boldly futuristic solutions.
To Order the Disorder, Alex and I discuss whether top-down or bottom-up governance solutions could help solve this issue, and what we need to do to regain the public’s trust in experts.
Here are some of my favourite quotes from Jaime’s book:
The ultimate problem we face today is not SARS-CoV-2 or any other
virus. It’s not pandemics or climate change, nuclear weapons, or any other
single threat. It’s not CRISPR genome editing or generative AI or any single
technology. It’s that our societies and world are not optimally organized
to solve the shared existential challenges we face. We haven’t been able
to create an empowered global public health system to protect us from
deadly pandemics, a global environmental authority to coordinate efforts
to keep our planet livable, a mechanism to prevent the widespread diffusion
of nuclear weapons, autonomous killer robots, and other weapons of
mass destruction, or a global system to help collectively manage our most
transformative technologies—all for the same reason.
‘The challenge of rapidly advancing generative AI was a
perfect parallel to the challenge of pandemics and biosecurity, but almost
no one framed those issues together in the public conversation. All the steps
that could be taken in response to the perceived risks of uncontrolled AI systems
were the same, at least in broad terms, as the steps which needed to be
taken to respond meaningfully to all of our world’s other biggest common
challenges, including the challenges posed by human reengineered life.’
‘Imagine a world where each of us has our whole genomes sequences soon after birth, if not before… if a child has a problem, the sequenced genomes informs the baby’s care…. As time passes much of a person’s recorded life, including their medical history, is incorporated into this massive and growing personal data set. AI systems, continually assess all of this data and share lifestyle recommendations… predictive algorithms constantly assess to detect patterns of concern.’
‘Someone who is truly against the genetic modification of corn might logically, therefore, have a bigger problem with ancient indigenous people in the Americas who introduced the entire concept of farming than with modern seed companies like Bayer or Syngenta.’
Just as it would be absurd and self-defeating to simply declare today that we do not want to apply advanced genetic and other technologies to our food supply, it would be similarly absurd to say that a small number of scientists and government regulators should alone determine the future of the foods we eat and the plant life on the planet we share. That’s why we, all of us, must play a role in assessing the safety of these powerful technologies and determining how they should or should not be applied. ’
MEGA ORDERER DEEP BACKGROUND:
Mega-order Jamie’s book, Superconvergence, at
https://superconvergencebook.com/
For more on Jamie’s unbelievable career:
And his novel ‘Eternal Sonata’: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28695898-eternal-sonata
And his theories and extensive public engagement about the origins of COVID-19: https://jamiemetzl.com/origins-of-sars-cov-2/
NOW FOR OUR PAID SUBSCRIBERS… Here is an audio of my whole unedited discussion with Jaime (as an audio file) and
A major article on COVID-19 origins and the genuine likelihood of a coverup
that was published last week in Der Spiegel, Germany’s leading news magazine.
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