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Neuro, Cyber, Slaughter: Emerging Technological Threats In 2017 (thebulletin.org)

Posted by EditorDavid on from the happy-new-year dept.

"Wouldn't it be nice if advances in technology stopped throwing new problems at the world? No such luck," writes Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. "Several emerging technological threats could -- soon enough -- come to rival nuclear weapons and climate change in their potential to upend (or eliminate) civilization." Lasrick writes: In 2017, the cyber threat finally began to seem real to the general public. Advances in biotech in 2017 could lead to the deliberate spread of disease and a host of other dangers. And then there were the leaps forward made in AI. Here's a roundup of coverage from the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists on advances in emerging technological threats that were made in the last year.
One article even describes the possibility of malevolent brain-brain networks in the future, warning scientists (and the international community) to "remain vigilant about neurotechnologies as they become more refined -- and as the practical barriers to their malevolent use begin to lower."

24 of 38 comments (clear)

  1. Malevolent brain-brain networks in the future? by Harold+Halloway · · Score: 1

    Aren't those things the reason I've been wearing tin-foil hats all this time?

  2. Dreamscape by cellocgw · · Score: 1

    One of my favoite SciFi/fantasy flicks that never made it big.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dreamscape_(1984_film)

    --
    https://app.box.com/WitthoftResume Code: https://github.com/cellocgw
  3. Hobos with TB by PPH · · Score: 1

    ... and hepatitis.

    We used to have sanitariums where we could put people with communicable diseases. Now they just wander around, wheezing on people, asking for spare change. We have a big public health campaign to get adults vaccinated for whooping cough because "Muh poor baby!" But parents think nothing of dragging their kid with them to Starbucks and plopping them down next to a bum coughing up a lung.

    --
    Have gnu, will travel.
    1. Re:Hobos with TB by Applehu+Akbar · · Score: 1

      Starbucks? Now you have to worry about the filthy, bedbug-infested bums at the public library where your kid is trying to do her homework.

  4. Being Malevolent, Is Worth It. by geekmux · · Score: 2

    "...and as the practical barriers to their malevolent use begin to lower."

    The Military Industrial Complex champions warmongering for profit.

    Big Pharma continues to put opium in a bottle, creating millions of addicts.

    The Banking Industry creates a housing crisis and global financial collapse, with zero punishment or deterrent to repeat it.

    Let's not even fucking pretend we give a shit about being malevolent. Greed welcomes that activity.

    1. Re:Being Malevolent, Is Worth It. by DontBeAMoran · · Score: 1

      Sometimes I think the Ferengi and their Rules of acquisition are better than the hu-mans and their relentless quest for profits.

      --
      #DeleteFacebook
    2. Re:Being Malevolent, Is Worth It. by PingPongBoy · · Score: 1

      Let's not even fucking pretend we give a shit about being malevolent. Greed welcomes that activity.

      Funny that the devil you don't know might not be nicer. Suppose we create a place where greed is allowed but malevolence is not. I don't know, would that be a place to be?

      --
      Know your pads. One time pad: good for cryptography. Two timing pad: where to take your mistress.
    3. Re:Being Malevolent, Is Worth It. by geekmux · · Score: 1

      >The Banking Industry creates a housing crisis and global financial collapse, with zero punishment or deterrent to repeat it.

      If the banking industry stops lending to low income deadbeats then they will be tagged as racist and attacked by SJW. Better to cause a major financial crash than be labelled racist, am I right comrade?

      If someone is labeled a deadbeat, then there's a damn good chance they've earned that label.

      Pay your bills on time. Don't live beyond your means. Don't drown yourself in debt. Debt to income ratios and other common sense lending practices are colorblind, so the racist excuse doesn't work.

    4. Re:Being Malevolent, Is Worth It. by geekmux · · Score: 1

      Let's not even fucking pretend we give a shit about being malevolent. Greed welcomes that activity.

      Funny that the devil you don't know might not be nicer. Suppose we create a place where greed is allowed but malevolence is not. I don't know, would that be a place to be?

      There's nothing wrong with Greed itself at a reasonable level. We all have goals, and strive to better ourselves and our families. The problems arise when Greed becomes Fucking Obscene Greed, which requires a dismissal of ethics, and often champions immoral and illegal behavior.

      When you look at what a person can reasonably spend in a lifetime, there is essentially no reason that a millionaire should strive to become a billionaire. And yet we have billionaires striving to become trillionaires. A massive imbalance of global wealth serves no purpose, and negatively impacts billions of people.

      Greed can be used as a positive motivator for most. For some, it can grow into an addiction, and become as damaging for a society as any cancer. It is the latter we must find a cure for.

  5. Re: Climate Change? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    You must be an ignoramus who doesn't watch the news. Hurricanes kill, severe snow and ice kills, hot summer kills, migrating illegal sand-n1gger terrorists kill, lung-brain-prostate cancer from breathing carcinogenic exhaust kills.

  6. If this all sounds incoherent, get used to it. by hey! · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Visualize human knowledge as a sphere. The surface area of that sphere increases as the square of the radius -- in other words our contact with the unknown grows more rapidly than our reach.

    At the edge of that sphere is a shell of things we've only recently become aware of -- the known but unfamiliar. For a stone age hunter-gatherer this was a very thin rind, like the skin of an apple. For us, that rind is big fraction of the fruit's volume. In other words Og the Caveman almost always knew exactly what he was doing. In comparison we spend a huge amount of effort in making things up as we go along, and it will only get worse as knowledge continues to advance.

    --
    Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
    1. Re:If this all sounds incoherent, get used to it. by 110010001000 · · Score: 1

      The only thing that made sense in your post was the part where you said it sounded incoherent. It is.

    2. Re:If this all sounds incoherent, get used to it. by hey! · · Score: 1

      Irony is dead, I guess.

      --
      Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
    3. Re:If this all sounds incoherent, get used to it. by 110010001000 · · Score: 1

      Well you got +4 Insightful, so I guess it really isn't.

    4. Re:If this all sounds incoherent, get used to it. by HiThere · · Score: 1

      The part that didn't sound incoherent sounded wrong. The volume of a sphere grows more quickly with the radius than the surface area. Of course, it was a metaphor, and one can imagine rules such that the "thickness of the rind" would increase fast enough that the volume of the rind would grow faster than the core...but they sure weren't mentioned.

      Not that I think the metaphor is in any way useful. It's not as if any one person knows all the stuff "in the core".

      --

      I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
  7. Re:Climate Change? by DontBeAMoran · · Score: 1

    Climate change doesn't happen quickly. You may think 20-30 years is a lot, but for the planet's ecosystem, it's barely a blink.

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    #DeleteFacebook
  8. Re: Climate Change? by LifesABeach · · Score: 1

    Do hurricanes count?

  9. Meanhile in the real world... by 110010001000 · · Score: 1

    ....we can barely create functional software. Major corporations release software regularly that has huge bugs and security holes. But, yeah, magically we are going to create malevolent "AI". Right after they figure out how to play "Go" or "Chess" or Monopoly or whatever the AI "researchers" think of next.

    1. Re:Meanhile in the real world... by currently_awake · · Score: 1

      Just because most corporations can't be bothered to write good software doesn't mean nobody can. We know human level intelligence is possible, we just don't know how to get there.

  10. Re: Climate Change? by 110010001000 · · Score: 1

    Yes. Because hurricanes are caused by climate change. That is why the frequency of hurricanes are at an all time low. Er, wait.

  11. Keep capitalism, muslims and socialists separate. by aliquis · · Score: 1

    That would make it easier to deal with.

    They shouldn't mix.

  12. MKULTRA by manu0601 · · Score: 1

    If I recall correctly, MKULTRA main achievement was to destroy a few patients minds at McGill University.

  13. 2017? really? by Cederic · · Score: 1

    Cyber started to become a nasty threat in 1992.

    First time I was cybered by a man masquerading as a woman :(

  14. Re: Climate Change? by LifesABeach · · Score: 1

    Maybe we could ask them if they are empowered by Fox News?