Having calmed down slightly from my fits of anger about "flat-packed futures" [Scott Smith] yesterday, I've had some time to think about what to take away from it and how I can apply this frustration to my project. There's a certain potential for malevolence that comes with crowds just bowing down to new technology, as more and more people just accept that things work a certain way without questioning the mechanics or motives behind it.
There's a great piece by Jamais Cascio (what a name!) off Futurist Forum, that tells us that the best way to predict the future of technology is to figure out how people will use it illegally. Whatever the intentions of the inventors or marketers or corporations that roll out these shiny new things, there will always be someone who will figure out how to use it in illicit ways; we've seen it time and time again. "3D printing is going to be so amazing! Everyone will become a new-age designer in no time!" we all scream. Pretty soon the 3D printed gun is prototyped and shared. "Bitcoin is the revolution of self regulated currency! It will change the way we look at banks and government!" we all applaud. Next thing we know a $1.8 billion drug marketplace is in operation, accounting for around half of all Bitcoins in circulation.
During the Boston Marathon bombing, there was an explosion of confusion and finger-pointing at falsely-accused suspects on Twitter, while traditional media sat idly by, shrugging their shoulders. At first it seemed social media had accomplished for the first time to uncover a story before news media – a great victory for crowdsourcing. Instead it just turned out to be a lesson in how quickly social media can become infected with disorder as a little false information spirals out of control.
So what happens when these patterns are applied to the future of biotech? As living things are calculated into these algorithms, what kind of disorder and disruption will emerge? Black market gene therapy is definitely a viable example, and I think there could be more – much more – if we take into the consideration all of the different institutions that might get involved with this. The collection of nationwide DNA databases means banks of genetic information could be used for marketing or political strategies, in the same way that "big data" currently dictates the strategies of government and corporate.
People already talk about how much people are "worth" in terms of monetary value, but what about biological value? There might be ways that people would start investing in genetic properties rather than financial. Perhaps stock markets will begin to revolve around the biological value of individuals or communities. And what happens when these genetic information banks get hacked? Could a single tweet cause that bio-market to crash like it did on Wall Street last April?
What about malicious behaviour on an individual scale? If people's biological makeup becomes a coveted commodity, it doesn't take much imagination to envision how it could infect the already horrible atrocities that we know so well. People might start hoarding whatever pieces of valuable DNA they can find; we might see a rise in genetic theft or women raping biologically affluent men to steal their precious sperm. It sounds really crazy, but I don't think it's impossible.
There's a great piece by Jamais Cascio (what a name!) off Futurist Forum, that tells us that the best way to predict the future of technology is to figure out how people will use it illegally. Whatever the intentions of the inventors or marketers or corporations that roll out these shiny new things, there will always be someone who will figure out how to use it in illicit ways; we've seen it time and time again. "3D printing is going to be so amazing! Everyone will become a new-age designer in no time!" we all scream. Pretty soon the 3D printed gun is prototyped and shared. "Bitcoin is the revolution of self regulated currency! It will change the way we look at banks and government!" we all applaud. Next thing we know a $1.8 billion drug marketplace is in operation, accounting for around half of all Bitcoins in circulation.
During the Boston Marathon bombing, there was an explosion of confusion and finger-pointing at falsely-accused suspects on Twitter, while traditional media sat idly by, shrugging their shoulders. At first it seemed social media had accomplished for the first time to uncover a story before news media – a great victory for crowdsourcing. Instead it just turned out to be a lesson in how quickly social media can become infected with disorder as a little false information spirals out of control.
So what happens when these patterns are applied to the future of biotech? As living things are calculated into these algorithms, what kind of disorder and disruption will emerge? Black market gene therapy is definitely a viable example, and I think there could be more – much more – if we take into the consideration all of the different institutions that might get involved with this. The collection of nationwide DNA databases means banks of genetic information could be used for marketing or political strategies, in the same way that "big data" currently dictates the strategies of government and corporate.
People already talk about how much people are "worth" in terms of monetary value, but what about biological value? There might be ways that people would start investing in genetic properties rather than financial. Perhaps stock markets will begin to revolve around the biological value of individuals or communities. And what happens when these genetic information banks get hacked? Could a single tweet cause that bio-market to crash like it did on Wall Street last April?
What about malicious behaviour on an individual scale? If people's biological makeup becomes a coveted commodity, it doesn't take much imagination to envision how it could infect the already horrible atrocities that we know so well. People might start hoarding whatever pieces of valuable DNA they can find; we might see a rise in genetic theft or women raping biologically affluent men to steal their precious sperm. It sounds really crazy, but I don't think it's impossible.
