Futurist on Tech Backlash, Longevity, Transparency

Author David Brin expounds on artificial intelligence, bioterrorism, 3D printing, gut flora research, and living in the age of transparency.

This week, let's look far ahead. I can think of no better way to reflect on passing the middle of the decade than turning the rest of this column over to futurist David Brin for some choice observations and predictions.

The futurist and science fiction author is a recipient of the Freedom of Speech Award of the American Library Association for his 1998 nonfiction book, The Transparent Society. Brin was a featured speaker at HealthLeaders Media's inaugural Health IT and Quality Exchange this year, where he expounded on various topics.

On technology backlash: "In my latest novel, Existence… I portray a future 30 years from now in which there's truly substantial movement all across the Earth to… say 'stop charging forward.' That's one solution to the minefields. Stop charging forward. Be nostalgic for ancient wisdom. Almost every human civilization not only had a pyramidal social structure, but believed in a golden age in the past when people were better. When they flew to the sky. When they had the knowledge of gods. When they were close to God."

"And they fell from that state of grace because of some human flaw. And then can never rise up again. Now you all know I'm referring to some fable in your own backgrounds. Ours is the first civilization that is daring to move this golden age from the past into a future, a vague future that we probably are not wise enough to build. But one thing we can do is we can build the builders of the builders."

On building artificial intelligence systems: "The attitude that I believe will get us a soft landing when we build AI…is to treat [it the same] as our kids, because that's how we know how to create intelligences that are smart enough and still don't go destroy all humans. Because 99% of our kids wind up not going forth and destroying all humans."

On what makes a science fiction story great: "The greatest books of science fiction, or stories of science fiction, were self-preventing prophecies that so stirred people, so frightened people, that they would devote portions of their lives to making sure it never happened, and you can all think of what the great granddaddy of all such stories would be, and that's George Orwell's 1984."

On the microbiome and bioterrorism: "Get a book that moves too slowly for modern tastes. It's by Aldous Huxley, who wrote one of those self-preventing prophecies that's going to be very much discussed, because Brave New World is more likely how we'll get a tyranny [rather] than [Orwell's] 1984."

"Because so many people will be so empowered with so many technological means of destruction, that the powers that be, if the pyramid gets reinstated, will not be able to afford to make us mad. It won't be Orwell's iron boot in our face. Because millions of teenagers will have MolecuMax on their desktops."

"When those giant labs of computers got compressed down to a desktop, you...have 99% wonderful things and 1% horrible hackers, what do you think is going to happen when the average teenager can synthesize any known or unknown organic compound?"

"I know one immediate response, and that is none of us will ever eat at McDonald's again. Not until we have a tricorder and scan what they hand over… Aldous Huxley pointed out that it might be pleasure, not an iron boot, by which we're controlled."

On human longevity: "It turns out that we're the Methuselahs of Mammals. Did you know that mice and elephants get the same number of heartbeats? A mouse has very rapid metabolism, and she races through hers. The elephant has a very slow metabolism, especially the females. And she takes her time. But they all get about a billion heartbeats. We get three and a half billion heartbeats on average. There's a wall that almost no one gets past. And public health doesn't help with that. Modern medicine doesn't really help with that."

On breakthroughs in 3D printing and gut flora research: "I think within two years, three years, you're going to see things in your local health food store that are actual pills that will actually change your microbiome for the better…we're developing techniques for regeneration. Right now they're able to rip out a cancerous esophagus, put in a cartilaginous module, and stem cells, and when they first started doing this, they thought they would have to imbue into the matrix different growth factors for different types of cells, because we're going to have to grow cartilage here, grow muscle tissue here."

"You would have thought that it would have to take a fantastic level of science and engineering that would often fail, and have this very tailored mix of growth factors embedded in this replacement esophagus. No! They just plug it in! And it becomes a functioning esophagus. Now it's not going to be that easy for kidneys or livers. But what an age to live in."

On the age of transparency: "Blinding elites is not effective. You can't name for me any time in human history when freedom was augmented by that approach, because the elites won't let themselves be blinded. It feels like an existential threat to descendants of monkeys and apes, to be blinded."

"The core point of The Transparent Society is that if you want to maintain freedom, you have to be aggressive about maintaining our ability to look at, and sousveillance is the answer to surveillance… if they use this information against you, you should be able to know who's using it against you… I am Mister Transparency, but I'm not Mister Nakedness."

"There is a cause and a place for technical secrecy. I tell the CIA, there's a time and a place for privacy, without which you can't be human. There's a time and a place to be able to gather your forces. But these will only be defended if they are narrowed."