I think this is only a very small update to our picture of spree killer or terrorist demographics. We already know about the enrichment of terrorism with engineers, and Aum Shinrikyo had access to some smart generalists (neuroscience is not a directly deadly field). We also know that such folk are much more likely to succeed at super-simple plans, like this one, than at doing complex technological endeavours for the first time in the face of countermeasures.
How long will it be (if ever) before a typical bio-science Ph.D will have the capacity to kill, say,a million people?
That doesn’t have to ever happen. Ubiquitous DNA sensors that identify deadly agents, DNA vaccines, ubiquitous surveillance at the planning stage, tripwires in synthesis machines, and so forth can proliferate. The typical bio-science PhD is pretty crappy (Sturgeon’s Law), and likely to fail at something like making the smallpox virus unless there is a cookie-cutter script kiddy style approach pre-packaged. That might happen, but we also might see varied government interference that makes failure much more likely, just as interference at every stage of potential nuclear terrorism makes it impracticable (although that is eased by the rare materials).
It doesn’t have to happen. Certainly, if you take defensive measures, it’s less likely to happen.
But warfare has always been an offensive/defensive battle. Offense has seemed to have the advantage for a while, and random violence in a free society has a huge advantage as well. 1K seems easy. 10K takes some skill. 1000k seems unlikely without a very contagious bug with just the right incubation time.
“Ubiquitous surveillance at the planning stage”—that sounds rather ominous there, Big Brother.
What’s more amazing to me is how little damage crazies do, when it just doesn’t seem like it would be that hard.
But warfare has always been an offensive/defensive battle. Offense has seemed to have the advantage for a while, and random violence in a free society has a huge advantage as well. 1K seems easy. 10K takes some skill. 1000k seems unlikely without a very contagious bug with just the right incubation time.
1k seems easy? That is, killing 1k people? That seems possible, but not easy. At very least it deserves a “takes some skill and a huge amount of dedicated planning”.
I started replying, but I just don’t think it’s worth it. I have no particularly brilliant idea here, and likely you’d still just disagree, but I don’t see mileage in giving people ideas about this on the internet just so we can chat.
Ubiquitous DNA sensors that identify deadly agents, DNA vaccines,
Sensors and vaccines all rely on that the pathogen is known, even coded. You could have a register of virulent genes, in order for it to be effective against hybrids, but even then it would be very hard to say whether a something is dangerous or not.
It is much harder to make and test a new deadly pathogen than to create smallpox from the genome, and avoiding even known dangerous genes forces evildoers to do real science.
The whole premise of the original question was that the evildoers are capable of doing real science, within the limits of one or a few people, years, and personal budgets and tools.
“the genome” wouldn’t help really be of much use, in order creating pox from a genome you need to transplant the genome into a similar bacteria, which is no small feat, it would be much easier just to get your hands on the pathogen somehow, and you don’t need to know anything about bio-science to do that, just have a source. In this matter advancing technology is will not likely result increase risk.
I know, it’s hard to restore smallpox without a sample, harder still to create a new and unrecognizable disease, harder still to make one without using identifiable dangerous already-studied genes.
I think this is only a very small update to our picture of spree killer or terrorist demographics. We already know about the enrichment of terrorism with engineers, and Aum Shinrikyo had access to some smart generalists (neuroscience is not a directly deadly field). We also know that such folk are much more likely to succeed at super-simple plans, like this one, than at doing complex technological endeavours for the first time in the face of countermeasures.
That doesn’t have to ever happen. Ubiquitous DNA sensors that identify deadly agents, DNA vaccines, ubiquitous surveillance at the planning stage, tripwires in synthesis machines, and so forth can proliferate. The typical bio-science PhD is pretty crappy (Sturgeon’s Law), and likely to fail at something like making the smallpox virus unless there is a cookie-cutter script kiddy style approach pre-packaged. That might happen, but we also might see varied government interference that makes failure much more likely, just as interference at every stage of potential nuclear terrorism makes it impracticable (although that is eased by the rare materials).
It doesn’t have to happen. Certainly, if you take defensive measures, it’s less likely to happen.
But warfare has always been an offensive/defensive battle. Offense has seemed to have the advantage for a while, and random violence in a free society has a huge advantage as well. 1K seems easy. 10K takes some skill. 1000k seems unlikely without a very contagious bug with just the right incubation time.
“Ubiquitous surveillance at the planning stage”—that sounds rather ominous there, Big Brother.
What’s more amazing to me is how little damage crazies do, when it just doesn’t seem like it would be that hard.
http://www.gwern.net/Terrorism%20is%20not%20Effective
1k seems easy? That is, killing 1k people? That seems possible, but not easy. At very least it deserves a “takes some skill and a huge amount of dedicated planning”.
I started replying, but I just don’t think it’s worth it. I have no particularly brilliant idea here, and likely you’d still just disagree, but I don’t see mileage in giving people ideas about this on the internet just so we can chat.
Sensors and vaccines all rely on that the pathogen is known, even coded. You could have a register of virulent genes, in order for it to be effective against hybrids, but even then it would be very hard to say whether a something is dangerous or not.
It is much harder to make and test a new deadly pathogen than to create smallpox from the genome, and avoiding even known dangerous genes forces evildoers to do real science.
The whole premise of the original question was that the evildoers are capable of doing real science, within the limits of one or a few people, years, and personal budgets and tools.
“the genome” wouldn’t help really be of much use, in order creating pox from a genome you need to transplant the genome into a similar bacteria, which is no small feat, it would be much easier just to get your hands on the pathogen somehow, and you don’t need to know anything about bio-science to do that, just have a source. In this matter advancing technology is will not likely result increase risk.
I know, it’s hard to restore smallpox without a sample, harder still to create a new and unrecognizable disease, harder still to make one without using identifiable dangerous already-studied genes.