Question Technology

Top 10 privacy threats of 2007 (Slate)

William Saletan at Slate lists his Top science-and-technology privacy threats of 2007.  A few (numbers 2, 3, and 4: the wars on smoking, trans-fats, and salt) seem like a bit of a stretch.

New Money behind Immortality Enthusiasts

Conde Nast Portfolio has an article profiling Ray Kurzweil, Aubrey de Grey, Silicon Valley venture capitalist Peter Thiel, and some other rich people who -- surprise! -- want to live forever.  From the blurb:

The search for immortality—or at least the exponential extension of human life—is hardly new. But now the hedge fund set has joined the quest, and some big money and names are betting on a "cure" for aging.

Link: Never Say Die,

via Singularity Institute Blog.

Forstalling the New Eugenics

Richard Hayes of the Center for Genetics and Society reviews two new pro-human-enhancement books, Babies by Design: The Ethics of Genetic Choice by Ronald Green and Enhancing Evolution: The Ethical Case for Making Better People by John Harris.  It's worth reading the article in full.  From his conclusion:

If we are to forestall a descent into a techno-eugenic human future of the sort that so captivates Green, Harris and their colleagues, we need to declare and build support for a compelling, majoritarian position on the new human biotechnologies. We will need a bipartisan initiative bringing together influential social and political leaders, enlightened secular and religious conservatives, the morally serious communitarian Left, religious leaders from many faiths rooted in the great traditions of moral inquiry, scientists who appreciate the wider societal context of their work, and biotech industry leaders who understand where markets have their place and where they don’t. We will need regulations, laws and treaties at domestic and international levels that preclude dangerous applications of the new human biotechnologies in order that the many benign and beneficent applications can be developed in good faith and full confidence. It is difficult to imagine a greater or more urgent challenge.

Link: Self-Made Man (The American Interest)

Do We Need a Presidential Debate on Science?

Many prominent bloggers and scientists have been lobbying for a presidential debate on science: Sciencedebate 2008.  From the site:

Given the many urgent scientific and technological challenges facing America and the rest of the world, the increasing need for accurate scientific information in political decision making, and the vital role scientific innovation plays in spurring economic growth and competitiveness, we call for a public debate in which the U.S. presidential candidates share their views on the issues of The Environment, Health and Medicine, and Science and Technology Policy.

Good luck with that.  It sounds eminently reasonable -- there are many important policy issues related to science -- but does anyone expect substantive discussion to happen in political debates any more?  Does anyone even watch them?  I caught a few minutes of one "town hall" CNN debate that was astoundingly idiotic.  People in the audience were actually asking good questions but CNN's Wolf Blitzer turned most everything into a hot-button "hands up" question (e.g. "What are the attributes you look for in a supreme court justice?" becomes "Overturn Roe v. Wade?  Hands up everybody who wants to overturn Roe v. Wade!").  I can't imagine a debate on science issues turning out any better.

Even if debates were useful, does science really deserve its own?  Why not just ensure that these questions get asked at other debates?  The Sciencedebate 2008 site tells us that Science and Technology "may be the most important social issue of our time."  Is that true for everyone or just a certain sci-tech elite?  Hasn't this crowd already gotten their answers from the candidate days at Google and interviews in TechCrunch, Wired, etc.?

To sum up, I'm not really against a science debate, but this campaign bugs me a little.

Nick Carr and others on 23andMe

From the Guardian last week:

Google's involvement suggests that 23andMe probably has larger ambitions than just providing individuals with gene maps. As its online store of genetic information grows and as customers add personal information, the company could end up with a database of extraordinary value to pharmaceutical firms, medical researchers and insurance companies.

Sorted and analysed with Google's sophisticated data-crunching tools, the database could disclose hidden connections between genes, aptitudes and diseases. In a privacy statement on its site, the company acknowledges that it plans to grant outside groups access to its database, allowing them to search, "without knowing the identities of the individuals involved", for correlations between genetic variations and health conditions. That could well turn into a major business.

The company also says that it will give users "the ability to connect with other 23andMe customers through sharing features". 23andMe could evolve into a social network, a biotech version of MySpace or Facebook where people make connections not with friends but with people who share similar genetic traits. This, too, could provide the basis for a lucrative business. Given that 23andMe tracks its customers' movements with cookies, it may not be long before we see genetically targeted advertising.

Link: Google gives new gene mapping service a bit of spit and polish.

See also earlier articles by David Ewing Duncan in Portfolio: Welcome to the future and David Hamilton in VentureBeat: Will 23andMe and Navigenics lock up your genome and charge you for the key? (via Biopolitical Times)

MySpace for Your Genome

Jesse Reynolds of the excellent Center for Genetics and Society had a good article last week on AlterNet about the risks of putting your genome data online, something the Google- and Genetech-funded startup 23andMe wants you to do.  An excerpt:

Eminent technology investor and pundit Esther Dyson isn't worried about privacy policies, her personal records being hacked, or these companies cooperating with the National Security Agency. In fact, she wants you to turn over not just your medical records, but your personal genetic sequence as well.

In a recent interview on Charlie Rose, Dyson explained that she's among ten people about to put their health histories and genetic sequences on the internet for public viewing. She optimistically predicts that lots of us will soon entrust such information to online companies, albeit in private accounts.

Although Dyson acknowledged some of the troubling questions this prospect raises, she quickly dismissed them: "Like it or not, it's gonna happen."

Her rhetorical dodge is unfortunate. The convergence of biotechnology, the web, and big business is, in fact, quite alarming.

Here's the scenario: After signing up online, you receive a kit in the mail. In your home, you provide a saliva sample in the supplied cup and ship it off to a lab. For a few hundred dollars, much of your genome is sequenced, and the company places it on a website. It's then linked to your complete medical history, also online.

At this point, the company says, you can learn about your predispositions to diseases, conditions for which you carry a recessive gene, and genealogical information. The website offers medical advice, along with advertisements for potentially useful products and services. You can even communicate with people with similar genetic characteristics, making "friends" and forming "groups."

That seems to be the plan of a Silicon Valley start-up, 23andMe, named for the 23 pairs of chromosomes that hold your genome. Google, Genentech, and venture capital firms have invested at least $10 million in 23andMe. Its founder recently married one of Google's founders. Ms. Dyson is also an investor and board member -- something that didn't come up during her interview.

Link: Google wants to track your medical history -- and your genome

Book Notes

I recently read Tarleton Gillespie's Wired Shut: Copyright and the Shape of Digital Culture.  It's a remarkably comprehensive study of issues surrounding digital copyright.  He gets beyond the simplistic rhetoric heard from both sides to look at the broader story in historical, political, and social terms.  On digital rights management (DRM), in particular, he discusses how the strategy has moved beyond legal or public relations campaigns to a "turn to technology."  Enforcing a technological solution, by building the restrictions right into devices, is dangerous not only because it subverts tenets of copyright law like "fair use," but because it sets a dangerous precedent by hiding choice away from users.  There are also chapters on the Strategic Digital Music Initiative (SDMI), encryption in DVDs, and the FCC's "broadcast flag."  Tarleton Gillespie has a blog here.

The Best of Technology Writing 2007 is edited by Steven Levy and looks to be a great collection.  Several of the articles, such as a couple by Kevin Kelly and Jaron Lanier, will be familiar to anyone who paid much attention to tech media or blogs last year, but there are a number of lesser-known articles as well.

Aubrey de Grey has written a book, Ending Aging: The Rejuvenation Breakthroughs That Could Reverse Human Aging in Our Lifetime.  After reading the material for Technology Review's SENS Challenge last year I think I've had my fill of Aubrey de Grey's prose for one lifetime (finite or not), so I think I'll pass.  Here is a review by Paul Boutin in the Wall Street Journal: Battling Time's Ravages.

Singularity Summit 2007 Announced

Last year I reported on the Singularity Summit at Stanford, which featured Raymond Kurzweil, Douglas Hofstadter, Bill McKibben and other thinkers discussing the future of artificial intelligence and its impact on humanity.

This year it's a two-day event and takes place in San Francisco on September 8th and 9th (it's also no longer free -- tickets are $50).  I'm planning to attend and will report on it here, from a skeptical perspective, of course.  Their featured speakers include roboticist Rodney Brooks, Google's Peter Norvig, and even a bioethicist, Wendell Wallach from Yale.

Link: Singularity Summit 2007: AI and the Future of Humanity.

Here is a related post by Bruce Klein: When will AI surpass human-level intelligence?
A rough poll says the singularity is due to arrive between 2030 and 2050.  Better start preparing!  I think that's optimistic, and it's kind of an ill-defined question anyway.  I'm not sure you could ever measure such a thing definitively, at least not until the robots have enslaved us -- then I think you could say it's happened.

Risks of Ethnic-Specific Weapons

Barry Kellman has an op-ed on this topic in yesterday's San Francisco Chronicle.  Excerpts:

For $1,000, you soon will be able to purchase the text of your own DNA  -- the unique sequence of your genetic inheritance. You can get the information, that is, unless you're Russian. President Vladimir Putin has just announced a ban on the export of all human medical biological materials. He is worried that his citizens' genetic data could enable Western scientists to make ethnic-specific biological weapons for use against Russians.

[...] It is important to stress that there does not now appear to be any independent confirmation of Putin's fears. [...] If anyone actually decided to make an ethnic-specific weapon, are there laws in place to prevent a catastrophe? Are there controls to ensure that information about ethnic-specific genetic traits is kept away from terrorist organizations? The answer must be an emphatic no.   

Today, there is too much that is unknown about bioscience. We do not know where every well-equipped laboratory is, and we have inadequate systems for tracking the movement of pathogens and equipment. There are grossly deficient capabilities for putting information together to give law enforcers the best chance to stop evil applications of emerging techniques. In many parts of the world, a terrorist or criminal group could prepare bioweapons without substantial risk of detection and could inflict unimaginable damage against unprotected populations.

Link: The potential dark side of genetics.

Kellman has a book on this topic due out in August: Bioviolence: Preventing Biological Terror and Crime.

CBC Rebroadcasts 2006 Massey Lectures

This week the CBC radio show Ideas is rebroadcasting Margaret Somerville's 2006 Massey Lectures, titled The Ethical Imagination.  It's in five parts, airing evenings this Monday-Friday (July 2-6).  Part one is archived and always available on their site, but the rest aren't, so you'd have to catch it live on one of the streaming stations.

I read and liked the book version, but haven't heard the lectures.

Links: The Ethical Imagination, 2006 Massey Lectures, Ideas main page (with link to streaming audio).

Aubrey de Grey at Google

Video of a talk Aubrey de Grey gave at Google this week: Prospects for extending healthy life -- a lot.

It's about an hour long.  I've only watched a bit of the intro and conclusions.  He concludes with a bizarre (and probably tasteless) analogy.  He compares his work to what the passengers on Flight 93 did by overtaking the hijackers in order to save people on the ground.  His final two slides are a picture of Todd Beamer and a slide that says "Let's Roll."

Previous posts about Aubrey de Grey.

DNA Testing For Dogs

From Technology Review's blog:

A new genetic test, marketed by Maryland-based MetaMorphix, can determine a dog's mix of breeds with 90 percent accuracy. The company has processed thousands of tests since the product went on the market in February, CEO Edwin Quattlebaum said at the Biotechnology Industry Convention in Boston earlier this week.

Because many canine diseases are linked to particular breeds, the results could help owners make health decisions about their dogs. The test has also garnered interest from animal shelters: shelter employees say that being able to provide a bit of a dog's "back story" encourages people to adopt. "Owners get a kick out of knowing the heritage of their dogs," says Quattlebaum.

Link: Uncovering your dog's genetic history.

It seems like this opens up some of the same medical ethics dilemmas that genetic testing in people does.  And maybe I'm being a bit too negative, but when I read about knowing a dog's heritage before adopting, I think more about the flip-side -- that this will result in more dogs of mixed or less popular breeds being euthanized.

I'm surprised at that accuracy rating -- 90 percent accuracy at identifying only 38 breeds doesn't seem very impressive.

Update: In the comments, Angela has pointed to an earlier story in the Washington Post on the troubled history of MetaMorphix: Independent Biotech Follows DNA to Dollars.  (Thanks Angela!)

Are You A Machine?

I recently spotted this new book: Are You A Machine? The Brain, the Mind, and What It Means to be Human.  It looks like a good read and what's also impressive is that it began as a high school essay.  The author, Eliezer Sternberg is now a sophomore at Brandeis University.  There's an article about Sternberg and his book in The Bradeis Hoot.

From the book description:

Right now, someone in an artificial intelligence lab is fusing silicon circuitry in an attempt to engineer the human mind. In a hospital, a neurosurgeon is attempting to influence a patient’s emotions by firing electrical impulses into his brain. In a classroom, a teacher is explaining how neurons in the brain interact to generate thoughts, feelings, and decisions.

The question of where consciousness comes from and how it works is likely the greatest mystery we face. Despite progress in our knowledge of the brain, we still don’t know how it allows us to do things like enjoy a sunset, solve a math problem, or use our imagination. For those of us who have ever thought about issues of the mind or free will, these developments pose provocative questions.

What would happen if those mysterious processes could be understood? Would a scientist be able to know everything about our minds just from studying the systems in our brains? Could he predict how we will think and act? After all, the brain is an organ just like the heart or stomach, and scientists can figure out when the heart will beat and when the stomach will release bile. If such a thing could be accomplished, would that make me a machine?

There are those who approach this question from a technological perspective. Someday, an engineer might be able to build a robot with my memories, opinions, and behavior. Would that make me a machine?

This concise, lucid primer on neuroscience and philosophy of mind takes the reader to the very depths of the mystery of consciousness, exploring it through the eyes of key philosophers, neuroscientists, and technologists. Avoiding jargon and oversimplification, author Eliezer J. Sternberg illuminates baffling questions of the brain, mind, and what it means to be human.

Link: Are You a Machine? (publisher's page)

DNA Tests Offer Immigrants Hope or Despair (NYT)

From today's New York Times:

For 14 years, Isaac Owusu’s faraway boys have tugged at his heart. They sent report cards from his hometown in Ghana and painstaking letters in fledgling English while he scrimped and saved to bring them here one day.

So when he became an American citizen and officials suggested taking a DNA test to prove his relationship to his four sons, he embraced the notion. Imagine, he marveled as a lab technician rubbed the inside of his cheek, a tiny swab of cotton would reunite his family.

But modern-day science often unearths secrets long buried. When the DNA results landed on Isaac Owusu’s dinner table here last year, they showed that only one of the four boys — the oldest — was his biological child.

Federal officials are increasingly turning to genetic testing to verify the biological bonds between new citizens and the overseas relatives they hope to bring here, particularly those from war-torn or developing countries where identity documents can be scarce or doctored.

But while the tests often lead to joyful reunions among immigrant families, they are forcing others to confront unexpected and sometimes unbearable truths.

Link: DNA Tests Offer Immigrants Hope or Despair - New York Times.

Risks of Drugs in Your Food

In an article in today's New York Times, Denise Caruso (author of Intervention) writes about new "BioPharma" crops and how the current processes for assessing risk are inadequate.  Excerpts:

A new generation of genetically engineered crops that produce drugs and chemicals is fast approaching the market — bringing with it a new wave of concerns about the safety of the global food and feed supply.

The plants produce medicinal substances like insulin, anticoagulants and blood substitutes. They produce vaccine proteins for diseases like cholera, as well as antibodies against tooth decay and non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Enzymes and other chemicals from the plants can be used for a range of industrial processes.

[...]

Once the rogue seeds are replanted, could the plants thrive in their new home and possibly overtake native varieties or wild relatives? Could the pharma trait increase in frequency and concentration, until it reaches a “dose” that causes health effects in those who consume it unwittingly? The probability for any one of these situations may be low, Professor Ellstrand said, but the scientific answer to each question is yes.

What is most worrisome is that the Agriculture Department seems to reject such reasonable, science-based public safety concerns. Agency policy allows developers to withhold data on pharma crops from the public as confidential business information, and the public is not allowed to comment on biopharma planting applications until after an official risk evaluation is completed.

[...]

Scientists often dismiss the idea that people without technical knowledge can help them make risk assessments. As a result, biotech scientists and regulators have long made safety determinations from within an opaque system of their own design, using only the evidence they accept as valid.

But scientific evidence is not a constant, like the speed of light or pi. Especially in biology, where we still know so little, “evidence” is often just a small circle of light surrounded by the darkness of the unknown. Decisions about risk cannot safely be made in a private club that accepts only its members’ notions of scientific evidence.

The best research on risk declares the opposite to be true: that risk evidence is particularly subject to distortion by conflicting interests, and that the best foil for such distortions is to ensure that the people whose fate is at stake participate in the analysis.

We need a new policy framework for scientific evidence that is built on this foundation. If developers want to sell their products, they must subject their inventions to the helpful scrutiny of people outside the club — before radical technologies like biopharma are brought to market.

Link: How to Confine the Plants of the Future? - New York Times.

There's more about the article at Denise Caruso's blog, HybridVigor.net.