The Future of Technology, the Technology of the Future

Recently, there was a call for a global treaty, modeled after the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, to regulate human genetic engineering. The reference to nuclear weapons immediately called to mind the current global situation, with “rogue” states defying international calls to halt their nuclear development programs. It’s easy to envision a future with a recalcitrant state carrying out a program of human genetic engineering in violation of the so-called Genetic Heritage Safeguard Treaty. Certainly top Pentagon scientists have raised this issue. But is a 20th century solution really the best way to solve a distinctly 21st century problem?

Without dueling superpowers to keep the smaller nations in line, non-proliferation has already started to breakdown. That goes to show that a 20th century solution can’t solve a distinctly 20th century problem in the 21st century. In addition, the technology for human genetic engineering, once developed, will be far easier to conceal from inspectors and satellite reconnaissance than the equipment required to produce nuclear weapons. Thus, enforcement will be much more difficult, even with ostensibly cooperative nations. Enforcement also relies on powerful nation-states, which may be another relic of the 20th century thanks to emerging neofeudalism.

We do need global regulation of human genetic engineering, but it’s vitally important that we not reject world-changing innovations just because they’re new or scary. Genetic engineering isn’t Frankenstein. We need to look at the situation, as much as we can, in terms of what someone in the year 2100 would want us to do and not just have a knee-jerk, 20th century reaction.

Researchers at Cornell Medical Center in New York have genetically modified a human embryo (additional coverage from The New York Times). While the embryo was not viable due to a chromosomal imbalance, the work has drawn fire from watchdog groups concerned about “designer babies.” I found a quote from Kathy Hudson, director of the Genetics and Public Policy Center in Washington, D.C., particularly interesting:

“We’re not even close to having that technology in hand to be able to do it right,” she said, and it would be ethically unacceptable to try it when it’s unsafe.

That’s a bit of a myopic statement. She seems to be saying that we’ll never develop the techniques because it’s unethical to use them if they’re unsafe, but they can’t be made safe without testing them. The very existence of the story, however, shows that at least one ethics committee in this country approved of using unproven techniques on non-viable embryos. That’s one avenue to perfecting the necessary tools, and there may be others.

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Scientists in Massachusetts have engineered bacteria to penetrate tumors in mice and destroy the tumor from the inside out. As The Speculist points out, this essentially makes them a very rudimentary nanorobot. On the other coast, researchers have created new enzymes [hattip: CRN] to carry out reaction that are not catalyzed by any enzyme anywhere. The technique, though computationally intense, can potentially be expanded to virtually any reaction. That means the new enzymes, similar to the bacteria, are some of the first nanomachines and the forerunners of possible molecular assemblers.

There are interesting possibilities for combining the two technologies, as well. For example, rather than using their current method for killing tumors, the bacteria could instead use a novel enzyme to convert an inert substance into a lethal one. This approach would allow medication to be targeted directly to the tumor while minimizing primary or side effects in healthy tissues. But why limit it to fighting tumors? Get the bacteria to hang out in your liver and help process toxins. Or they could speed healing after a heart attack or major surgery. The ability to add new activities to our bodies will be a boon to 21st century medicine.

Computers are already everywhere in our society, but in the years to come, we’ll become less and less aware of when we’re interacting with a computer and when we’re. Eventually, the distinction between the physical world and the virtual world will disappear completely. This will have a profound impact on how we see ourselves as individuals.

Jamais Cascio starts us off by describing the Internet in 2020:

It will be indistinguishable from the physical world. Everything and everyone you see around you will have a simultaneous physical and digital instantiations. You can think of it in terms of augmented reality with glasses or contact lenses.

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