5.0 out of 5 stars
The Bill Joy segment, November 26, 2007
This review is from: Charlie Rose with Bill Joy; Daniel Barenboim (March 13, 2000) (DVD)
Joy may not be witty and he certainly does not smile a lot , but what he says makes great sense. He warns about the dangers presented by future developments in Robotics, Genetic Engineering, Nanotechnology. He explains how the 'democratization of evil' may be enabled by the new technologies. Weirdos and haters anywhere might use it to create great human disasters. He is troubled by Ray Kurzweil's vision of Intelligent Machines coming into being- this when he says the rule is the stronger species in contact with a weaker one usually eliminates it. He says it is because he is an optimist and believes that there will be tremendous developments in the coming centuries in the technologies he is speaking about that he is so worried. He essentially is not ordering a moratorium on anything but suggesting that mankind stop and think of what it is doing. He knows that this suggestion is not likely to be taken. The world now seems to be in or out of the hands of a runaway rush of technological development.
I believe Joy is correct in pointing out great dangers. There are many more than he elaborates in this interview. Martin Rees in "Our Last Century?" elaborates more. It seems with each new technology there come new possiblities for disasters.
As I write this the world is on the verge of a possible nuclear Iran, widespread nuclear proliferation, massive transfer of wealth due to energy prices to totalitarian states. Joy that is might have elaborated on the great danger caused by technology's failure to produce a reasonable alternative to fossil fuels.
In any case this was an instructive show with an important social thinker.
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