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> How would you feel about people releasing a $100 'build your own Covid-variant' kit? Not very good but: a) the people who currently have this tech are not w

> How would you feel about people releasing a $100 'build your own Covid-variant' kit? Not very good but: a) the people who currently have this tech are not what I'd call trustworthy so why should I leave dangerous tech only in the hands of dangerous people? b) it would probably kickstart a "build your own vaccine kit" industry

Madmallard 4y ago
Human life is quite fragile
afarrell 4y ago
What questions would you ask to decide if someone is a trustworthy steward of that technology?
- brigandish 4y ago
  Did you fund gain of research function at the labs in Wuhan? Do you know what they found? Were you aware of the low level of biosecurity protocols on the site? Things like that ;-)
  - alexvoda 4y ago
    These would not answer whether someone behaves responsibly with dangerous research. It answers whether someone had any connection to Wuhan. You can find plenty of people who would answer all "no"-s and would be far more destructive if they had access. Would you also claim that no one who worked at Cernobyl was trustworthy? This is just guilt by association.
    - brigandish 4y ago
      > These would not answer whether someone behaves responsibly with dangerous research. Let's see. “Did you fund gain of research function at the labs in Wuhan?” This speaks to trustworthiness and responsibility/recklessness. “Do you know what they found?” This speaks to, again, trustworthiness and transparency. “Were you aware of the low level of biosecurity protocols on the site?” This speaks to, again, trustworthiness and responsibility/recklessness. > You can find plenty of people who would answer all "no"-s and would be far more destructive if they had access. It shows that those with the technology now are not trustworthy, going forward I might have different questions but we should start where we are, not by providing an apologetic and condoning poor behaviour. > Would you also claim that no one who worked at Cernobyl was trustworthy? Did they fuck up? Were they part of an organisation that fucked up? What did they do to stop the incredible fuck up from happening? > This is just guilt by association. Of whom to what?
      - alexvoda 4y ago
        Again, your 3 questions do not provide any information with regards to trustworthiness. You have just decided that the Wuhan Lab is an epicenter of evil and therefore anyone tangential is untrustworthy. There is no logical connection, you filled it in. With regards to Cernobyl, other than Anatoly Dyatlov (who can directly be ascribed blame and served prison time), it is really hard to blame any of the people involved. Yet there were all kinds of known and unknown stresses and defects in the system that resulted in a tragedy. Does that mean we should ban nuclear energy?
        brigandish 4y ago
        > You have just decided that the Wuhan Lab is an epicenter of evil and therefore anyone tangential is untrustworthy. I'm so glad you were able to read my mind, perhaps you could open source your mind reading device, or would that be too dangerous to share to the public? What I have decided is that there is evidence of lies by people involved in the funding and the implementation of the research at Wuhan, there really is no need for your clumsy straw men, especially when you can read my mind. > Does that mean we should ban nuclear energy? I'm the one arguing for the further distribution of technology, are you arguing with yourself now or did your mind reading device go on the blink?
blululu 4y ago
This is just beyond obtuse. More people having access will mean more people who are untrustworthy having access, which means more malicious action. (Unless you want to setup some toy scenario where the only bad faith actors people on the planet are biochemistry researchers). As for building your own vaccine. Even large nations were not able to develop effective ones. It’s easier to put a bullet in someone than it is to take it out.
- brigandish 4y ago
  Pandora's box is open, technology will spread regardless of what you do. You want to limit tech that will become cheaper and easier to build through the efforts of legitimate, well meaning research, and try to stop knowledge spreading as we wish for there to be more people in this line of work. More people having access will mean more people who are untrustworthy having access is entirely right but whether "which means more malicious action" is a corollary is up for debate, as we've seen with violent action around the world via many different types of weaponry. In this talk[1] at DEF CON, John Sotos pleads with hackers to put their time into learning how to combat biological weapons. He points out that the tech will move forward to being able to target more and more specific populations. Like any other weapon, knowing that your enemy has it too and can hurt you or those you care about with it is a highly effective deterrent. > As for building your own vaccine. Even large nations were not able to develop effective ones. It’s easier to put a bullet in someone than it is to take it out. Two things here. Firstly, trauma surgery and techniques from the military and places where bullet wounds are common have benefited the rest of us for when we get into scrapes of even a non-violent kind. Secondly, defence does not always lag behind attack, you assume that the future would look like now but that is to ignore the history of any tech of such nature. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKQDSgBHPfY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKQDSgBHPfY
alexvoda 4y ago
That you even express the problem like this shows an impressive ammount of bias. By calling them dangerous people you are actually implying malice. What makes you believe people with access to biomedical tech are inherently more malicious than the populace? What makes you believe there aren't far more malicious people who do not yet have access to such tech? I think this is just fear of the unknown at work. Biomedical knowledge is complicated and requires effort to learn therefore most consider it a known unknown therefore something to be feared. Some people do have such knowledge therefore they are to be feared because who knows what nefarious intentions they have and what conspiracies they are part of. Therefore they are dangerous people using dangerous tech. Were the physicists who discovered how to split the atom also dangerous people?
- t-3 4y ago
  Danger is not a moral judgement, but a rational one. Iranian nuclear scientists weren't assassinated for no reason, and I highly doubt anyone involved had serious moral accusation to make against them. The U.S. also banned export of cryptography in the past (and still does in some cases), solely based on strategic grounds, not because mathematicians are "bad people". People in positions of or close to power and/or possessing certain knowledge are dangerous, not because they are necessarily morally repugnant, but because of their privilege and ability.
- pjc50 4y ago
  > Were the physicists who discovered how to split the atom also dangerous people? In the ordinary meaning of the word? Yes. That's why they were sworn to secrecy. Not the same as saying they were immoral or wrong to have worked on the Bomb, that's a different debate, but in terms of sheer effectiveness they were incredibly dangerous. An army is dangerous. That's how it works.
  - alexvoda 4y ago
    To you and sibling comment I would argue the comment I responded to conflated dangerous with immoral. Danger is part of the domain of threat modelling. And when doing threat modelling, the morality of the opponent is a distraction. However in the domain of propaganda, threats, immorality and assigning the latter to the former go hand in hand.
Barrin92 4y ago
>so why should I leave dangerous tech only in the hands of dangerous people? because handing it to everyone doesn't make things better? I don't like that Putin has nukes, but it's much better than Putin and every offshoot of Al-Qaeda having nukes. Civilization ending tech in the hands of powerful actors is usually subject to some form of rational calculus. Having it in the hands of everyone means basically it's game over. For a lot of dangeorus technologies there is no 'vaccine' (in time).
- brigandish 4y ago
  > Having it in the hands of everyone means basically it's game over. It might mean it's time to face up to more important questions, like why every offshoot of Al-Qaeda wants to use nukes and then countering that.
  - alexvoda 4y ago
    I do not believe you are arguing in good faith but I will answer. Nukes Are very very effective at creating terror. Terror is somewhat effective at almost any action that requires the participation of others. Ergo, nukes are effective at threatening other to do what you want. Want to counter that, fine. Genetically engineer every person to be invulnerable to radiation and explosions and the desire to use nukes diminishes because they are no longer as effective. Sayonara.
    - brigandish 4y ago
      > I do not believe you are arguing in good faith This isn't Twitter, please keep this juvenile nonsense for there. As to your "answer": > Genetically engineer every person to be invulnerable to radiation and explosions and the desire to use nukes diminishes because they are no longer as effective. aside from it approaching word salad, I was referring to the deeper causes of violence. I would trust (there's that word again, I hope you can cope this time) the Dalai Lama with any weapon known to man and any only dreamt of, because, as he says[1]: > “Real gun control must come from here,” the Dalai Lama said, pointing at his heart. How you failed to deduce that with your enhanced powers of insight into me, I cannot fathom. [1] https://www.sfgate.com/politics/article/Dalai-Lama-says-real-gun-control-comes-from-8313907.php https://www.sfgate.com/politics/article/Dalai-Lama-says-real...
permo-w 4y ago
this is the gun debate rephrased
- bumby 4y ago
  There is a fundamental difference in the US: access to guns is a constitutional right.
  - Spivak 4y ago
    But that fact doesn’t matter in the actual discussion because the debate is the same but the implementation is different. In the US the “get rid of guns” stance is just restricting their use to the maximum extent allowed by the constitution and making them as close to de facto banned as possible.
    - bumby 4y ago
      The fact that there is a constitutional right puts pretty strong limits on where that line is drawn though. I think those guardrails make it a fundamentally different perspective.
  - emptybits 4y ago
    Freedom to speak and publish, even dangerous ideas, is also a right. Beyond the US.
    - bumby 4y ago
      True, but (in the US at least), those rights also stop when they come up against an imminent threat. See the trope about falsely yelling “fire” in a crowded movie theater. The issue here seems to be accurately defining that risk.
      - SAI_Peregrinus 4y ago
        The "fire in a crowded theater" case was overturned as unconstitutional prior restraint on speech.
mannykannot 4y ago
> it would probably kickstart a "build your own vaccine kit" industry. This is a scenario for a dystopian science fiction novel, as opposed to a a rational plan for our children's future.
- b112 4y ago
  Tell someone from 1950 about modern cell phones, tracking in them and online, tracking in car ECUs, tracking all purchases, with companies listening in on everything said at home, and that's their dystopian novel!
  - Bakary 4y ago
    It's also a dystopia according to our current sensibilities. Or at least for a plurality of people. Even the people who don't seem to care tend to react adversely once they understand how it can affect them.
  - mannykannot 4y ago
    We have seen your scenario, and we have also had, in the last three years, a taste of brigandish's scenario, so I feel people can make up their own minds about whether they are usefully comparable. And if you do think they are comparable, note that the equivalent of a "build-your-own vaccine kit" in your scenario has not materially improved the situation (right now, "Google Has Most of My Email Because It Has All of Yours" is at position 8 on the HN front page.)
- brigandish 4y ago
  One of the co-founders of BioNTech had this to say[1]: > “What we have developed over decades for cancer vaccine development has been the tailwind for developing the COVID-19 vaccine, and now the Covid-19 vaccine and our experience in developing it gives back to our cancer work,” Tureci said. [1] https://nypost.com/2022/10/19/covid-vax-makers-say-cancer-vaccine-could-be-available-by-2030/ https://nypost.com/2022/10/19/covid-vax-makers-say-cancer-va...
  - mannykannot 4y ago

Madmallard 4y ago

Human life is quite fragile

afarrell 4y ago

What questions would you ask to decide if someone is a trustworthy steward of that technology?

brigandish 4y ago
Did you fund gain of research function at the labs in Wuhan? Do you know what they found? Were you aware of the low level of biosecurity protocols on the site? Things like that ;-)
- alexvoda 4y ago
  These would not answer whether someone behaves responsibly with dangerous research. It answers whether someone had any connection to Wuhan. You can find plenty of people who would answer all "no"-s and would be far more destructive if they had access. Would you also claim that no one who worked at Cernobyl was trustworthy? This is just guilt by association.
  - brigandish 4y ago
    > These would not answer whether someone behaves responsibly with dangerous research. Let's see. “Did you fund gain of research function at the labs in Wuhan?” This speaks to trustworthiness and responsibility/recklessness. “Do you know what they found?” This speaks to, again, trustworthiness and transparency. “Were you aware of the low level of biosecurity protocols on the site?” This speaks to, again, trustworthiness and responsibility/recklessness. > You can find plenty of people who would answer all "no"-s and would be far more destructive if they had access. It shows that those with the technology now are not trustworthy, going forward I might have different questions but we should start where we are, not by providing an apologetic and condoning poor behaviour. > Would you also claim that no one who worked at Cernobyl was trustworthy? Did they fuck up? Were they part of an organisation that fucked up? What did they do to stop the incredible fuck up from happening? > This is just guilt by association. Of whom to what?
    - alexvoda 4y ago
      Again, your 3 questions do not provide any information with regards to trustworthiness. You have just decided that the Wuhan Lab is an epicenter of evil and therefore anyone tangential is untrustworthy. There is no logical connection, you filled it in. With regards to Cernobyl, other than Anatoly Dyatlov (who can directly be ascribed blame and served prison time), it is really hard to blame any of the people involved. Yet there were all kinds of known and unknown stresses and defects in the system that resulted in a tragedy. Does that mean we should ban nuclear energy?
      - brigandish 4y ago
        > You have just decided that the Wuhan Lab is an epicenter of evil and therefore anyone tangential is untrustworthy. I'm so glad you were able to read my mind, perhaps you could open source your mind reading device, or would that be too dangerous to share to the public? What I have decided is that there is evidence of lies by people involved in the funding and the implementation of the research at Wuhan, there really is no need for your clumsy straw men, especially when you can read my mind. > Does that mean we should ban nuclear energy? I'm the one arguing for the further distribution of technology, are you arguing with yourself now or did your mind reading device go on the blink?

blululu 4y ago

This is just beyond obtuse. More people having access will mean more people who are untrustworthy having access, which means more malicious action. (Unless you want to setup some toy scenario where the only bad faith actors people on the planet are biochemistry researchers). As for building your own vaccine. Even large nations were not able to develop effective ones. It’s easier to put a bullet in someone than it is to take it out.

brigandish 4y ago
Pandora's box is open, technology will spread regardless of what you do. You want to limit tech that will become cheaper and easier to build through the efforts of legitimate, well meaning research, and try to stop knowledge spreading as we wish for there to be more people in this line of work. More people having access will mean more people who are untrustworthy having access is entirely right but whether "which means more malicious action" is a corollary is up for debate, as we've seen with violent action around the world via many different types of weaponry. In this talk[1] at DEF CON, John Sotos pleads with hackers to put their time into learning how to combat biological weapons. He points out that the tech will move forward to being able to target more and more specific populations. Like any other weapon, knowing that your enemy has it too and can hurt you or those you care about with it is a highly effective deterrent. > As for building your own vaccine. Even large nations were not able to develop effective ones. It’s easier to put a bullet in someone than it is to take it out. Two things here. Firstly, trauma surgery and techniques from the military and places where bullet wounds are common have benefited the rest of us for when we get into scrapes of even a non-violent kind. Secondly, defence does not always lag behind attack, you assume that the future would look like now but that is to ignore the history of any tech of such nature. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKQDSgBHPfY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKQDSgBHPfY

alexvoda 4y ago

That you even express the problem like this shows an impressive ammount of bias. By calling them dangerous people you are actually implying malice. What makes you believe people with access to biomedical tech are inherently more malicious than the populace? What makes you believe there aren't far more malicious people who do not yet have access to such tech? I think this is just fear of the unknown at work. Biomedical knowledge is complicated and requires effort to learn therefore most consider it a known unknown therefore something to be feared. Some people do have such knowledge therefore they are to be feared because who knows what nefarious intentions they have and what conspiracies they are part of. Therefore they are dangerous people using dangerous tech. Were the physicists who discovered how to split the atom also dangerous people?

t-3 4y ago
Danger is not a moral judgement, but a rational one. Iranian nuclear scientists weren't assassinated for no reason, and I highly doubt anyone involved had serious moral accusation to make against them. The U.S. also banned export of cryptography in the past (and still does in some cases), solely based on strategic grounds, not because mathematicians are "bad people". People in positions of or close to power and/or possessing certain knowledge are dangerous, not because they are necessarily morally repugnant, but because of their privilege and ability.
pjc50 4y ago
> Were the physicists who discovered how to split the atom also dangerous people? In the ordinary meaning of the word? Yes. That's why they were sworn to secrecy. Not the same as saying they were immoral or wrong to have worked on the Bomb, that's a different debate, but in terms of sheer effectiveness they were incredibly dangerous. An army is dangerous. That's how it works.
- alexvoda 4y ago
  To you and sibling comment I would argue the comment I responded to conflated dangerous with immoral. Danger is part of the domain of threat modelling. And when doing threat modelling, the morality of the opponent is a distraction. However in the domain of propaganda, threats, immorality and assigning the latter to the former go hand in hand.

Barrin92 4y ago

>so why should I leave dangerous tech only in the hands of dangerous people? because handing it to everyone doesn't make things better? I don't like that Putin has nukes, but it's much better than Putin and every offshoot of Al-Qaeda having nukes. Civilization ending tech in the hands of powerful actors is usually subject to some form of rational calculus. Having it in the hands of everyone means basically it's game over. For a lot of dangeorus technologies there is no 'vaccine' (in time).

brigandish 4y ago
> Having it in the hands of everyone means basically it's game over. It might mean it's time to face up to more important questions, like why every offshoot of Al-Qaeda wants to use nukes and then countering that.
- alexvoda 4y ago
  I do not believe you are arguing in good faith but I will answer. Nukes Are very very effective at creating terror. Terror is somewhat effective at almost any action that requires the participation of others. Ergo, nukes are effective at threatening other to do what you want. Want to counter that, fine. Genetically engineer every person to be invulnerable to radiation and explosions and the desire to use nukes diminishes because they are no longer as effective. Sayonara.
  - brigandish 4y ago
    > I do not believe you are arguing in good faith This isn't Twitter, please keep this juvenile nonsense for there. As to your "answer": > Genetically engineer every person to be invulnerable to radiation and explosions and the desire to use nukes diminishes because they are no longer as effective. aside from it approaching word salad, I was referring to the deeper causes of violence. I would trust (there's that word again, I hope you can cope this time) the Dalai Lama with any weapon known to man and any only dreamt of, because, as he says[1]: > “Real gun control must come from here,” the Dalai Lama said, pointing at his heart. How you failed to deduce that with your enhanced powers of insight into me, I cannot fathom. [1] https://www.sfgate.com/politics/article/Dalai-Lama-says-real-gun-control-comes-from-8313907.php https://www.sfgate.com/politics/article/Dalai-Lama-says-real...

permo-w 4y ago

this is the gun debate rephrased

bumby 4y ago
There is a fundamental difference in the US: access to guns is a constitutional right.
- Spivak 4y ago
  But that fact doesn’t matter in the actual discussion because the debate is the same but the implementation is different. In the US the “get rid of guns” stance is just restricting their use to the maximum extent allowed by the constitution and making them as close to de facto banned as possible.
  - bumby 4y ago
    The fact that there is a constitutional right puts pretty strong limits on where that line is drawn though. I think those guardrails make it a fundamentally different perspective.
- emptybits 4y ago
  Freedom to speak and publish, even dangerous ideas, is also a right. Beyond the US.
  - bumby 4y ago
    True, but (in the US at least), those rights also stop when they come up against an imminent threat. See the trope about falsely yelling “fire” in a crowded movie theater. The issue here seems to be accurately defining that risk.
    - SAI_Peregrinus 4y ago
      The "fire in a crowded theater" case was overturned as unconstitutional prior restraint on speech.

mannykannot 4y ago

> it would probably kickstart a "build your own vaccine kit" industry. This is a scenario for a dystopian science fiction novel, as opposed to a a rational plan for our children's future.

b112 4y ago
Tell someone from 1950 about modern cell phones, tracking in them and online, tracking in car ECUs, tracking all purchases, with companies listening in on everything said at home, and that's their dystopian novel!
- Bakary 4y ago
  It's also a dystopia according to our current sensibilities. Or at least for a plurality of people. Even the people who don't seem to care tend to react adversely once they understand how it can affect them.
- mannykannot 4y ago
  We have seen your scenario, and we have also had, in the last three years, a taste of brigandish's scenario, so I feel people can make up their own minds about whether they are usefully comparable. And if you do think they are comparable, note that the equivalent of a "build-your-own vaccine kit" in your scenario has not materially improved the situation (right now, "Google Has Most of My Email Because It Has All of Yours" is at position 8 on the HN front page.)
brigandish 4y ago
One of the co-founders of BioNTech had this to say[1]: > “What we have developed over decades for cancer vaccine development has been the tailwind for developing the COVID-19 vaccine, and now the Covid-19 vaccine and our experience in developing it gives back to our cancer work,” Tureci said. [1] https://nypost.com/2022/10/19/covid-vax-makers-say-cancer-vaccine-could-be-available-by-2030/ https://nypost.com/2022/10/19/covid-vax-makers-say-cancer-va...
- mannykannot 4y ago