Revisiting Joy

“And he said unto me, They are come to pass. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give unto him that is athirst of the fountain of the water of life freely.” – revelations 21: 6

In 2000, Bill Joy published a paper entitled “Why the future doesn’t need us”. In this piece, Joy, considered by many to be one of the greatest programmers and developers, offered a take on technological development that was decidedly counter-intuitive to what could have been expected from this adamant technophile.

Joy’s paper revolves around one central thesis: some technologies must cease being developed or else mankind runs the risk of annihilating itself. Calling from the experiences learned by the atomic bomb and the subsequent guilt of the men who worked on it, Joy takes aim at three specific technologies:  genetic engineering, nanotechnology and robotics. These three key fields represent in his opinion the most dangerous fields of research thought which human could partially or totally annihilate themselves by malice or misuse.

Before “terrorism” became a buzzword, Joy’s article argued that these “self-replicating” technologies could easily be reverse-engineered or deployed for nefarious purposes against the general population if placed in the wrong hands. Joy gloomily envisions many scenarios in which these technologies could spell doom. Notably Evildoers empowered by new communication technologies like the internet, downloading viral strain schematics over the internet, reverse-engineering nanobots to attack living cells and ultimately destroying earth’s biosphere or robots surpassing humans and thus making the former irrelevant are all scenarios he envisions. Throughout his piece Joy compares and contrasts these threats with nuclear proliferation. He deems them more perilous to a certain degree as they do not require a large amount of raw material to produce. In other words, while the world supply of uranium can be closely guarded, all that is needed to unleash genetical-nano-robotical technologies (hereafter GNR) according to Joy is access to the knowledge required to produce them.

This argument by Joy implies a consideration that distinguishes him from traditional Luddites, technophobes or techno sceptics who would espouse a seemingly similar position. Joy’s cautionary message implies that these technologies are, in a sense inevitable if things remain as they are. Indeed, as a technophile and a spearhead to many breakthroughs in computer science, Joy is no stranger to Kurzweil’s law of accelerated returns[i] and to a certain degree has contributed to it himself. As such Joy considers technological progress capable of producing a GNR apocalypse not as an “if” but “when”. This accelerating development in technology, while enabling us to achieve greater things, is making us more and more dependent on this very same technology. As such this is creating an environment vulnerable to GNR catastrophes. Joy goes on to argue that because of this increasingly vulnerable environment, voluntary measures by the industry or early detection initiatives would be insufficient in preventing a catastrophe. Joy thus postulates that the only effective means to avoid GNR-related dangers is to relinquish research in this field.

A primitiviste, a luddite or a technophobe would probably come to a similar conclusion and thus some would be tempted to answer Joy the same way they would answer one of these three groups. However, Joy’s position is slightly different. The first difference, and arguably the most evident, is that Joy’s conclusions emerge from a entirely different reasoning. Joy sees technology the same way a technophile sees technology: inherently neutral. This is evident by how he presents GNR as double-edged swords that can offer great things while representing a danger nonetheless. Technophobes and the like would rather argue instead that technology is inherently evil or at least dependant on the morals of it’s creator. The second distinguishing element is the scope of the conclusions. While a technophobe or especially a primitiviste would argue that all research must be relinquished, Joy argues that solely research in GNR should be relinquished. This is a fairly important distinction as it places Joy somewhere between a technophobe and a technophile.

Joy’s position is not without detractors. Some of the critics Joy’s position received were anticipated in his paper and answered. Others came after the publication of his article. The obvious critic that can be made is that technology and social development are not mutually exclusive. Specifically, as technology are developed and adopted our use of them shapes their limitations and scope. Furthermore, these technologies do not simply “appear” therefore their creation process is influenced by social considerations. A second critic, but one that does not answer the dilemma brought forth by Joy, is that the human species does not follow a single path and as such, while some may choose to relinquish, others might not. Thus, GNR development, rather than being a question of simply “if” or “when” is instead a question of “by who” and “how”. A corollary to this argument is that some scientists currently developing these technologies might choose to either pursue work illegally or move to a nation that allows their development. The question then becomes “What is worse: is it best to have to deal with the risk of GNR terrorism or live within a nation that, lacking knowledge on how to use and counter GNR weaponry, can be effectively wiped out by a rival state?”. This framing of the question might seem excessively paranoid and pessimistic, but in the context of the fairly negative view on human nature that Joy espouses, that humans would consider wiping themselves and the rest of their species for political, religious or other reasons, it seems fair. Although Joy’s pessimistic vision of humanity has merits, it must be also noted that some philosophers like Jean-Jacques Rousseau argue humans are fundamentally good; both position are neither right or wrong and should be given equal consideration. Thus, although Joy and Kurzweil might be right on the exponential growth of technology, it remains to be determined if humans will ever consider producing the means by which self-anihilation can be accomplished. Thus Joy’s prediction, viewed in this lens, might turn out to be a self-defeating prophecy.

In his paper, Joy voluntarily avoided trying to prescribe specific remedies through which this outcome might be prevented[ii]. He does propose however means by which this can be achieved: policy, law and ethics. Although Joy does believe the GNR industries can self-regulate to a certain degree, he calls upon stronger means to coerce them in to relinquishment as all that is needed is one rogue creator. More controversially Joy postulates that a slight trade-off in scientific liberty for government control and surveillance might be acceptable. As such Joy advocates the creation of more regulatory bodies and transparency amongst scientists. Notably he asks that researchers take into account not only their own devices but those of their peers and how both can interact. Another avenue that Joy explores is that of having scientists take a Hippocratic oath of sorts. Although this might not represent an effective means of prevention, Joy believes it has an intrinsic value and can only do good. In that same vein he proposes redefining our objectives as researchers and technophiles from “immortality” to “fraternity” and “equality”.

In retrospect, Bill Joy’s piece offered many novel ideas and thoughts for technologists to consider. What made Joy’s piece especially compelling and powerful was his pedigree as a technological pioneer and innovator. This was not the rant of an ivory tower social science professor denouncing the “nintendos” and the “PC computer machines” that complicated “everything”.  Another strength of Joy’s piece was that it took head-on the sacred-cows, so to speak, of techno-futurology, namely Kurzweil, and addressed directly some of their claims. Where Joy seems to fail however, and this constituted the first counter-argument we presented, is in noting the synergetic relationship between technological development and social development. With that in mind, Joy seems much too pessimistic. That said, maybe that is what is required for Joy’s prophecy to prevent itself from ever happening. As such, postulating on if Joy is “right” or “wrong” is irrelevant.

[ii] http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/11.12/billjoy.html?pg=2&topic=&topic_set=