An explosion in artificial intelligence has sent us hurtling towards a post- human future, warns Martin Rees
In Davos a few years ago, I met a well-known Indian tycoon. Knowing I had the title Astronomer Royal, he asked: “Do you do the Queen’s horoscopes?” I responded, with a straight face: “If she wanted one, I’m the person she’d ask.” He then seemed eager to hear my predictions. I told him that markets would fluctuate and that there would be trouble in the Middle East. He paid rapt attention to these insights. But I then came clean. I said I was just an astronomer, not an astrologer. He immediately lost all interest in my predictions. And rightly so: scientists are rotten forecasters – worse, often, than writers of science fiction.
Nevertheless, 12 years ago, I wrote a book that I entitled Our Final Century? My publisher deleted the question-mark. The American publishers changed the title to Our Final Hour – Americans seek instant (dis)gratification. My theme was this: our Earth is 45 million centuries old, but this century is special. It’s the first when one species – ours – can determine the biosphere’s fate.
In the years since, a few forecasts have somewhat firmed up: the world is becoming more crowded – and warmer. There will be about 2 billion more people in 2050, and their collective “footprint” will threaten our finite planet’s ecology unless we can achieve more efficient use of energy and land. But we can’t predict the path of future technology that far ahead. Today’s smartphones would have seemed magic even 20 years ago, so in looking several decades ahead we must keep our minds open to breakthroughs that may now seem like science fiction. These will offer great hopes, but also great fears.
• Sir Martin Rees on the science behind the fiction of Star Trek Society is more interconnected than ever, and consequently more vulnerable. We depend on elaborate networks: electric-power grids, just-in-time delivery, satnav, globally dispersed manufacturing, and so forth. Can we be sure that these networks are resilient enough to rule out catastrophic disruptions cascading through the system – real-world analogues of the 2008 financial crash? London would be instantly paralysed without electricity. Supermarket shelves would soon be bare if supply chains were disrupted. Air travel can spread a pandemic worldwide in days, causing havoc in the megacities of the developing world. And social media can amplify panic and rumour, literally at the speed of light. The worry isn’t just accidental breakdowns. Malicious events can have catastrophic consequences. Cyber-sabotage efforts, such as “Stuxnet”, and frequent hacking of financial institutions have highlighted these concerns. Small groups – and even individuals – are more empowered than ever before. And there are downsides to the huge advances in biotech, despite the bright prospects these offer for medicine and agriculture. There were reports last month that Chinese researchers had been gene-editing human embryos using a new technique called CRISPR, raising controversial ethical issues about “designer babies”. But more disquieting are the experiments at the University of Wisconsin and in the Netherlands that show it’s surprisingly easy to make an influenza virus more virulent and transmissible. Last October, the US federal government decided to cease funding these so-called “gain of function” experiments.
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