From: Brian Atkins (brian@posthuman.com)
Date: Mon Aug 19 2002 - 22:16:16 MDT
Harvey Newstrom wrote:
>
> On Monday, August 19, 2002, at 12:50 am, Brian Atkins wrote:
>
> > Harvey Newstrom wrote:
> >>
> >> On Sunday, August 18, 2002, at 08:01 pm, Brian Atkins wrote:
> >>
> >>> At this point the various governments and corporations still haven't
> >>> figured out how to perfect a multilayered defense against 40 year old
> >>> offensive weapons (jet passenger planes),
> >>
> >> Actually, this is not quite correct. Many of the assumptions floating
> >> around since 9/11 are not quite accurate.
> >>
> >
> > Ok assuming I buy into your theory that US jetliners are now 100%
> > hijacker-proof (I don't personally, but...),
>
> I didn't say that. They certainly aren't 100% hijacker-proof. I was
> just objecting to the point that we "can't" protect ourselves. My point
> is that we certainly can do a lot better than we have been, the real
> problem is that we weren't trying before.
Ok, but my point if you read it closely was "perfect". So you agree with
me that after 40 years they still haven't "perfected" the security of this
technology?
>
> > my other point remains
> > that the real problem here is that the government will be increasingly
> > required to anticipate such attacks before they occur, because if they
> > do occur the results may be increasing bad as technology advances. So
> > the real issue is how does government become able to do perfect
> > prediction of threats?
>
> I agree with your point, but I don't think we are close to it yet. The
> box-cutters were not an example of increased technology. We are still
> fighting old technology with old technology.
The planes were the technology. The point being that our society seems
to have a rather dismal record when it comes to coming up with perfect
(or even near-perfect) defenses to new technologies right from the get-go.
Usually it seems to take a long evolutionary period of mistakes before
we finally figure it out. This kind of evolutionary period however is
unacceptable when it comes to existential risks.
>
> >> In other words, many of our security procedures work just fine. It is
> >> not true that we are incapable of defending ourselves. We just haven't
> >> really tried before. Now that we know security is imperative, we can
> >> apply what we know in ways we have never tried before. We shouldn't
> >> have to reinvent everything from scratch.
> >>
> >
> > For jetliners, no. For suitcase nukes, maybe no, although I still
> > haven't
> > heard a complete theory of interlacing defenses that will prevent them.
> > For designer biowarfare, nanotech, etc. YES. And the defenses for those
> > have to be in place and able to deal with/anticipate everything that
> > will get thrown at them before it happens.
>
> I know other people have accelerated predictions compared to mine, but
> remember that we don't have nanotech yet. It think it will be decades
> before terrorists get working nanotech.
>
Yes, nanotech comes later. My points remain though, and will only become
more relevant as time passes.
-- Brian Atkins Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence http://www.singinst.org/
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