Re: self censorship urged on science journalists

From: Anders Sandberg (asa@nada.kth.se)
Date: Sun Feb 16 2003 - 14:39:31 MST

  • Next message: Samantha Atkins: "Re: Censorship in publishing"

    On Sat, Feb 15, 2003 at 09:57:14PM -0600, Damien Broderick wrote:
    > http://abc.net.au/news/scitech/2003/02/item20030216103135_1.htm
    >
    > "Any work that might be used by terrorists for malevolent purposes should
    > not be published," the statement said.

    The problem here is of course that it is impossible to determine what
    could be used. Maybe it will stop the paper describing that compound X
    (made by mixing dishwash detergents and cinnamon) is super-toxic, but
    what about the paper on the theoretical possibility of making
    macroscopic black holes if very theoretical conditions are true? Years
    later it is discovered that the conditions are true, and suddenly people
    can brew black holes. Should the report that the conditions be stopped?
    And what if nobody makes the connection until after the paper is out?

    There is also a more practical problem. Have terrorists to look at
    scientific journals for terror ideas? I had a bull session yesterday
    with a few friends, and we rapidly (~10 min) came up with at least four
    realistic schemes to cause massive destruction/death in our home town,
    some requiring extremely simple means. There is no *need* for censoring
    scientific journals, since it is enough to know a bit about engineering
    and the local infrastructure to do untold damage. Even if the results of
    a research paper could produce tremendous damage, terrorists can easily
    pick from the lower branches of the tree of knowledge. If one is really
    is serious about preventing terrorists from acquiring dangerous
    information, one has to censor basic engineering courses or monitor all
    people who have passed them.

    Again it is a case of chilling effects: systems of censorship are built,
    that won't really prevent terrorism but makes people refrain from
    working in fields where they know they won't be able to publish freely.
    In the long run that will hurt attempts to develop protections from
    bio-, info-, nano- and other weapons. We are already seeing it in the
    realm of computer security.

    -- 
    -----------------------------------------------------------------------
    Anders Sandberg                                      Towards Ascension!
    asa@nada.kth.se                            http://www.nada.kth.se/~asa/
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