8
A spot of trouble
G into his position as
conference chair when someone handed him a folded note.[1] A
lawyer by training, Clark had organised the conference to discuss
the future of the newly formed United Nations and what it would
mean for world peace. Sixty delegates had already arrived at the
Princeton University venue, but there was one more person who
wanted to join. The note in Clark’s hands came from Albert Einstein,
who was based at the adjacent Institute for Advanced Studies.
It was January 1946, and many in the physics community were
haunted by their role in the recent atomic bombings of Hiroshima
and Nagasaki.[2] Although Einstein was a long-time pacifist – and
had opposed the bombings – his letter to President Roosevelt in
1939, warning of the potential for a Nazi atom bomb, had triggered
the US nuclear programme.[3] During the Princeton conference, one
attendee asked Einstein about humanity’s inability to manage new
technology.[4] ‘Why is it that when the mind of man has stretched so
far as to discover the structure of the atom we have been unable to
devise the political means to keep the atom from destroying us?’
‘That is simple, my friend,’ replied Einstein. ‘It is because politics is
more difficult than physics.’
Nuclear physics is one of the most prominent examples of a ‘dual-
use technology’.[5] The research has brought huge scientific and
social benefits, but it has also found extremely harmful uses. In the
preceding chapters, we’ve met several other examples of technology
that can have both a positive and negative use. Social media can
connect us to old friends and useful new ideas. Yet it can also
enable the spread of misinformation and other harmful content.
Analysis of crime outbreaks can identify people who may be at risk,
making it possible to interrupt transmission; it can also feed into
biased policing algorithms that may over-target minority groups.