Global Catastrophic Risks

Features

• Cover Type: Hard Cover with 550 pages
• Published by: Oxford University Press, USA September 15, 2008
• Written in: English
• ISBN 10 Number: 0198570503
• ISBN 13 Number: 978-0198570509
• Book Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.1 x 1.6 inches
• Weighs: 2.3 pounds

Product Review
We should welcome this fascinating and provocative book. Martin J Rees (from foreword) [Provides] a mine of peer-reviewed information on the great risks that threaten our own and future generations. Nature

Product Description
A global catastrophic risk is one with the potential to wreak death and destruction on a global scale. In human history, wars and plagues have done so on more than one occasion, and misguided ideologies and totalitarian regimes have darkened an entire era or a region. Advances in technology are adding dangers of a new kind. It could happen again.
In Global Catastrophic Risks, 26 leading experts look at the gravest risks facing humanity in the 21st century, including natural catastrophes, nuclear war, terrorism, global warming, biological weapons, totalitarianism, advanced nanotechnology, general artificial intelligence, and social collapse. The book also addresses over-arching issues - policy responses and methods for predicting and managing catastrophes.
This is invaluable reading for anyone interested in the big issues of our time; for students focusing on science, society, technology, and public policy; and for academics, policy-makers, and professionals working in these acutely important fields.

Reader Reviews
This is a relatively comprehensive collection of thoughtful essays about the risks of a major catastrophe (mainly those that would kill a billion or more people). Probably the most important chapter is the one on risks associated with AI, since few people attempting to create an AI seem to understand the possibilities it describes. It makes some implausible claims about the speed with which an AI could take over the world, but the argument they are used to support only requires that a first-mover advantage be important, and that is only weakly dependent on assumptions about that speed with which AI will improve. The risks of a large fraction of humanity being killed by a super-volcano is apparently higher than the risk from asteroids, but volcanoes have more of a limit on their maximum size, so they appear to pose less risk of human extinction. The risks of asteroids and comets can't be handled as well as I thought by early detection, because some dark comets can't be detected with current technology until it's way too late. It seems we ought to start thinking about better detection systems, which would probably require large improvements in the cost-effectiveness of space-based telescopes or other sensors. Many of the volcano and asteroid deaths would be due to crop failures from cold weather. Since mid-ocean temperatures are more stable that land temperatures, ocean based aquaculture would help mitigate this risk. The climate change chapter seems much more objective and credible than what I've previously read on the subject, but is technical enough that it won't be widely read, and it won't satisfy anyone who is looking for arguments to justify their favorite policy. The best part is a list of possible instabilities which appear unlikely but which aren't understood well enough to evaluate with any confidence. The chapter on plagues mentions one surprising risk - better sanitation made polio more dangerous by altering the age at which it infected people. If I'd written the chapter, I'd have mentioned Ewald's analysis of how human behavior influences the evolution of strains which are more or less virulent. There's good news about nuclear proliferation which has been under-reported - a fair number of countries have abandoned nuclear weapons programs, and a few have given up nuclear weapons. So if there's any trend, it's toward fewer countries trying to build them, and a stable number of countries possessing them. The bad news is we don't know whether nanotechnology will change that by drastically reducing the effort needed to build them. The chapter on totalitarianism discusses some uncomfortable tradeoffs between the benefits of some sort of world government and the harm that such government might cause. One interesting claim: totalitarian regimes are less likely to foresee disasters, but are in some ways better-equipped to deal with disasters that they take seriously.