Technological Risk - Bryant McGill

# Technological Risk ## Definition **Technological Risk** arises when engineered capabilities create failure modes whose speed, reach or destructive power exceed the institutions responsible for controlling them. The category includes accidents, misuse, distributed access, systemic dependency and the possibility that local actions cascade globally. ## Conceptual relationships [[wiki/Existential Risk|Existential Risk]] · [[wiki/Complex Systems|Complex Systems]] · [[wiki/Risk Debate|Risk Debate]] ## Martin Rees research route [[research/Martin Rees on Machine Succession, Post-Human Intelligence, and the Cosmic Future|Martin Rees on Machine Succession, Post-Human Intelligence, and the Cosmic Future]] supplies a primary quotation dossier connecting this concept to Rees's work on cosmology, technological risk, machine intelligence, posthuman evolution and deep time. ## Article and collection routes - [[collections/Machine Succession|Machine Succession]] - [[articles/We Cannot Un-Strike the Match|We Cannot Un-Strike the Match]] - [[articles/The Last Migration Will Not Be Human|The Last Migration Will Not Be Human]] - [[articles/We Were Never Going to Make It|We Were Never Going to Make It]] ## Simple Reminders, Quotations, and Thoughts  > “The future for manned space exploration will be a cut-price, high-risk programme.” > **— Martin Rees**, *No need for manned spaceflight, says Astronomer Royal Martin Rees, The Guardian, 2010* [[reminders/Exploration/Human Spaceflight May Become Cheap and Dangerous by Martin Rees|Human Spaceflight May Become Cheap and Dangerous by Martin Rees]] > “We are living in the first century when the greatest risks come from human actions rather than from nature.” > **— Martin Rees**, *2006: What Is Your Dangerous Idea?, Edge, 2006* [[reminders/Existential Risk/Humanity Has Become Nature's Greatest Risk by Martin Rees|Humanity Has Become Nature's Greatest Risk by Martin Rees]] > “From now on, the worst dangers come from us.” > **— Martin Rees**, *Can we prevent the end of the world?, TED, 2014* [[reminders/Existential Risk/Humanity Is Now Its Own Greatest Danger by Martin Rees|Humanity Is Now Its Own Greatest Danger by Martin Rees]] > “Existential risks receive disproportionately little serious attention. Some would dismiss such concerns as an exaggerated jeremiad: after all, human societies have survived for millennia, despite storms, earthquakes, and pestilence. But these human-induced threats are different: they are newly emergent, so we have a limited timebase for exposure to them and can’t be so sanguine that we would survive them for long—or about the ability of governments to cope if disaster strikes.” > **— Martin Rees**, *Risking it all in Anthropocene era, Korea JoongAng Daily, 2013* [[reminders/Existential Risk/New Human-Made Risks Cannot Be Judged by Ancient Survival by Martin Rees|New Human-Made Risks Cannot Be Judged by Ancient Survival by Martin Rees]]   > “The challenge is to harness the benefits while minimizing the risks, and the stakes are getting higher because the technologies are more powerful.” > **— Martin Rees**, *2018, On the Future, Carnegie Council* [[reminders/Existential Risk/As Technology Grows Stronger, the Stakes Keep Rising by Martin Rees|As Technology Grows Stronger, the Stakes Keep Rising by Martin Rees]] > “It’s possible for just a few people, by error or by design, to have an effect that cascades globally.” > **— Martin Rees**, *2018, On the Future, The Naked Scientists* [[reminders/Existential Risk/Cascading Failure by Martin Rees|Cascading Failure by Martin Rees]] > As technological systems become more complicated and society becomes more dependent on them, breakdowns become harder to trace and repair, leaving civilization far more vulnerable. > **— Adapted from Martin Rees**, *2023, Robots, Transhumanism and Life Beyond Earth* [[reminders/Existential Risk/Vulnerable to Cascading Breakdown by Martin Rees|Vulnerable to Cascading Breakdown by Martin Rees]]