by
Reviewed by
The New York Public Library
and Oxford University Press, 1999
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Review
In 1997, scientist and philosopher Freeman Dyson was asked by the New York Public Library to give a series of public lectures on whatever subject he thought interesting. Dyson, an emeritus professor of physics at the Institute for Advanced Study (affiliated with Princeton University), responded with a three-lecture series titled "The Three Faces of Science," which wove together seemingly disparate things - solar power, the Internet, and the human genome.
| Dyson's lectures explore science and humanity. |
Those lectures have been turned into a slim book, The Sun, the Genome, and the Internet: Tools of Scientific Revolutions, jointly published by the library and Oxford University Press. It is a quick and very nice read. For those familiar with Dyson's previous books - Infinite in All Directions, Disturbing the Universe, and Weapons and Hope - this new volume offers more of his intriguing insights into the nature of both science and humans. Here, however, Dyson looks more deeply into the implications of biology and genetic research than he has in the past.
Those not familiar with Dyson's eclectic and legendary mind have missed something, and this is a chance to make amends. Dyson's books are essentially stories about science and society, and like good stories, they wander in unexpected directions. The Sun, the Genome, and the Internet manages to tie together solar power, the promise of genetic research, and the explosive growth of the Internet into a single package that is wrapped in ethical concerns about the future of the human endeavor.
| Will new technology promote social justice? |
Technology and social justice are often linked in society, Dyson argues, and technological advances sometimes make the world more just, and sometimes less so. Foreseeing the impact of evolving technology on social processes is all but impossible, but that doesn't prevent Dyson from trying.
He provides his "easy list" of past technological advances that made the world more just. "In the fourteenth century, the new technology of printing changed the face of Europe, bringing books and education out of the monasteries and spreading them far and wide among the people," Dyson writes.
| Public health technologies don't protect the rich alone. |
He writes that "more recent technologies that contributed in a practical way to social justice were the technologies of public health, clean water supply, sewage treatment, vaccination, and antibiotics. These technologies could not protect the rich and powerful alone from contagion and sickness. They could only be effective in protecting the rich if they were also available to the poor."
While those seem obvious, Dyson also notes significant "social justice" changes that came about with the development of synthetic materials and household appliances - not the obvious tools of revolution. The arrival of synthetic materials meant that fine, colorful clothing was no longer the "badge of privilege and wealth" it had been. "No longer can one tell a woman's social class by her clothes," he says.
| Modern appliances "blew away" the servant class. |
"And the wind that blew away our servant class [Dyson grew up in a British family with servants] was not the ravaging invasion of Sherman's army, but the peaceful invasion of an army of electric stoves and gas heaters and vacuum cleaners and refrigerators . . ." When Dyson finishes the discussion, it isn't clear who got liberated and who was enslaved by the new technology.
There are clearly negative technologies, such as the gas chamber and nuclear bombs, he says. "But the more troubling examples are two of the technologies that are making the most rapid progress today, high-technology medicine and . . . communications. . . . In the United States, a medical system based on the ethic of the free market inevitably favors the rich over the poor, and the inequalities of medical treatment grow sharper as the costs increase."
| The "wired and unwired" form a new class structure. |
"And access to personal computers and the Internet is like medical insurance," he writes. "Almost everybody needs it, but most poor people don't have it." As the gulf between the "wired and unwired" grows, Dyson says, those who are not wired "are in danger of becoming the new servant class." Dyson worries about overpopulation and grinding poverty in Third World countries, then looks to solar energy and genetic engineering - and a blend of the two - as a way toward a more just future.
Not just genetically engineered crops, but "energy crops" with such things as genetically altered trees grown specifically for energy use. "If the trees converted sunlight into fuel with 10 percent efficiency, landowners could sell the fuel for ten thousand dollars per year per acre and easily undercut the present price of gasoline," Dyson contends. He sees genetic engineering leading to "trees that use sunlight to make other useful products, such as silicon chips for computers and silicon film for photovoltaic collectors."
| Every small village could be rich. |
Add to this solar-powered, genetically-altered biosphere an all-inclusive Internet, Dyson contends, and every small village in Mexico could become as wealthy as his hometown of Princeton: "Ethics must guide technology in the direction of social justice."
In other sections of the book, Dyson details his views of space travel, class warfare, and even the human species itself - all tied to advances in genetic engineering.
| Future space exploration depends on advances in biology. |
The future of human space exploration "depends on fundamental advances in biology"; champion cows, sheep, and pigs "will be standardized and mass produced"; the lure of giving superior genes to one's children through "reprogenetics" may become irresistable; and, as soon as cloning becomes safe and reliable, humans will probable use it on themselves.
Dyson, picking up an idea from biologist Lee Silver's book Remaking Eden, agrees that "the technology of reprogenetics will ultimately split humanity into many species, and that the division will not be only between rich and poor. The division will be between different philosophies of life and different ways of living."
| This small book is rich in ideas. |
The Sun, the Genome, and the Internet contains only 128 undersized pages of text, including the introduction. This review has barely skimmed the surface of the myriad ideas on those rich, well written pages. Whether Dyson's visions turn out to be right or not is almost irrelevant. The enjoyment comes in following along.
Jim Dawson covered cops, courts, education, politics, and most of the other standard newspaper beats before moving into science writing for the Minneapolis Star Tribune 10 years ago.
Science originated from the fusion of two old traditions, the tradition of philosophical thinking that began in ancient Greece and the tradition of skilled crafts that began even earlier and flourished in medieval Europe. Philosophy supplied the concepts for science, and skilled crafts supplied the tools. Until the end of the nineteenth century, science and craft industries developed along separate paths. They frequently borrowed tools from each other, but each maintained an independent existence. It was only in the twentieth century that science and craft industries became inseparably linked.
You may purchase this book (144 pp., hardcover) directly from:
Freeman Dyson's Brain - one of the most wide-ranging and in-depth interviews with Freeman Dyson. From the February 1998 issue of Wired.
Liberation Biology - a lengthy interview with Lee Silver, author of Remaking Eden: Cloning and Beyond in a Brave New World (Avon Books) and one of Dyson's influences. From Reason Online.
Should Cloning Be Banned? - a discussion from Reason Online, with links to different viewpoints on the subject and background information.
Wiring Isn't Enough - a brief essay by Dyson's daughter, Esther Dyson, who helped shape her father's views on the Internet.
Essays on Science and Society - covers a range of topics and includes Dyson's Science as a Craft Industry. From the journal Science.
Ethics and Technology: Conference Papers and Proceedings - from a recent meeting, on such areas as genetics, access to the Internet, and whistle-blowing. From the Intellectual Property and Technology Forum at Boston College Law School.
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