Eric Talbot Jensen Gives Online Lecture on Future Weapons and the Law of Armed Conflict

Post Date June 25, 2013
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Category emerging technologies, online lectures

On Wednesday 19 June, GCRI hosted an online lecture by Eric Talbot Jensen entitled ‘The Future of the Law of Armed Conflict: Ostriches, Butterflies, and Nanobots’. Jensen is an Associate Professor at the Brigham Young University School of Law and formerly spent two decades in the US Army as a Cavalry Officer and a Judge Advocate, including a position as Chief of the Army’s International Law Branch. His lecture is based on a forthcoming paper he wrote of the same name [1].

The law of armed …

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Catherine Rhodes Gives Online Lecture on Pathogenic Genetic Resources and Sovereign Rights

Post Date June 18, 2013
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Category infectious disease, law & policy, online lectures

On Tuesday 12 June, GCRI hosted an online lecture by Catherine Rhodes entitled ‘Sovereign Wrongs: Ethics in the Governance of Pathogenic Genetic Resources’. Rhodes is a Research Fellow at the University of Manchester’s Institute for Science, Ethics and Innovation, where she researches how science can address humanity’s major challenges, with a focus on the interplay between science and international processes. Her lecture is based on a paper she published of the same name [1].

Rhodes’s lecture raised the question of who owns ‘pathogenic genetic resources’, meaning …

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GCR News Summary May 2013

Post Date May 31, 2013
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Sunset from Mauna Loa Observatory image courtesy of NOAA/Eric Johnson.

The National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration reported that for the first time the daily mean atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide at the Mauna Loa Observatory was higher than 400 parts per million. The concentration of CO2 has grown at an increasing rate since the observatory began taking measurements in 1958. The concentration of CO2 is generally believed to be 40% higher than it was before the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. It …

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May 2013 Newsletter

Post Date May 13, 2013
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Dear friends,

If there’s one thing we know from the study of risk, it’s that sudden, unexpected events can change the game. So it was for the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill, the subject of a new paper by GCRI Deputy Director Grant Wilson. So too it is right now for GCRI and our parent organization Blue Marble Space, which recently lost its 501c3 tax status. For Deepwater Horizon, the result was several deaths plus massive environmental and economic damage. For GCRI, it means we have to …

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GCR News Summary April 2013

Post Date April 29, 2013
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You can help us compile future news posts by putting any GCR news you see in the comment thread of this blog post, or send it via email to Grant Wilson (grant [at] gcrinstitute.org).

So far 115 people have been diagnosed with a strain of bird flu known as H7N9 that was previously unknown in humans. Twenty-three of the people known to have contracted the disease have already died. The discovery of a 4-year-old boy who has the virus but who has no apparent …

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March 2013 Newsletter

Post Date March 07, 2013
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Dear friends,

A lot of the knowledge needed to address global catastrophic risk – and many other issues – is already out there somewhere in the world. But it’s spread across many different people. The challenge then is bringing people together to share and synthesize their knowledge. GCRI is dedicated to meeting this challenge. In this month’s newsletter, we announce three new initiatives on this front. First, we invite you to join us at the 2013 Society for Risk Analysis Annual Meeting, which will be December …

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February 2013 Newsletter

Post Date March 07, 2013
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Note from the editor: GCRI forgot to post the February 2013 Newsletter on our blog last month, so here it is. Enjoy!

Dear friends,

It is always a bittersweet moment when a close colleague moves on with his career. For the last nine months, Tim Maher has been working as a Research Assistant for GCRI through the Bard College M.S. program in Climate Science and Policy. Now Tim is transitioning back to Bard to finish his degree. His presence will be greatly missed. Everywhere you look within …

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New IEET Article On International Treaties For Emerging Technologies

Post Date March 02, 2013
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Category emerging technologies, law & policy, publications

Quick FYI – Grant Wilson and I have a new article up at IEET: How to create an international treaty for emerging technologies. The article discusses several options for the institutions that can support such a treaty, mainly institutions within the United Nations. The article was produced for our crowdfunding campaign Preventing Technological Disaster Through International Treaties. We had hoped to raise $8000 and write a full academic journal article, but we only raised $300, so we wrote this instead. I still think it provides …

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January 2013 Newsletter

Post Date January 10, 2013
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Dear friends,

Happy new year. 2012 was GCRI’s first full year in existence. It was a great year for us. We grew from three people to ten, launched a new website, publications, resources for the GCR community, and more. Now, having survived the December 2012 apocalypse, we look forward to an even better 2013.

We’re sending out the January newsletter a few days late because we wanted to include two new papers that were recently accepted for publication – one on geoengineering and one on nuclear war. Each paper demonstrates a key theme that …

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Grant Wilson On Emerging Tech Treaties At IEET

Post Date December 30, 2012
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Quick FYI: Grant Wilson has a new article at IEET: Emerging Technologies: Should They Be Internationally Regulated? The article discusses existing and possible treaties for a range of emerging technologies, including bioengineering, geoengineering, and artificial intelligence. The article summarizes Grant’s recent law paper Minimizing global catastrophic and existential risks from emerging technologies through international law.

Note that the IEET article lists me as an author on this. My name is only listed because I was the one with existing IEET status. Grant wrote the article. I …

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