Rosennean ideas used as a "weapon"?

["Judith Rosen" <***>]

This is something my father was gravely concerned about. He not only thought
it could be done, but believed it would be INEVITABLE if he published
anything close to "instructions" on How To Build A Living System.

One only has to watch the news to see how it might be used. 9/11? The
anthrax scare? Chemical weapons? War? That would be nothing compared. A new
life form, not naturally occurring, wouldn't be some sort of pet. All living
things have their own set of imperatives and go about satisfying those
imperatives, no matter what. To assume that humanity could control any new
life form would be foolish. (And, even if it was possible to control it, do
we have enough wisdom as a species to be respectful towards some new
organism of our own creation? I think not.) To assume that any danger a new
life form presents to humans wouldn't be used for aggressive purposes by one
group of humans against another group of humans would be just as foolish.
People have been using animals and their various protective mechanisms for
aggressive purposes of our own since the beginning of our history--it's just
another kind of "tool". The religious right would see nothing wrong with it
since we were "given" dominion over all we see by the "creator" of said
universe. Business would find some way to exploit any and all capabilities
of a new organism, positive or negative capabilities, and multiply the
dangers and the atrocities all around. It would be a nightmare. My father
could see it, so can I.

He only wanted to know the answers to his own questions: What is life? /
What causes life? He had no interest in using what he learned to achieve
anything else. He spoke of an almost superstitious attitude in his
autobiographical "reminiscences" that I posted-- comparing the gifts he was
born with to "witchcraft" in that they must never be used for the benefit of
the person employing those gifts. To do so violates some sort of ethical
balance and leads to grief. He also never really cared if he was recognized
as "The Man Who....."  He never went political or played the popularity game
in any effort to aggrandize himself. Why? It wasn't for lack of ego. Trust
me. It was simply because there was no VALUE in that, according to how he
accounted such things. This is part of the reason why his work is not more
widely known. He wanted to be left alone to tinker with it his own way, not
become a target for whole other areas of human activity from the CIA to
foreign powers to the church to luddite nutcases like the Unabomber. He had
the occasional brushes with some of these people over the years. I'll have
to post a couple of those stories at some point.

Anyway, I think it needs to be said that paranoia might be exactly the mind
set called for when assessing the risks of application of theory on creating
new life forms-- life that would not be based on earthly evolutionary
processes.Paranoia in this case is probably not careful enough.

Judith Rosen