1/2 If at the extreme there are instruments of absolute power (not merely the H-bomb but computer systems that might control whole populations, or chemical intervention), who is to guarantee that an absolute government will never use them, that it will never, for example, make use of electrodes in the brain? As we know less and less about the results of our innovations and are increasingly unable to find the necessary remedies, little more is needed to bring us face to face
@ebbot 2/2 with an absolute risk. This is why all technical development that increases infinitely a risk that is hypothetical but absolute seems to me to be totally reprehensible. --Jaques Ellul The Technological Bluff (1988) #technology #dystopia