Introducing Brave New Planet

Introducing Brave New Planet, a seven-part series that delves deep into powerful technologies changing our world. They have amazing potential upsides, but we can’t ignore the serious risks. Hosted by Dr. Eric Lander, Brave New Planet is a partnership between the Broad Institute, Pushkin Industries, and the Boston Globe.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:15):
Pushkin. In the twenty first century, powerful technologies have been
appearing at a breathtaking pace, related to the Internet, artificial intelligence,
genetic engineering, and more. They could dramatically improve our world, or,
if we don't make wise choices, could leave us a

(00:37):
lot more solve. I Americ Lander. I'm a scientist who
works on ways to improve human health. I helped lead
the Human Genome Project, served as a science advisor to
the Obama White House, and today direct the Broad Institute

(00:58):
of MTN Harvard. This generation's choices will shape the future
as never before. The decisions ahead aren't just up to
scientists or politicians. We all of us are the stewards
of a brave new planet. In this podcast, we'll explore

(01:21):
hard questions. Should we alter the Earth's atmosphere to prevent
climate change? I can imagine conflicts that could arise when
nations start tinkering with the composition of the stratosphere. Should
we deploy a new genetic engineering technology in the wild
possibilities of a shining, marvelous future. We're just exploding all

(01:44):
around me like fireworks, And at the same time it
was literally in the same breath, I was also just
like Holly crap. If this isn't used properly, this could
be really damaging to our planet. As machines learn to
mimic human decision making, can we keep them from learning
human prejudices. When I learned that there was actually an

(02:06):
algorithm that judges used to help decide what to sentence people,
I was stunned. Can truth and democracy survive the impact
of deep fakes? Creditors would chime in and say, you
can absolutely make a deep fake sex video of your
ex with thirty pictures. I've done it with twenty. Here's
the things that keep me up at night. A video

(02:28):
of Donald Trump saying I've launched nuclear weapons against Iran.
And before anybody gets around to figuring out whether this
is real or not, we have global nucleu ountdown. And
is it time to turn war over to robots? I
know people who have killed civilians, and in all cases

(02:49):
where people made mistakes, it was just too much information.
Thanks for happening too fast. We'll talk to remarkable people.
A West African scientist fighting malaria, the co founder of LinkedIn,
A recent US Secretary of Defense, a civil rights lawyer
focused on artificial intelligence, one of the Navy's first female

(03:11):
fighter pilots, and many many more. To get the world
we want, we'll need to make wise choices. So fellows,
stewards of this Brave New Planet, join us as we
grapple with opportunities and challenges that are too big to
fit in a tweet, but that will shape our future.

(03:33):
Utopia or dystopia. It's up to us. Subscribe to Brave
New Planet on Apple Podcasts. Our first episodes drop October twelfth,