Within recent memory, two other major disruptive technologies have been developed: information technology and bio-technology. Examining their records reveals two paths for how nanotechnology could develop.

Information technology has, for the most part, been a good citizen. Since computers, networks, and the Internet have become common, industry groups like the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) and the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) have done a good job of promoting standards of interoperability. Schools and professional training programs have smoothly (or by fits and starts) integrated computers into their curricula. Periodicals and training manuals exist for every level of expertise from the beginner to the expert, and industry watchdog groups such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT) watch both government legislation and industry practice for illegal or unethical activity. Other groups, including the Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) and independent computer security vendors, track the spread of computer viruses and software vulnerabilities with such efficiency that major newspapers carry notifications of big problems and fixes are usually released within days. Despite recent antitrust issues, the industry remains quite open and competitive and, for the most part, it has been remarkably constrained in its lobbying for legislative protection (though the same cannot be said of the telecommunications industry). Many questionable laws such as the Communications Decency Act have been defeated or repealed, and potentially threatening legislation like the Total Information Awareness Act are openly debated. Intellectual property protection remains strong enough for companies to make respectable profits, but solid alternatives for almost every software product now exist within the open source community, many of them in the public domain.

Biotech’s record is spottier. While basic biology is part of primary education, most people don’t have a good understanding of the issues involved. There is less engagement by the press and there are fewer journals for nonexperts. Also, since there is less concern for how different biotech applications interoperate than there is for computer parts, there are fewer open industry associations setting standards. The level of secrecy in biotech research largely prevents watchdog groups from being effective, but this is to some extent justified since the biotech product development cycle is so much longer than it is for information technology (years as opposed to months), and a key scientist leaving a project can set it back almost to its beginning.

The stakes are also higher in biotech than they are with information technology. Few people march or riot over new software releases (tempting though it can sometimes be), but the biotech industry is almost always vilified as meddling with nature or playing God, even though it has generated greater advancements in medical treatments and in prolonging life than any other technological revolution in history. The stakes are also higher because when research is done incorrectly or when companies act unethically, their behavior is likely to result in serious side effects or death, often at a massive scale. Biotech is an industry that needs more ethical scrutiny than it has received.

Nanotech sits at the crossroads between scientific and engineering disciplines, and it has a lot to learn from each. We hope it will be able to combine the best of both, and we now turn our attention to particular areas.

People may have started, as Rousseau thought, in the state of nature. But the nation state is the organizing structure of current societies almost everywhere on earth, and it is within these nation states that nanotechnology will emerge. People cannot plan for nanotechnology as individuals, so it will be necessary for public organizations to embrace the future and plan for it.

In the United States, the National Nanotechnology Initiative (NNI) was launched during the Clinton administration. This initiative is now funded at a level of almost $1 billion per year, with much of this funding going into research and development efforts at universities, national laboratories, and industrial research operations. NNI also has important educational, policy, ethical, and outreach components. Some regulatory structures that were put in place for other concerns, including everything from zoning laws and air pollution regulations to noise abatement statutes and building codes, deal with aspects of nanotechnology. Government-supported education and training initiatives and development zones (including nanotechnology incubators) are also responses to nano. For these reasons NNI, plus extant regulatory structures, represent the nucleus of current nano policy.

More is needed. In Chapter 5, we discussed the environment, energy, and economics. Since the economic impact of nanoscience will be very large, it is the responsibility of public policy to anticipate its effects and to try to cushion some of the possible negative ones. This includes planning for the economic shock that may come if competitive new products and nanomanufacturing cause job losses in older manufacturing sectors. Public policy must also provide appropriate new regulatory bodies to handle the unique challenges of nanoscience.

The set of challenges that nanotechnology will provide might seem intimidating. It is clearly wise for government to look before it leaps, but inaction or unending delays could be destructive. The ETC Group, an international public interest body, advocates a total moratorium on nanotechnology until all of its environmental, economic, and other impacts can be evaluated. This approach is not feasible. Nanoscience is already here and nanotechnology is arriving. Both are already providing great benefits for the society and will provide many more. Delay is not feasible (and from a defense perspective it is strategically suicidal, for even if the work is not done in the United States, it will certainly continue elsewhere), but regulation, planning, and education are needed.

Watchdog groups like ETC are important contributors to the debate. Their studies, along with academic review and open research policies by institutions doing nanoscience research, provide crucial transparency similar to that enjoyed by information technology. Only with this kind of transparency can the nanoscience community hope to maintain public trust while pursuing research that many people find threatening. In addition, it is important to keep public attention focused on nanotechnology. Continued press coverage, open industry meetings, and even coverage in popular fiction are important components of this. On the government side, specialized task forces, panels, committees, reports, and legislative and executive actions help keep attention focused, and they allow for speedy decisions on nanotechnology policy when necessary. This speed will be essential as the nanotechnology industry continues to gather momentum. The rate of innovation for nanotechnology could well exceed that of either information tech or biotech, and the decisions required by the government to regulate it could be at least as complex.

Why is this so important? The discussion surrounding genetically modified (GM) food provides a prime example. In 2002 the United States promised famine relief to Africa, shipping tens of thousands of tons of grains including genetically modified corn. Despite the threat of starvation, African governments in Mozambique, Zambia, and Zimbabwe hemmed and hawed about whether to accept the food, saying they were unsure if it was safe to eat, plant, or even feed to livestock. Genetically modified food of this type has been common in America for years, but regulators in Europe had escalated fears about the safety of GM food, largely due to pressure from farmers’ lobbies. Even after years of using GM crops in the United States, old-fashioned trade wrangling combined with the GM food industry’s perceived lack of forthrightness in providing impartial studies about the safety of their products resulted in this crisis. It had nothing to do with science or technology, only with irresponsible policies and a lack of education. Governments have a responsibility to prevent this kind of thing from happening.

Technologies are developed by people and organizations, and these inventors have the right to protect their discoveries and developments by securing patents. Nearly all developed countries have a patent system, and some larger entities such as the European Union and World Trade Organization (WTO) are developing even broader patent policies. Patents will be as crucial for nanotechnology as they have been for other technologies. Inventors, developers, and investors need to protect their ideas, devices, and investments. Reasonable patent protection is a necessity for nanotechnology to flourish and to contribute its unique attributes to all aspects of society, including homeland security.

But a key difficulty lurks in the word reasonable. For an example, far from nano anything, think for a moment about children’s literature. In 1998 Congress approved an extension of copyrights often called the “Mickey Mouse Law,” since it was passed under enormous pressure from Disney just before Mickey went out of copyright. In Mickey’s case the law extended the copyright to a total of 95 years after first publication. Mickey first appeared in 1928, so this extension to the copyright will preclude any other creators from using Mickey (or Goofy and Unca Scrooge, either of whom might have provided a better name for this copyright policy) until at least 2023. This hyperextended copyright protection reaches well beyond any reasonable lifespan of the creators and seems arbitrary, unreasonable, and suffocating.

J. K. Rowling, now richer than the Queen of England and worth some $500 million, is seeking very broad copyright protection for her character Harry Potter. She and her publisher are now using copyright protection to limit other creative work involving child magicians. For example, they have sought to block the western publication of a story about a Russian girl apprentice magician called Tanya Grotter as well as Chinese and Bengali take-offs on Rowling’s idea. A case could be made that these are noninfringing “fair use” creations covered under laws designed to protect parodies, or that they are derivative works that do not deprive an author of reasonable profit from her work. By pursuing an attack on these works, Rowling and company are potentially stifling other authors whose work could in no way be mistaken for the original Harry Potter stories but could delight children who are culturally removed from Harry (British-style boarding schools, myths, and values not being universal). Based on this behavior, their view of copyright protection seems as draconian as anything Voldemort might have conjured up.

How does this apply to nanotechnology? Copyrights and patents are intricately related, and intellectual property law will be key to the development and use of nanotechnology. In the pharmaceuticals area, for example, patent issues are particularly complex since they can have life and death consequences. Without patent protection, big pharma cannot justify the very large expenditures involved in drug development; it can cost more than $100 million to develop, test, and certify a drug. However, protection that is too strong can be abused, and serious abuses have already been committed. Abuses can take a variety of forms. A few common ones include patenting a drug but not producing it (either to protect a competing profitable drug or to await a more lucrative offer for distribution), holding a patent back while demanding an exorbitant licensing fee, and keeping prices artificially high long after development costs have been recouped.

Patent law is already very broad. It is possible to patent individual genes, for example. This means that a patent-holder can choose to delay the development of therapies and treatments for any reason at all. Not reading Harry Potter in a Russian setting may not work significant harm to society, but a 20-year delay on a drug for halting breast cancer certainly would. While the pharmaceutical industry has produced remarkable drugs that have made our lives richer, healthier, and longer, the ethical issues that surround patent policies are vexing.

One other aspect of globalization is that it now takes much less time than it has at any other point in history for a product to reach world markets once it is approved for release. Harry Potter was released in markets worldwide on the same day, and drugs can be on pharmacy shelves across the country within weeks after approval by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The World Trade Organization has opened many new markets and is working to provide equal protections in all of them. All of this means that it should be easier than ever for companies (or authors) to profit from their inventions in less time than ever. This would seem to make the case for shortening rather than extending protection, and there should be some review of when public policy considerations should allow specific intellectual property rights to be overridden. Led by Brazil, which ignored some international patents to create one of the world’s most effective and affordable AIDS treatment programs, this is indeed happening in the developing world. Even as authors, we think it would be nice to live in a world where we could sing iconic American songs by George Gershwin or Irving Berlin without having to slip a copyright notice into the chorus.

In nanotechnology, the patent issues have not yet captured public attention, but clearly there is an overwhelming human need to see that the technology is developed and used. Patents should advance both the society’s progress and the developer’s income, and we do not want the situation to be similar to the worst of Harry and Mickey on drugs.

The Constitution of the United States does not specifically mention the right of privacy, but it is a remarkable, strong charter protecting civil liberties. Issues of privacy and civil liberty within American society are clearly much larger than any simple nanotechnology considerations, but nanotechnology does add urgency to them. Our progress toward the use of nanostructures within the society should engender a new concern about secure protection of privacy and civil liberties.

Shakespeare’s Brutus was concerned about Caesar taking too much power when he said, “And then, I grant, we put a sting in him, / That at his will he may do danger with.” There are obvious ways in which nanotechnology will substantially increase the capability of governmental and large private organizations to ride roughshod over privacy and civil liberties. For example, if we develop the capability to screen any individual’s genome in one day for a thousand dollars (and this will happen before the end of this decade), then whose property is that information? The genome will contain, for example, indicators about inherited diseases, allergies, different medical dysfunctions, and genetic traits. Already, screening for particular markers (like the brac gene for breast cancer) has been a great advance in preventive medicine. Full knowledge of a genome would be a great medical advance for the individual patient, whose awareness of his or her own condition would be very much improved. But if these records become the property of employers, insurance companies, or government agencies (or boyfriends, or girlfriends, or mortgage brokers) then the individual’s rights have been invaded.

In a total information society where nano-enabled pervasive computing is present everyplace, the ability to protect citizens’ privacy is challenged. Things like grades in school, memberships in clubs and organizations, sexual preferences, consumption patterns, and political views can all be captured. Nanobased code breaking would not only allow better cracking of terrorist plots, it could also prevent any personal computer files or Internet browsing habits from remaining private. This could be both a government problem and a corporate one. The Recording Industry Association of America has advocated and received some legislative support for broad rights allowing it to defend its copyrights aggressively by breaking into computers of those it suspects of sharing music files on the Internet. If support for these policies continues and if advanced cryptographic techniques become available, the music industry (and any other similarly treated industry) could easily create a database of personal information more impressive than the FBI’s.

To whom does this information belong? To whom should it be revealed? What are the constraints on disseminating that knowledge? These issues, again, predate nanoscience. But when we can monitor individual conversations through walls and windows, when old-fashioned wire taps are replaced by electromagnetic monitoring, and when nanotechnology allows labeling and tracing of every individual pill, computer chip, and pizza box, then the possibilities for loss of privacy and civil liberties are more frightening. At a time when the Attorney General of the United States is pursuing ever broader surveillance rights and continues to develop plans to reward the citizens for spying on one another these privacy concerns are immediate and deep. Clearly, effective regulation arising from awareness of capabilities and the importance of privacy is part of the answer. Nanoscience simply creates a more pressing need for society to address these issues.

It would seem consistent with the complexity of our society and with many Supreme Court findings to assume an implied federal privacy right. However, the capabilities of nanotechnology, biotechnology, and information technology demand further and more permanent protection. Within an American context, it seems that only a Constitutional amendment directly stating a right to privacy can be trusted in light both of inconsistencies of government policy (as can be seen in the USA “Patriot” Act and the proposed Total Information Awareness Act) and of these advances in technology.

The invention of the automobile required driver’s education. The invention of the aircraft required pilot training courses. The development of information technology required many of us to learn more than we might want to know about operating systems, file formats, and networking components. The invention of the telephone brought telephone operators, linemen, telemarketers, and AT&T. Similarly, the development of nanotechnology will mean new jobs, new careers, and new work patterns. It will also mean displacements, economic disruption, and changing employment and investment patterns. Nanotechnology should represent an opportunity for economic gain and for better peace prospects worldwide.

To enable society at large and individuals within that society to take maximum advantage of the opportunities and to overcome the challenges of nanotechnology, new educational systems will be required. With appropriate education and training, nanotechnology and its products will be no scarier than the bicycle, which was also a tremendous technological advance when it was developed. Education and training can provide security, employment, understanding, and ease in the society as it will exist after nanotechnology has added its modicum of new things. Even in Prey, his novel on nano disasters, Michael Crichton shows that the perceived nano dangers can be solved by thought and by education.

People’s fear of the unknown can be palpable, and can lead to riots, ostracism, xenophobia, government change, and war. Education, training, and openness are ways around these disruptions. Globalization, economic change, and rapid innovation become familiar, rather than frightening, when our education permits us to understand what they are about.

Nanotechnology will provide new medicine, new energy, new materials, new fabrics, new tennis rackets, new deodorants, new cheeses, and new skis. We will be able to see, hear, smell, and taste better. Since some aspects of this technology will be strange, it will be the responsibility of our educational systems—public, private, and supplemental—to help us understand these things. Books, Web pages, articles, lectures, newspaper columns, and television specials will help us realize the huge capabilities that nanotechnology brings.

Science and technology are at their base value-free and amoral. Insight and wisdom can be used positively or negatively, depending on education, moral values, and social issues. In the words of Deuteronomy 30:19, “I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live.”

All of science—indeed all of human effort—empowers society in all directions, good and bad. Radio brought communications and safety, but it also brought the boom-box and electric instruments and noise pollution. Prometheus the fire-giver is an image of power, but fire can burn destructively. The Haber process that makes synthetic ammonia from nitrogen and hydrogen was developed at the beginning of the 20th Century, and the fertilizers it produces are essential for world agriculture to feed the billions of people on earth. But the Haber process also makes it much easier to make artificial gunpowder, a result that helped extend World War I, killing millions in the process. In all of these examples, science and technology enable society to do critically important things both good and bad, and it is the responsibility of the society to decide how to use new ideas. Education will help, and all the moral and societal values that we develop will help determine how the world responds to the capabilities of nanotechnology.

Henry David Thoreau claimed that “time is but the stream I go a-fishing in.” But the current in the stream has sped up. We now measure time in nanoseconds or less, and as this book has tried to make clear, structures at the nanoscale determine behavior in our tangible and real world. The total information society will make everybody more aware, simply because more information will be available to everybody.

The promises and threats from amoral science and technology are greater than ever. Global society will change tremendously in this century, and nanoscience will play a significant part in this change.

In the Constitution for the State of Massachusetts, John Adams required that the government of the State further the arts, the sciences, and education as part of its mission. But the individual members of our present society must force the establishment of appropriate government regulatory structures based on knowledge, insight, tradition, and individual rights.

Admiral David Jeremiah, former vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, understood the need for vigilance in a world in which the MAD doctrine is no longer adequate when he said, “Military applications of molecular manufacturing have even greater potential than nuclear weapons to radically change the balance of power. In anticipation of that possibility, the uninformed policy maker is likely to impose restrictions on the development of technology in such a way as to inhibit commercial development (ultimately beneficial to mankind) while permitting those operating outside the restrictive bounds to gain irrevocable advantage.”

The need, then, is for vigilance, awareness, and action on the part of society. We no longer live in small villages isolated from one another, but in a huge, global village. We can no longer just move to avoid the smoke from the neighbor’s chimney, as Abraham Lincoln’s family did. Instead, we need to embrace the capabilities and possibilities that technology offers, and to do so within a societal structure that is functional, creative, responsible, and protective of individual rights.

In an article from Defense Horizons in March of 2002, Peterson and Egan make the following argument about instability brewing in the world.

Regulation is one of the legitimate activities of government at all levels. The existence and enforcement of local, county, and state regulations such as noise abatement statutes, air and water quality standards, workplace safety regulations, zoning laws, and toxic waste disposal requirements are very important. These constitute the first level of society’s defense in light of the environmental and safety issues associated with nanotechnology and all emerging technologies.

More is needed. Federal action on such issues has become a political football. The current Bush administration has both pluses (the initiatives on hydrogen fuel cells, nuclear fusion, and support for the NNI) and major minuses (refusing to deal responsibly with global warming, advocating drilling in the Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge, and alteration and lagging enforcement of environmental standards). The issues that advanced technologies present require federal attention in both the development and regulatory sectors. We need an FNA (Federal Nanotechnology Agency) to complement the tremendous development efforts of the NNI with appropriate regulation, policy advice, product approval, and monitoring. This agency should undertake development, adoption, and enforcement of statutory and regulatory aspects of nanotechnology and associated advanced technologies.

Just as flight brought the FAA, as radio and TV brought the FCC, and as food health concerns and drug development brought the FDA, so nanotechnology requires (and society deserves) an independent FNA with deep expertise and broad powers. The reason to propose yet another federal agency, rather than to assign responsibility to existing alphabetical organizations, is that nanotechnology is so different. For example, according to ETC Group reports, the FDA has assigned so-called “functional equivalence” (a designation indicating that a new food or drug operates on the same premise as another and therefore requires less rigorous approval) to nanoscaled structures, such as titanium dioxide nanoparticles used in skin cream and suntan lotion. This means that their toxicity levels may receive less attention than is due, and major concerns over the carcinogenic properties may be glossed over without adequate testing. This reflects a lack of understanding of the vast differences at the nanoscale.

Just as globalization is a major theme in nanotechnology’s development and application, so global approaches are needed for effective regulation. As an example of what does work, there is the Montreal Agreement that led to the protection of the ozone layer by phasing out worldwide production of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs). An example of what doesn’t work is the failure to date of the Rio/Kyoto approach to the control of global warming. We now have the UN, the WTO, the World Health Organization (WHO), and the World Bank. We need a World Nanotechnology Organization (WNO), perhaps as a working group within one of these larger and established organizations. The WNO structure must be inclusive—advanced and developing countries, government and labor, industry, public interest, and academic representatives must all be included. To operate, the WNO will require open meetings and clear mandates and powers. This kind of inclusive policy may account for the success of the Montreal Agreement, just as the failure to date of Rio/Kyoto may be due to its lack of inclusion. This WNO should both regulate and document the technology. It should set standards and help in their enforcement. It should enlist the best minds and the best efforts of humanity in the control, understanding, and applications of nanotechnology.

Visionaries from Isaiah and Zamenhof (the inventor of Esperanto) to Woodrow Wilson and Grotius (founder of international law) have envisioned both world peace and world security through understanding, law, morality, and policy. New capabilities for great economic security through energy, science, biotechnology, nanotechnology, and information technology can hasten the betterment of the world, and of its individual citizens.

The answers to these challenges lie in action and in education, in understanding and in responsibility, in civic awareness and in reaffirmed respect for privacy, civil rights, and individual determination. Big Brother is not the answer. We need the collective will and wisdom of all peoples. We need vision, humility, and peace. Nanoscience and nanotechnology will lead to wealth, to security, to better health and better living, but they will only do so if society welcomes them with awareness, education, and responsibility.