Doom merchants have given the latest scientific discovery to threaten to wipe the human race from the face of the planet a cautious welcome.
Despite claims the creation of the world’s first synthetic life by controversial geneticist Dr Craig Venter will lead to the development of “the most powerful bio weapons imaginable,” members of doomsday groups remain sceptical.
Professor Matt Pinter, chair of the End is Nigh Technology Forum (END), said last night: “Don’t run screaming to the hills just yet.”
“We’ve been here before,” said Prof Pinter. “Remember nano technology?
“Our scientists were confident these microscopic robots would turn on their creators and devour mankind within a decade. What’s happened? A big fat zero.”
END is one of several privately-funded science pessimist groups which explore all new technological advances and their potential to obliterate the earth.
“We ended up looking right wallies with genetically modified food didn’t we? Our best boys were on that, confident this messing with nature would destroy the world’s crops and starve mankind, but we were way off beam.
“This latest development is pressing all the right buttons, but I’m afraid I can’t see it.”
Dr Venter has been described as “playing God” with his “Frankenstein” discovery in which he has constructed an artificial set of DNA strands and implanted into a bacteria cell.
But as a threat to the destruction of the planet, END and other prophets of doom have their reservations.
Oxford University’s ethics expert Julie Jupitus said: “There is a real danger that all we’ll get from Dr Venter’s discovery are effective medicines that will actually do more good than harm.
“There’s a faint chance the world will be destroyed but we don’t want to be putting all our eggs in one basket.
“The nuclear option is still a safe bet. We thought we were onto a good one in the forties when the atomic bomb was invented. Two explosions in a fortnight was a promising start, but it sort of petered out.
“You can still get good odds on global warming ending life as we know it, but I’ve got a sneaking suspicion Aids might just mutate into something global.
“The synthetic life created by Dr Venter is, I‘m afraid, highly unlikely to be developed into massive world destroying bombs … still, here‘s hoping.”
