18/03/2025
The bioweapons arms race is to the 21st century what the nuclear arms race was to the 20th century. Perhaps weaponized Artificial Intelligence will someday surpass bioweapons, but that remains to be demonstrated. Consider this a challenge to the computer science community. For now, virologists can rightfully claim the title of “Death, Destroyer of Worlds”. Sorry Oppenheimer, but your time has passed.
The rewards for countries to pursue bioweapons development are simply too great to ever stop this race. Any country that develops a bioweapon capable of causing a deadly pandemic will ensure its ultimate survival through the principle of Mutually Assured Destruction. When faced with an existential threat, said country can threaten to release the bioweapon and destroy human civilization.
The infected fatality rate (IFR) does not even need to be that high. SARS-CoV-2 has an IFR of less than 1%, yet it will massively disrupt economies and other human activity, causing widespread death, financial losses, and misery. Scientists estimate that an IFR of 10% would knock our interconnected civilization back several hundred years in time. An IFR of 50% would likely return human beings to a Stone Age way of life.
Bioweapons developers continue to refine the technology to achieve the Holy Grail: a bioweapon, perhaps coupled with a vaccine, that can be selectively deployed against an enemy while leaving the country that releases the bioweapon relatively untouched. Yet this is very hard to achieve. Our fellow inhabitants of planet Earth need to realize that bioweapons development will continue, and there will be more accidents in the future. The genie is out of the bottle, there is no stopping it now.