New paper on precaution and existential risk online for free reading and download

 Some time back, I had two posts here, with a slightly tongue-in-cheek comment on some ongoing academic campaigns and discussions for attending to small or very unclear risks with potentially very serious negative outcomes - so-called existential risks: here, and here. As reported later, this led to an invitation to debate the issue with Olle Häggström (mathematician and crossdisciplinary futurist), author of this new book on the existential risk issue, at The Institute of Future Studies in Stockholm, and Olle used a number of pages in his book to comment on the points I made in the blog posts. Parallel to all of this, I was invited by Sune Holm at the University of Copenhagen, who's been coordinating a nice series of international workshops on the ethics and philosophy of risk, to contribute to a coming special issue of the research journal Ethics, Policy and the Environment on the theme of the ethics of precaution, an area that readers of this blog know that I'm deeply engaged in since many years. Happy to accept, I took the opportunity to start off from the blogposts and the ensuing debates to clarify what existential risks means for the ethics of precaution, and to attend to some quite difficult theoretical issues left hanging in my own theory of the ethics of precaution and risk, published 5 years ago. I have now submitted my contribution, and the so-called preprint, that is my submitted manuscript before peer review, etc. can be freely read and downloaded here and here.

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What Is A Terrorist Threat, And How Should One Respond To It?

The other day, following the recent horrid events in Paris, linked to several temporally closely aligned similar attacks by Daesh, e.g., in Lebanon and Iraq, apparent intelligence on several other planned attacks throughout Europe, and specifically that a possible Daesh operative had entered Sweden to organise a large.scale attack of some sort, my country raised its official terrorist threat level from 3 to 4 on a scale that ends at 5. One named suspect of preparation of terrorist crime has now been apprehended, but the police and security organs apparently continue to search for others, and the government has been clear that this single factor will not by itself motivate downgrading the threat level. At the same time, several voices criticise the development either for coming much too late (claiming, among other things, that the knowledge of the presence of Daesh sympathisers in the country should have been enough), or for being misdirected, as actual terror attacks in Sweden (save one) tend mostly to be domestic extreme right wing nationalist/racist (targetting refugees and street begging EU migrants, people of visibly Muslim or Roma identity or Middle East or African descent, their living quarters, and so on), or is exaggerated and bound to create more problems than what it prevents or fixes. It struck me that many of these reactions seem based on ignoring or fixing on only selected aspects of what is technically known as a risk analysis. For this is basically what the assessment of the level of terrorist threat by a state is about: assessing certain risks and cost of events classified as terrorist attacks, as well as various actions possibly to take in response to various such levels of risk, and to evaluate on that basis what to do.

A disclaimer before I start: the putative facts about the seriousness of typical types of terrorist attacks, and the likelihood of different types of such attacks, are, of course, open to revision in the face of facts – although, as will become clear, less obviously according to what standard of evidence. All of the aspects described are part of the discussion of the ethical basis of environmental and technological risk policy that I undertake in my book The Price of Precaution and the Ethics of Risk.

First, there is the two main dimensions of the concept of risk itself: the probability and harm dimensions. A risk is always the possible (and to some extent likely) occurrence of some type of variably harmful event. In risk analysis, the magnitude of a risk is determined by a combination of these two dimensions, so that a low probability may be balanced by a serious harm-level, and the other way around. Already this simple analytical unpacking points to a factor that may seem to be at work in the reaction to the raised Swedish terror threat level. Some people focus mainly on the likelihood dimension, and then would hesitate to criticise that new evidence and circumstances changes the assessment, or would rather have seen an earlier raised level in view of the actual wave terror attacks in the form of typical "lone wolf" deeds, and thus a concentration on extreme right wing violence rather than its Islamistic sibbling. Others focus instead on the harm dimension, and then lets the demonstrated vastness of the damage of attacks such as the one in Paris dictate the risk assessment, also when the evidence of likelihood is very weak. This may then motivate the position that, knowing that Daesh and similar groups do have had attacks such as the one  in Paris on its theoretical agenda for a long time (and carried out i the Iraq and Syrian theaters). With the notable exception of Anders Behring Breivik, although much more frequent and actually realised rather than merely theoretically imagined, the right-wing extremist deeds, while clearly terrorism in the sense of attempting to spread fear for political purposes through the use of violence against civilians, tend to be more restricted in its consequences than the large scale massacres that have now occurred and known to be on the Daesh agenda.

Second, there is the way in which different such combinations and magnitudes of risk are evaluated, or seen to support various courses of action. Here, a number of additional issues linked to the assessment of the risk magnitude is actualised, namely:

Third, how the constituents of the risk (its probability level and its harm level) are evaluated in terms of how much we should care about it. This gives another way in which we may get a similar output that was just described above, even if all agree of the risk magnitude. This since risks with the same magnitude may still be evaluated differently, e.g. due to being made up of very low probability, or very serious potential harm. here, one may also want to pay attention to the context, such as if one is making the assessment from the position of already being burdened by much risk of different kind. So if the potentially worst terror threat are the least likely, and the most likely ones the least serious (relatively speaking, of course), we may again get differences of opinion of a similar sort, but now more clearly based on differences of values rather than appraisal of fact.

Fourth, how the opportunity costs of different actions in response to a risk assessment are evaluated, that is, what is lost and risked by taking these various actions rather than other ones. Here we may spot a number of ways in which assessments may differ, although not basically disagreeing on the risk assessment (such disagreements may, of course, also be added to other disagreements). For instance, several argued against extensive action in face of the wave of apparently extreme right wing nationalist attacks against Swedish actual or in preparation asylum shelters that it would not be worth the costs it would mean to have effective guarding of each one of them. At the same time, there has been no or very little hesitance to mobilise extensive police and security forces to guard potential targets and just demonstrate the presence of the state organs to effect public calm in the wake of the new threat level. But there has been some criticism, for instance, from one of the country's most prominent terrorist experts, Magnus Norell, who claimed that even if there is a raised threat, the actions in response to it and the very act of public threat level raising itself mostly creates unnecessary worry and fear, that is the very effect aimed for by terrorists. One may also wonder how effective the guarding by police of places like train stations and main squares of large cities are, provided that combatants such as those responsible for the Beirut and Paris attacks are set on targeting them. In both cases, this would also mean that these resources are, in fact, wasted. In that light, posting armed guards outside every asylum shelter to guard against a wholly different kind of terrorists targeting these may suddenly seem as a more effective and less costly measure. This aspect, of course, has many more sides, but this only goes to show how the evaluation of options in response to a described threat, and the opportunity costs attached to them may be used to inject the issue with limitless complexity.

Fifth, there is the issue of the evaluation of evidence, underlying the probability estimates at work in all of the considerations pointed to above Here, we may see a number of differences on what type of evidence is to be given the most credence: Actual similar past events is one model, following the "frequentist" ideal in decision theory. That would, in the present case, probably speak in favour of a much higher probability for more extreme nationalist right wing terrorism against refugees, migrants and their quarters in Sweden, as this is what wa have mostly had in the past (especially the very close past). Another model is to instead trust qualified estimates, by appointed experts, who may then, if they so prefer, let other reasons than frequentist ones affect the probability estimate. For instance, even if there has been no, or relatively very few, attacks of the type known to be on the Al-Qaeda and Daesh agendas, the fact there are such attacks on this agenda combined with the presence of people who sympathise with these movements in the country, and maybe witness statements that some such person in the country has been mentioned to plan or want to plan such an attack, may be used as evidence. Some of that evidence may be broken down into an indirect frequentist argument, as it points to factors believed to have been active in relevantly similar past events elsewhere. But a substantial portion would also seem to be about subscribing to certain qualitative and evaluative assessments, such as choosing to trust certain bearers for information as credible, viewing certain events as relevantly similar in spite of notable dissimilarities, and so on. The point is that the more of this latter sort of probability grounding is used, the more room to assess as probable also events of which there have been no very similar precedent.

Sixth, there is the issue of the how much evidence (given some standard of its quality of the sort just described) should be required for a credible estimate, and for taking action. This factor is basically about how long we should wait and amass evidence to have a more well-founded risk assessment, in view of the potential costs of being to late to act effectively against the threat (if there is any). Also this aspect seems to be at work in the Swedish debate, as those who complain about the threat level not having been raised and associated action taken earlier seem to be prone to care less about the evidence of the threat, and rather have action on looser grounds to be "better safe than sorry", but the of course also downgrade or ignore the opportunity costs of this. Those who require more evidence will, on the other hand, want to wait longer even in the face of potential dangers such as the present ones, and some of these might be content with the balance made by Swedish authorities, while others would find the actions premature and would prefer more evidence to assess the raised level and the linked actions justified.

The idea that, inside this vastly variable complex of factors and possible positions on how to do a risk analysis and act on its results there exists one, simple and self-evident alternative is, of course, utterly ridiculous.

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(Now Updated with open access link) Review in Theoria of The Price of Precaution and the Ethics of Risk

Update 2013-02-17: I discovered today, that Theoria has chosen to make this review available for all, free of charge, so-called open access. To read it in full, follow the link given below, or access a pdf directly here.

My book on the moral basis of the precautionary principle that was published by Springer in 2011, The Price of Precaution and the Ethics of Risk, is very favorably reviewed over four pages in the latest issue of the renowned philosophy journal, Theoria. To read the entire review, written by Niklas Möller, you need access to reach behind the Wiley paywall (e.g. through a university library) or a subscription of your own, and in that case just click here. If you lack this sort of access, clicking the just mentioned link can still let you sample the first page of the four of the review.

Of course, besides describing the content of the book, the reviewer also launches some criticism – as should indeed be the case in any serious academic review. However, the overall assessment is very favorable, evidenced by these quotes of the sections where Möller sums up his overall evaluation:

Munthe’s book is a well-argued contribution to the PP [i.e. precautionary principle] debate, putting neglected justificatory and methodological questions at the forefront. His many discussions of alternative accounts as well as his drawing out the consequences of his own suggestion in practical cases give the reader a thorough, holistic sense of what justification of PP amounts to. /..../ Munthe’s main case, his argumentation for the requirement of precaution as a moral norm, is convincing and puts a strong pressure on too narrow alternative suggestions on how it should be perceived and justified, and he launches a plausible defence of its practical usability.

 Should you be interested in acquiring the book as hardcopy or pdf, this can be done through the Springer book webpage above or any major online book seller. If you have university library access, chances are the library has a Springer license and in that case you can access and download the e-book through that channel. If you're interested in the issue of the precautionary principle and its moral and political justification, as well as the ethics and politics of environmental and technological risk in general, you may be interested in a lengthy review article written by myself on exactly that topic, including some further ideas, considerations and contributors over and above those discussed in my book, which will be appearing the the very soon to be released International Encyclopedia of Ethics, under the heading of "precautionary principle".

Comment in Nature on Proposal to Slack Ethical Requirements on Gene Therapy Research

So, if anyone's interested, I just posted a comment in Nature's online edition on a proposal from gene therapy research specialist Fulvio Mavilio to slack the research ethical requirements for clinically introducing gene therapy. A few typos managed to find their way in, but I don't think the message is muddled by that.

Read Entire Chapt. 1 of My New Book Online for Free

Springer, who publish my new book on the ethical basis of the precautionary principle, The Price of Precaution and the Ethics of Risk, has permitted Google books to make the entire first chapter available for online reading. Here it is embedded:




And if you rather prefer that, here's a link to the Google books site. And here's a presentation of the book from a recent post, with links for sampling other chapters and look at the index.

My Book on the Ethical Basis of the Precautionary Principle is Out!

So, some shameless self-promotion:

My book on the ethical basis of the precautionary principle, The Price of Precaution and the Ethics of Risk, is now officially released by Springer. To view the table of contents, sample substantial portions of chapters and look up names or subjects in the index, click on the button below:

 Here's the content summary in all of its glory:

Since a couple of decades, the notion of a precautionary principle plays a central and increasingly influential role in international as well as national policy and regulation regarding the environment and the use of technology. Urging society to take action in the face of potential risks of human activities in these areas, the recent focus on climate change has further sharpened the importance of this idea. However, the idea of a precautionary principle has also been problematised and criticised by scientists, scholars and policy activists, and been accused of almost every intellectual sin imaginable: unclarity, impracticality, arbitrariness and moral as well as political unsoundness. In that light, the very idea of precaution as an ideal for policy making rather comes out as a dead end. On the basis of these contrasting starting points, Christian Munthe undertakes an innovative, in-depth philosophical analysis of what the idea of a precautionary principle is and should be about. A novel theory of the ethics of imposing risks is developed and used as a foundation for defending the idea of precaution in environmental and technological policy making against its critics, while at the same time avoiding a number of identified flaws. The theory is shown to have far-reaching consequences for areas such as bio-, information- and nuclear technology, and global environmental policy in areas such as climate change. The author argues that, while the price we pay for precaution must not be too high, we have to be prepared to pay it in order to act ethically defensible. A number of practical suggestions for precautionary regulation and policy making are made on the basis of this, and some challenges to basic ethical theory as well as consumerist societies, the global political order and liberal democracy are identified

Thank you for your kind attention!

Nuclear Power and Climate Change – No Easy Fix

The massive earthquake and following tsunami hitting Japan yesterday, today had a first serious secondary effect in the form of a large explosion in a nuclear power plant close to Fukushima, causing physical injuries and severe structural damage – thus adding to an already quite serious situation of other nuclear power plants in the same area:



This picture, circulated by global news media illustrates the amount of damage to the external structure caused by the explosion:

The problems started already yesterday, when the tsunami caused electrical failures that incapacitated the technological installments meant to control the temperature of another plant in the Fukushima area. Already then, radioactivity was emitted and tens of thousands of people where relocated for protection, and plans for venting radioactive gas into the air to release the pressure inside the reactor was made official. The explosion in the second plant means that the problems have significantly escalated, it now includes five nuclear reactors and the evacuation scale has been  doubled; now to cover a 20 km radius around the plants. If not before, both plants' cooling systems are now declared completely out of order. The Japanese agency for radiation protection has gone public with warnings that there is a risk of a bona fide "meltdown" – i.e. a Chernobyl type development that may cause massive radioactive emissions and ruin a large area around the plant for any sort of human activity or habitation for a very long period of time. This, however, is denied by the Tokyo Electric Power Company, that owns and runs the plants. According to them, the technology is of a sort that will stop the process of nuclear fission as the temperature rises – that is, assuming – I would personally like to add – that no vital parts of this technology has been damaged due to the precedent events. In any case, there will be substantial emissions of radioactivity due both to the explosion and the venting, and factors such as wind conditions will determine how this will immediate affect japanese people. Reports and further footage of all of this can be found here, here, here, here, here, here and here (in my own country, here, here and here) and in numerous other places. And here is an excellent link for keeping yourself updated on this matter.

Now, besides all of the tragedy directly caused by these and the related events, this development also provides some important perspectives on the recent return in Western countries of  strong nuclear power advocacy and support in view of the threats created by climate change due to green house gas emissions. This angle has revived the political leverage of the nuclear power lobby's old environmentalist argument, now beefed up with supporting claims about technology that guarantees that no Chernobyl scenario would be possible even if there was to be serious incidents in the plants. In my forthcoming book, The Price of Precaution and the Ethics of Risk, I assess this argument with rather pessimistic conclusions. Seen in a larger context, where the not only immediate security but also the serious long-term waste problems of nuclear energy are taken into account, there are much better alternatives for dealing with the challenge of ensuring energy production in the face of climate change. However, the recent events in Japan adds a further layer of doubt regarding the idea of nuclear power as the easy fix of climate change problems.

The events we now see unfolding in Japan need to be viewed simultaneously through four lenses: (1) Japan is a vastly rich and technologically well-developed country and its nuclear technology can therefore be assumed to be top notch, (2) for historical reasons, Japan is well-known to host a very demanding security culture when it comes to nuclear power, (3) what has broken down the security measures in this case are concentrated powers of nature, and (4) one of the main aspects of climate change scenarios are about how familiar patterns of where and when concentrations of such powers, resulting in events severely threatening human life and infrastructure, may change in virtually unpredictable ways.

Now, for sure, climate change will not directly affect the movements of Earth's shell – the basic cause of earth quakes and tsunamis. However, it does massively affect large-scale patterns of interaction between water, air, land and biological life (whether or not this may interact with the basic geological forces causing earth quakes, I don't know). I'm not any sort of expert in the field, but it doesn't take a rocket scientist to understand the basic uncertainties that this creates regarding temperature and sea levels, weather patterns, and so on. This adds severe complications to the context of any risk-benefit analysis of the idea of the developed world securing its access to energy in the face of climate change through a vast expansion of nuclear power. We have seen what one single earth quake and an ensuing tsunami means in a case where none of the excuses about lax security measures or dated technology wielded in the Chernobyl case are accessible. In the face of the severe uncertainties regarding very powerful concentrations of natural powers created by climate change, how can we in a responsible and cost-effective way decide such things as the proper construction of nuclear power plants, their location, and a suitable system for managing the waste problem?

It is not given, of course, that the answer to these questions have to be that we cannot. However, the apparently tempting piece of chocolate made up of the idea of managing climate change while not having to pay much of a price in terms of energy production cannot be taken seriously until thorough risk analysis is undertaken. Such an analysis needs to not – as is otherwise commonplace – assume basic patterns of nature making up the context of factors determining the security of any sort of installation to be static or foreseeable as linear predictions. It has to address the uncertainty regarding these factors created by climate change scenarios head on, as it has to include the costs needed to guarantee sufficient security in the light of such uncertainties.