Our 'Oppenheimer moment': Today’s threats, from nuclear power to artificial intelligence | Opinion

This summer’s blockbuster biopic “Oppenheimer” awakened a new interest in the dangers and promises of nuclear technology and, by extension, the double-edged sword of other advanced technologies.

Christopher Nolan’s opus chronicled J. Robert Oppenheimer’s work as a theoretical physicist heading the Los Alamos nuclear laboratory in the race to beat Germany to the atomic bomb.

The first bomb test in the New Mexico desert, called Trinity, was the dramatic turning point for Oppenheimer. While his scientific goals were fulfilled, the destructive power of the bomb led to misgivings about the consequences.

Oppenheimer helped the military plan the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings, but he questioned the ability to control such destructive weapons.

Oppenheimer and some fellow atomic scientists argued for international governance of nuclear power and openly opposed development of more powerful nuclear arms.

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Why ‘Oppenheimer’ resonates with audiences today

“Oppenheimer,” the movie, continues with his further travails. Despite worldwide celebrity as “father of the atomic bomb,” his political positions ran afoul of the government. The result was revocation of his security clearance and exile from the community of nuclear scientists.

What about “Oppenheimer,” a three-hour journey through the accomplishments and struggles of a scientist many Americans knew little about, caused such a stir among movie-goers?

Dr. Rachel Bronson, president and CEO of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, the “Doomsday Clock” people, spoke at a recent Tennessee World Affairs Council (TNWAC) webinar: “The movie is having such resonance because of how fraught the nuclear landscape is today … it’s tapping into the zeitgeist.”

She pointed to developments like Russia’s naked threats to use nuclear weapons to resolve its Ukraine quagmire. “This isn't your father's nuclear landscape,” she said, adding, “Major powers are shredding our arms control architectures … it is very similar to the moment when Oppenheimer and his colleagues were operating.”

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These technologies are helpful – and can be dangerous

If we’ve reached a new “Oppenheimer moment,” as Alexander Karp argued last month in The New York Times when discussing A.I., then it’s time to examine the technologies like nuclear power that can be dangers to humanity while at the same time offer incredible opportunities for society. As Oppenheimer said in 1947: “You argue about what to do about it only after you have had your technical success.”

We know about the potential for nuclear weapons to end civilization and nuclear technology to provide life-saving medical applications and fossil-fuel free energy. There are other technologies that are both game changers for society and existential threats to humanity. Some have been with us for years; others are relatively new.

Biomedical technologies have been a godsend for human healthcare and disease treatment. Yet, a single virus spread to three quarters of a billion people, killing almost seven million worldwide and over a million in the United States.

Did SARS-CoV-2, which gave us Covid-19, start in the wild or in a laboratory? No one who knows for sure is saying. What future existential threats will come from test tubes?

Generative A.I. is a recent technology to join this category. There’s promise for advancements in education, medicine, manufacturing, art and much more. But there’s also alarms being sounded.

The debut of ChatGPT introduced the world to the power of A.I. last fall. Since then, a one-sentence statement from 350 A.I. experts, including senior officials at the top three A.I. companies, shocked the public this spring, “Mitigating the risk of extinction from A.I. should be a global priority alongside other societal-scale risks, such as pandemics and nuclear war.” “Extinction,” from a technology that students are using to produce faux term papers?

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We need more robust democratic discourse

The control of these technologies – nuclear, A.I. and biomedical – falls among public, private and a combination of the two sectors. And they span the international community, many of whom are not likely to agree on responsible architectures like those Oppenheimer pursued for nuclear weapons.

What does this doomsaying mean for us citizens? Dr. Bronson at the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, founded by Oppenheimer and his colleagues, says their purpose is to educate the public about these paramount issues: “We were founded on the belief the public is important to democratic discourse and (should) pressure our political leaders to do the right thing.”

That’s a good first step, open the conversation at the grassroots level so our communities are informed and involved. That was the point of the TNWAC Webinar with Dr. Bronson [archived at TNWAC.org] who said, “The dangers of these technologies insist that we stay focused because it's too dangerous for us to throw our hands up and say, well, the time isn't right.” We have reached our “Oppenheimer moment.”

Patrick Ryan served 26 years in the Navy as a Submariner and Intelligence Officer. He is founder and president emeritus of the Tennessee World Affairs Council (TNWAC.org) and president of the Tennessee Submarine Memorial Association (TennSub.org)

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Our 'Oppenheimer moment': Assessing threats, from nuclear power to AI