In response to the first ARC exchange on bio-hacking ckelty, who has done extensive work on the politics and ethics of hacking and the free software movement (see his book Two Bits), offered the following. The original can be found here.
Post: ckelty
Ok friends. Before the discussion of Hackers gets too out of control, let me just say, there is empirical work to go on. I take Paul?Äôs point about analogies seriously?Äìthe analogy with computer hacking should be more carefully inspected, and treated circumspectly. There are a few old school hackers in the DIY Bio space, but there is mostly what I think of as the ?Äúconsumer?Äù-hackers (those who love Make magazine). What to make of this? Start asking about the relationship between liberalism and security. To that end, here is one of the best recent accounts of the diversity of computer hacking:
Hacker Practice: Moral Genres and the cultural articulation of liberalism. By Gabriella Coleman and Alex Golub
What I think bears investigation is the comparison along the axis of liberalism, on the one hand, and security along the other. The connection between liberalism and security that led Foucault to reframe biopolitics and start down the path of invesitigating liberalism has some obvious connections to what animates hackerdom. And it has its apotheosis in the case of Free Software (and I?Äôve been saying this for a long time, but either no one listens or I?Äôm wrong, and I actually hope it?Äôs the latter).
In any case, Coleman and Golub look at three cases, which I think of more or less as cypherpunks, free software geeks and the Def Con crowd. Each of these cases might bear on DIY Bio and synbio more generally, thus:
1) cypherpunks are all about privacy and government control of technology. the gov?Äôt classification of crypto as a munition for most of the 70s, 80s and 80s bears obvious comparison to the almost total lack of government control over diybio or synbio as it currently exist. The cases of Steven Kurtz and the right to tinker notwithstanding, it is clear that we live in an era of far less government control of high technology than only 20 years ago.
2) the free software geeks are all about freedom of tool-making. Here, and I keep saying this to the DIYbio people I meet (but no either one is listening etc. etc.) that the real free software group is Richard Jefferson?Äôs Cambia/BIOS group which actually understands the problem of liberating the operating system level of biology, and has a clear political stake in transforming the agro-biotech world. DIY Bio currently has almost none of that, nor does synbio?Ķ with a few minor exceptions like Meredith Patterson?Äôs attempt to create melamine-detecting bacteria, and of course the west coast Human Practices group in SynBERC. Word.
3) The underground is what people seem to fear. If this community exists w/r/t to bio, I haven?Äôt seen it yet. A better locus of comparison is probably the various bio-art groups like the tissue culture and art duo, Natalie Jeremijenko, etc. But these groups are not underground, and they don?Äôt really care about the CIA, FBI or NSA the way computer hackers of this ilk did.
So Golub and Coleman suggest that all three of these cases can be seen as active engagements with liberalism?Ķ liberalism-in-the-making as it were. I agree, but I think we can go further. What hackers of these various sorts represent, I think, are solvents of a sort: they reveal and dissolve certain sedimented understandings of governance. In the case of cryptography, the assumed power of the government to restrict and control a technology which allows people to communicate secretly with each other was experienced as an affront to liberal notions of freedom. Arguably, we have created less danger and more stability in our global networks by freeing up control over cryptography than by restricting it.
Similarly, free software has done this for intellectual property and underground hackers have done the same thing for what computer security researchers refer to as ?Äúsecurity by obscurity?Äù or security theatre. All these cases have reconfigured the limits of governance.
Will DIY Bio do the same? I doubt it very much, but there are elements there which could. Many of the discussions on the DIY Bio list have the same character as that amongst computer hackers; they divide into those who ?Äújust want to have fun?Äù and those who think there is something more important at stake. Somewhere along the line I expect there to be a split of the sort that severed Free Software and its explicit political stance from the ?ÄúJust for fun?Äù and just for profit open source people.
Comment: Rabinow
Chris,
This is very helpful. It would be good to get the vital systems boys (any girls?) involved here. We are beginning to get some convergent activity again.
Perhaps you could contact Coleman and see if she would like to join the discussion.
More soon
Paul
Comment: Gabriella Coleman
Thanks for the nice summary our article Chris:-) So, the article, if I can speak for both authors, was a first stab at looking at the various forms hacking can take and how these various types of hacking, which are in no way exhaustive, just illustrative of some of the dominants ones, are n cultural conversation with some elements of liberalism (including its critique launched mostly by he hacker underground, which I don?Äôt think came out strong enough). This conversation reminds me of a recent development in some academic/media pieces, which casts the net wide to include many things under the net/rubric of hacking, most especially any form of amateur tinkering from the past. I tend not to find that move so useful,if nothing else because it was not a native historical category among ham radio enthusiasts, for example. So I don?Äôt mind folks saying something is ?Äòlike hacking?Äô but not hacking (I think Adrian Johns raises this in his recent piece on piracy, if I remember correctly).
The case of biohacking is an interesting development as I do see that as quite connected to the hacker milieu, in spirit and in ethics, if nothing else because there are biologist programmers who have been clearly inspired by open source and are modulating?Äù (your term) the practice in other areas. Further, since biology is now seen in informational grounds, this too is another way that folks imagine the connection between biology and hacking. And finally the DIY hacker ethic seems to be exploding in many different realms (Make magazine, hardware hacking, electronics etc) and is supported by the unbelievable explosion of hacker spaces (kinda like a return to the guild, though more open). All of this is converging with and supporting the DIY bio ethic and I wonder when and if people might create amateur workshops (if they get the legal clearance to do so).
But as you already noted Chris, I don?Äôt think all manifestations of hacking carry over to bio-hacking (there can?Äôt be a bio-hacker underground?Ķ Well now that I think about it, how about http://www.erowid.org/ ?? Some of those folks, first, are active in the hacker scene, and given they are dabbling in drugs and often making and experimenting with them, there might be an overlap to explore there as well).
I also wanted to mention that when discussing the underground (and this has nothing to do with biology?Ķ), it is always a struggle to define its proper limits and scopes. I don?Äôt like the whitewashing that happens, where those who engage in illicit hacking activity are tagged as non-hackers (?Äôcrackers?Äô). But I think it is important to recognize even those engaging in illicit activity are also erecting ethical boundaries and think of themselves as hackers as well (as Bruce Sterling called it their ethic was ?Äúelitist contempt?Äù which meant the hack would have to be interesting and far more interesting than just stealing someones credit card).
It would be interesting to find those shadowy Russian ?Äúhackers?Äù among others who scavenge the net for YOUR credit cards and see what native ideologies of hacking, if any, they have: do the read 2600? Is Mitnick and others their heroes? Until someone relays this information, I am reluctant to call them hackers and as far as I know, no one has talked to them.
Related to this, I am fond of the new term ?Äútrolling?Äù as well as it specifies the specific form of hacking that is often meant to cause grief to people (covered in Matt Swartz NYT times article and perhaps related to Amazon?Äôs recent glitch: http://www.pcworld.com/article/163024/hacker_claims_credit_for_amazons_gaythemed_book_glitch.html)
Finally in terms of the Critical Art Ensemble, they remind less of the underground and more of a type of hacking that Alex and I barely addressed at all, except in a passing sentence, and that is explicitly political hacking and often critical of capitalism. These hackers are especially prevalent in Europe (especially in places like Spain/Italy/Croatia) and many host autonomous hack spaces and also provide support and services to activists around the world (such as http://www.autistici.org/it/ in Italy and Riseup in the US).
Again, all these groups are not entirely distinct: many are united by how they approach technology, the technologies they use, and the craft of hacking. The radical anti-capitalist hacker can also be found at a free software conference and so on but still worth differentiating then just lumping together. And it seems to me that the computer?Äîbeing a machine that can be made to do many different tasks?Äîis a good object to sustain this sort of diversity, more so than biology (but time will tell, I guess).