The report suggested that older technologies should be maintained as backups.
Dr. Merkle agrees with Mr. Joy that perhaps some technologies should be avoided.
Current and near-term technologies should be deployed as soon as possible for this purpose.
This suggests that new digital technologies should be able to wipe out their predecessors completely.
But he said such technologies should be used for disaster control, not for fine-tuning taste and texture.
The proponents of the existing technologies should be chastened by the reminder it provided of how things can go wrong.
· Globally, support for energy research and development should at least double; support for the deployment of low-carbon technologies should be increased my up to five times.
Experts in public perception of science suggest new technologies should be deployed, at least initially, in fields where they can really make a difference.
Another lesson is that regulatory bodies responsible for overseeing technologies should be separated from organisations put in place to promote them.
"It is the government's expectation that, in many circumstances, projects involving mature technologies should be able to secure finance from commercial financing sources".
"Technologies should be in place to empower citizens, not to oppress them," Obama said on Monday at a speech at the Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington.
