The Center's series Audit of the Conventional Wisdom continues with a look at the recent discovery out of the Venter laboratory: artificial life. Is this a global good or evil? Ken Oye, director of the Center's Program on Emerging Technologies and associate professor of political science and engineering systems, discusses the discovery from his MIT office on Friday, May 28, 2010.

Content and time approximates:
Intro
The significance of the discovery (1:40)
The reactions from NGOs, industry, media (4:01)
Potential applications, both near and long-term (5:06)
Potential risks (7:58)
Safety and security issues (12:12)
The bottomline (16:53)