In one of his well-researched book, Prey, Michael Crichton, one of the leading science fiction novel writers, predicted the possible effect when the varied renowned contemporary fields of study meet at one point. Crichton has again successfully defined the consequences if one technology is produced and used by the private sectors. He had distinguished the difference between professional thinking and corporate thinking.
Thinking professionally, as Michael implied in his book, people will weigh the pros and cons of every technology they will create. On the other hand, people, as they think in corporate terms, will just consider the benefits of what
they get from the technology neglecting the negative consequences of the action they took to produce a certain technology.The book Prey had illustrated how the private companies coevolve with the government. The government may fund a project that is being manufactured by private companies and in return, the technology produced will be provided for the government. Along with that symbiotic relationship between the sectors involved, it had also showed the possible conflict that may arise if one of the two will not meet the said requirements for them to evolve. One of the obvious decisions that can be made brought by disequilibrium is that the private company may lose funding from the government. Because of that, desperation emerges in part of the private sectors. They will do everything just to get the funding from the government even it costs people’s lives.
In Crichton’s Prey, the company Xymos has manufactured a
technology that can be used as surveillance. In military matter, they prefer surveillance that cannot be shot down. So the company produces many dust size camera –equipped surveillance technology made with E. Coli bacteria that will feed visual information for the government by swarming. That is why they call it as the swarm technology. The problem of being shot down is already eliminated with the project. But another problem appeared after that. Since they are dust size, they can be easily blown away by strong wind. That swarm technology had programmed with the predator-prey type of relationship called, PREDPREY. They also programmed the technology with evolving counter measure which helps the technology to adapt with his environment.To solve the problem about the wind, they set the technology free from the environment which brings catastrophic effect. The technology had adapted with the wind but the problem was that they cannot control it. Since it is programmed like predator, the technology had able to kill people by suffocating its victims and leaves biological disease which forces the professional consultant of the company Xymos to decide destroying the technology after some people died. But destroying it was not easy for them. They had infected themselves with virus to be immune with the disease cause by the technology and left the plant in rubble because of the explosive solution.
