FutureProofing

FutureProofing is a new series in which presenters Timandra Harkness and Leo Johnson examine the implications - social and cultural, economic and political - of the big ideas that are set to transform the way our society functions.

Episode 1: Life.

FutureProofing explores why emerging bio-technology will transform how we understand and control life itself.

Timandra and Leo discuss the consequences for humankind with leading genetic scientists and designers - people who are now able to create and manipulate the very building blocks of life.

The programme examines the results of inventing and editing life forms; how easy it is to become a bio-hacker; why the FBI has decided to adopt a strangely relaxed attitude towards such potentially catastrophic experimentation; and how a new understanding of biology as a software engineering system that we can design has profound consequences for the way we think about Life in future.

Producer: Jonathan Brunert.