Facebook’s CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, and his wife, Priscilla
Chan, announced in September, 2016, that they would invest more than $3 billion
during the next decade to build tools that can facilitate medical research on
diseases. The first outlay of funds ($600 million) would create a research lab
of engineers and scientists from the area’s major research universities.[1]
“This focus on building on tools suggests a road map for how we might go about
curing, preventing and managing all diseases this century,” Zuckerberg said at
the announcement.[2]
Moreover, the couple had previously announced a year before that they would
give away 99% of their wealth over their lifetimes through the Chan-Zuckerberg
Initiative in the areas of education and healthcare. I would like to point out
a few implications that may not be readily apparent.
Firstly, such funds going to preventing and curing disease
could bring the day nearer when—along with advances in anti-aging and stem-cell
research—death is no longer inevitable for a human being. Even before the
Zuckerberg-Chan announcements, some scientists were openly predicting that that
day might come as early as the 2050s. To be sure, being able to grow
replacement organs, apply an anti-aging treatment to the body’s cells, and
prevent major diseases (I suspect the common cold will still be around, just to
keep us humble) does not guarantee that death will be put off; running into a
train or bus, or jumping off a high building could still mean death.
Nevertheless, the notion that death can be put off indefinitely dwarfs the
combined impact from all the twentieth-century’s technological progress put
together.
Considering the costs involved, access to rendering death no
longer inevitable would doubtlessly raise ethical issues in terms of the
distribution. Moreover, ethical questions would suddenly arise concerning the
species’ increasing population and reproduction-rights. Secondary issues such
as climate change could become even more pressing. It could be, for example,
that a drastically increasing human population outstrips the planet’s
food-capacity as well as the capacity of the atmosphere to absorb the species’
waste, including greenhouse gases. It would be highly ironic were the feat in
removing the threat of death a major contributor to the extinction of the
species. In short, the story could go as follows: we maximize our species’
size—which means success genetically—only for the increased numbers to cause
extinction because the climate is no longer hospitable to human habitation or
the lack of food causes wars ending in nuclear war. The first alternative would
be particularly likely.
Secondly, that the couple could give up 99% of their wealth
over their lifetimes may imply that they will have earned too much money, if
being able to use it is at all relevant. Put another way, being able to give
away almost all of their total earnings may suggest that they (namely
Zuckerberg) earned too much. Does it even make sense for someone to get money
that is beyond the capacity to be spent even through inheritance?
One implication is the question of whether Zuckerberg’s
employees at Facebook should get a significant amount of what Zuckerberg earns,
whether in salary or stock. Why such a huge difference in compensation? To be
sure, ownership does have its privileges, but is there no limit? The fact that
Zuckerberg, Bill Gates, and Warren Buffet could give vast sums of money to
charity raises the question of whether founders and CEOs shouldn’t face some
limit in terms of wealth, with a progressive tax system kicking in for
multi-billionaires. Were elected representatives to decide how such vast sums
should be spent, the legitimacy of the power behind such a decision would be
greater.
1. Deepa Seetharaman, “Zuckerberg Fund to Invest #3 Billion,” The Wall Street Journal, September 22, 2016.
