Steven Pletsch Lv 1
Just to play devil's advocate here (A role I'm apparently well suited to)
Suppose someone did create some new form of pathogen with foldit. (I think this is very unlikely, but follow along)
Who is to say that would be a bad thing ? Even if the information were published, and the pathogen created, that act alone is not the act of in question. The real fear is the dissemination of such a creation. In fact if we were, on the off chance, to create some new form of designer "bug", what new insight and knowledge might be lost by suppression of the creation ? Perhaps it would lead to discovery of new types of treatments for an existing virus. Perhaps the study of such an object would even lead to new theories about the evolution of, and how to stop the spread and mutation of other pathogens.
Who is to say, that if it was found here, it would not be found again elsewhere ? Suppose years from now, some psychotic terrorist does decide to create a designer pathogen, and it's just like or very similar to one that is designed here and suppressed. Would we then find out that by suppressing it we are ill equipped to fight it ? Would those years we spent hiding the discovery turn out to be our own downfall because our fear drove us to deny the existence of a threat we may end up facing some day anyway ?
Would then the act of immorality in hindsight be the creation of such a thing, or hiding the knowledge of it's creation ?
Knowledge is a dangerous thing because what you don't know can be just as deadly as what you do know.
Ultimately we must place faith in our fellow human beings to do what is in the best interest of our species as a whole. If we cannot bring ourselves to do that, than we are forever doomed to live an existence of fear and lies.