Virtually all terrorists and criminals are idiots, and neither are interested in maximizing destruction.
Kinda funny, the first terrorist which came to my mind was this guy.
From Wikipedia: Kaczynski was born in Chicago, Illinois, where, as an intellectual child prodigy, he excelled academically from an early age. Kaczynski was accepted into Harvard University at the age of 16, where he earned an undergraduate degree, and later earned a PhD in mathematics from the University of Michigan. He became an assistant professor at the University of California, Berkeley at age 25, but resigned two years later.
It took the FBI 17 years to arrest the Una-Bomber and he only got caught because he published a pamphlet in the New York Times, which his brother could identify.
Anyway, IMO Savalescu merely says that with further technological progress it could be possible for smart ( say IQ around 130 ) sociopaths to kill millions of people. Do you really believe that this is impossible?
Wikipedia describes Una Bomber's feats as "mail bombing spree that spanned nearly 20 years, killing three people and injuring 23 others".
3 people in twenty years just proves my point that he either never cared about maximizing destruction or was really horrible about it. You can do better in one evening by getting an SUV, filling it with gas canisters for extra effect, and driving it into a school bus at full speed. See Mythbusters for some ideas.
The facts of the matter are such people don't exist. They're possible in a way that Russell's Teapot is possible.
In this video, Julian Savulescu from the Uehiro centre for Practical Ethics argues that human beings are "Unfit for the future" - that radical technological advance, liberal democracy and human nature will combine to make the 21st century the century of global catastropes, perpetrated by terrorists and psychopaths, with tools such as engineered viruses. He goes on to argue that enhanced intelligence and a reduced urge to violence and defection in large commons problems could be achieved using science, and may be a way out for humanity.
Skip to 1:30 to avoid the tedious introduction
Genetically enhance humanity or face extinction - PART 1 from Ethics of the New Biosciences on Vimeo.
Genetically enhance humanity or face extinction - PART 2 from Ethics of the New Biosciences on Vimeo.
Well, I have already said something rather like this. Perhaps this really is a good idea, more important, even, than coding a friendly AI? AI timelines where super-smart AI doesn't get invented until 2060+ would leave enough room for human intelligence enhancement to happen and have an effect. When I collected some SIAI volunteers' opinions on this, most thought that there was a very significant chance that super-smart AI will arrive sooner than that, though.
A large portion of the video consists of pointing out the very strong scientific case that our behavior is a result of the way our brains are structured, and that this means that changes in our behavior are the result of changes in the way our brains are wired.