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Don't Stymie Nanotech
Anonymous Coward writes "A new paper released by the Pacific Research Institute says that nanotechnology holds benefits for society if not blocked by misguided regulation or outright bans. Already, some prominent individuals (like Bill Joy) have questioned the rationale of continuing nanotech research - PRI's paper explains that nanotech has more benefits than drawbacks, and that bans and heavy regulation are not in society's best interests"
Perhaps he's just upset because they didn't call it Janotechnology.
Not that anyone really pays much attention to science in America, but as long as the information about what is going on in Nano-tech is out there I am 100% behind the research. Really the only reason to keep it secret is if you are doing weapons research, and do we really need any more ways to kill each other, I mean nukes already do a damn good job. Science will always go on, leagal or not, because it has to, it is part of human nature, but it's not worth it if it does not benifit mankind.
PRI is a fairly libertarian group. Their position papers whould be read with an eye towards their agenda; I'd be curious what might be influencing their analysis. These think tanks should have to pick names that say something about themselves -- if something salls itself the "Justice League" or "PeaceLoveHarmony Council" it tells you nothing about their actually being a front for the veal industry. Truth in advertising?
... and hasn't been quite the same since leaving. We haven't spoken for several years. :(
Disclosure: My half-sister worked for them
Proliferation to the point of ubiquity of cheap, reliable (read: self-replicating & autonomous) nanotech will have a dramatic effect on life on Earth the likes of which we haven't seen since early protists began excreting oxygen. It is impossible to fully realize the ramifications such a change would have, and it is certainly foolish to try to brand it as good or bad.
Bill Joy's now (in)famous article about the terrors of unabated research into nanotech and its siblings is one of the most profound post-WWII articles written, and ranks up there with such brilliant works as Ursula Franklin's Massey Lecture series, "The Real World of Technology." [1],[2]
Unfortunately, Bill made the same mistake as Ursula. Technology cannot and will not be contained. If we all agreed to a worldwide ban on unabated nanotech research, human cloning, or whatever the topic of the day is, there would be someone willing to fund a mad scientist based on a privately owned island[3]. Unfortunately, mad scientists have a bad habit of eventually succeeding.
Curiously, Ray Kurzweil took exactly the anti-cautionary approach in his equally (in)famous article, which actually spawned Bill Joy's. Who is right? Should we proceed enthusiastically to greater and more fantastic worlds than we can imagine, or restrain ourselves from destroying humanity?
The bottom line is that it doesn't matter what we _try_ to do, because someone out there will push forward. We will have nanotech in the most futuristic sense, and we will have human clones, indistinguishable from the originals. When, where, how, and who are irrelevant. It will happen. Be it fugitive criminal scientists working for money and fame, or noble researchers working for the betterment of the race, it will happen. The only thing we can do at this point is ACCEPT, EXPECT, and PLAN. The alternative is to REACT which just doesn't work well.[4]
The very saddest part of this is that it means we should be putting forth the brightest and most creative minds as legislators and policy makers. Seems like an ignoble fate for them.
If this makes no sense to you, then maybe I should quit posting to slashdot after returning from a single malt tasting.
[1]Whew! Don't know when I've had so many capital letters in one sentence!
[2]And I'm not just saying that because he created the One True Text Editor.
[3]It's surprising in this day just how many privately owned islands there are. Just go and check!
[4]I realise this sounds like a stupid slogan on an inspirational poster. Maybe I should write for those guys, despise them as I do.
"People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
You don't read all that much about nanotech in the mainstream press these days, of course, but it's possible that could change. Michael Crichton-- he of Jurassic Park, Timeline, etc.-- is just about to release a new book on the subject, called Prey. And I seem to recall reading something about the movie rights already being sold.
You know a science is entering the mainstream press when Crichton writes a thriller about it. In other words, you can look forward to several dozen articles in about a year's time on Slate with headlines such as "Nanotech - Is It for Real?"
In his very first book, Engines of Creation, available online, Eric Drexler laid out the possible consequences of attempts to suppress nanotech research. See chapter 12 especially.
He describes an ambitious program which will allow nanotech to be developed safely, via active shields to protect the environment and sealed assembler labs to allow safe experimentation.
Of course Drexler was far, far ahead of his time, but his analysis should be a starting point for any consideration of the prospects for nanotech development.
I'm a molecular biologist myself, so as a rule I'm all for nanotechnology. However, the fact that the libertarian nutjob who wrote the PRI article support unfettered research makes me think regulation must be needed. He thinks the constitution guarantees the right to overthrow the government through armed struggle.
So, okay, he (Prof. Reynolds) makes a strong case against prohibition (of course, as a ccientist, I'm easy to persuade that R&D should never be banned outright.) Military secrecy is something I dislike, again, because secrecy is not good for science. Neither of these proposals are being floated in reasonable circles anyway, so this is something of a straw man proposal.
So, why does he oppose even modest regulation? From the paper, as it is academic in nature, it can be difficult to tell what policy he advocates, but I'm pretty sure he favores the lassez-faire option. He makes some arguments about deregulation generally which I regard as pretty vaccuous. Requiring companies to use the best available technology encourages other companies to research it and then force the first company to buy.
Anyway, to answer your question - the reason we'd want to regulate nanotechnology is because it might be dangerous. The thousands and thousands of completely harmless applications of nanotechnology - basically just material science - don't need any special regulation. It is only when the nanotechnology begins to resemble a living organism that the need for regulation comes into play. The fear, and it is remote but still legitimate, is that someone would make tiny robots that would breed out of control and become a social problem.
He points to biotechnology (which is basically unregulated, except in so far as it is also medical) as a big success. It has been - SO FAR. As yet, we have had no environmental catastrophes resultant from biotech, and the medical errors have been fairly small in scope, and would have been prevented if existing laws/procedures had been followed.
However - that doesn't mean that what we're doing is safe. It means, either, that what we've been doing is safe OR that we've been lucky. Personally, I think biotech is "pretty safe," but that agro-biotech (Monsanto, in particular) has too much free reign.
In any case, until we have a better idea of what nanotechnology will actually be like, it is premature to discuss regulation to make sure it is safe. Banning nanotechnology outright would be impossible for the reasons he has mentioned. Banning specifically self replicating nanotechnology, though I think it inadvisable, WOULD be feasable. Regulating self-replicating nanotechnology is probably desirable.
The good and new comes from no quarter where it is looked for, and is always something different from what is expected.
"We can't 'eat' air and dirt and use it (and it alone) to grow and reproduce. Nanites could, in theory, do just that, by using raw materials in the air and the earth to reproduce. "
NO, neither could "Nanites"; simply being super tiny dosen't confer upon you the ability to circumvent the laws of thermodynamics! The amount of negative entropy available in any such reaction from eating air and dirt would be so miniscule as to prevent the Nanite from reproducing uncontrollably. Just like THESE bacteria that acually DO subsist on air nd dirt alone(nearly).
The parent post's point still stands, as I see it.
- "Hear that?! The percolations are imminent! Cease your ingress!"
What would a self-replicating nano-machine do if it went out of control?
That scenario is only possible with "free-roaming" nanites. These are the most complex type, and the ones with the most restrictive parameters.
1) They need energy. Their fuel will only last so long. If they use solar energy (some super-chlorophyl), they have to face the next problem:
2) They need appropriate building materials. Most nanites are designed to build a certain thing. This is part of their physical design, and not just some program. Unless that certain thing is simple (carbon fiber) they'll need more than air and dirt to build with. But what if they're programmed to build more nanites and those nanites need only air to build with:
3) They are their own competition. At this stage they're an artificial life form. Bacteria don't overrun the planet because bacteria compete with bacteria. Why go through all the hassle of separating out your needed trace element from the environment, when you can just disassemble that nanite over there? And if these guys might actually be edible to bacteria...
In summary, a free-roaming nanite designed to reproduce indefinitely using any randomly available material is just too complex, with too little economic value, and has too many naturally occuring constraints, to be a worry. It makes cool science fiction, but then again, so did little green men living on Mars.
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
I'm stunned that four people felt compelled to give you mod points. Your comment is the most absurd one I've seen so far in this thread, and that's counting the trolls.
The wonderful thing about being a human being is that we can choose what to do and what not to do. I can choose to stop at a crosswalk, or I can choose to plow through a crowd of second-graders.
Your argument is basically that it's foolish to stop. Somebody out there is going to plow through a crosswalk anyway, so we might as well get in there and figure out how to use it to our advantage. If you think I'm misrepresenting your argument, maybe you'd better go back and read your own words again. "New technologies will come and be used whether we like it or not. Cloning will occur whether we ban it or not." You say this as if there were no moral or ethical aspect to it whatsoever, and that's simply not true.
Some things just should not be done. If you're an amoral person-- and your post, especially the part about "religious paranoid idiots," certainly seems to suggest that you are-- then you probably reject this assertion on its face. If that's the case, I won't bother trying to convince you otherwise. (My opinion is that people with no sense of morality or ethics at all are mentally ill in a way we just haven't figured out yet. Nothing personal; it's just a theory.)
So let's just take as given that you believe, at least on some level, that some things are just morally wrong, and should not be done. I'll take an easy example: we have the technology to safely and painlessly sterilize people who have congenital mental or emotional defects. Such people obviously aren't capable of making rational decisions about reproduction by themselves, due to their defects, and we have the technology to do it for them. Should we do it?
The correct answer here is no. No person has the right to do something that drastic to another without just cause and without that person's informed consent. So some things are simply morally wrong. (You don't have to agree, but you do have to have an opinion. Not having an opinion on this question means you have no ethical sense at all; in that case, just stop reading, because I'm not interested in arguing about the nature of ethics with you.)
Is cloning wrong, morally, ethically, pragmatically, or for some other reason? How about stem cell research using in vitro embryos? I don't have answers to those questions, but it's vitally important that we ask them. Because the answer might just turn out to be yes. And if it is, and we didn't bother to think about it before acting, the results would be tragic beyond any justification.
When you were small, your parents-- or somebody, surely-- taught you to look both ways before crossing a road. This is the same principle. Should we ban cloning, or nanotechnology, or any such thing? I don't know. But I know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that we must ask the questions, and we must have the arguments, because the risk of acting without forethought is far too great.
Also, nice to know there might be millions of natural deadly bacteria in it.
Jellies and jams, and other canned and jarred goods, are inherently pasteurized. The jelly is poured into the jar while still quite hot-- over 140 F-- and the jar sealed. No bacteria in a jelly jar unless the seal is broken. You don't have to be afraid of the jelly jar any more.
I write in my journal
Once nanotechnology is in full force, how long do you think any encryption is going to stand up once we have the ability to make millions of specialized computers in a matter of weeks/days/hours/minutes?
Um. Encrypting something is easier than decrypting something by force. Therefore, no matter how much processing power is availiable to the world at large, encryption will still hold (discounting quantum computers or a solution to the NP complete set of problems).
Once the technology exists to create a computer for each possible combination in a 128-bit key, how long do you think your encryption is really going to hold up? Long enough for six million more computers to be built?
A 128 bit key has 3.4e38 possibilities. That's a lot of computers. Now, 6.022e23 hydrogen atoms make up one gram of mass (1 mole). Therefore there are at most 6.022e26 atoms in a kilogram. The Earth weights 5.972e24 kg. Therefore there is at most 3.6e51 atoms that make up the Earth.
Therefore perhaps the poster could explain to me how you could have the technology to "create a computer for each possible combination"? It might work for a 128-bit key, in theory. But a 256-bit key has 1.15e77 possibilities, which outnumbers the number of atoms in the Earth by billions to one. Even solving 128-bit encryption by having a computer per combination would require a minimum of weight of 565 million tonnes.
This reminds me of the story of the grains of rice and the chessboard, where one grain was put on the first square, two grains on the second, four on the third, and so forth. It quickly gets out of control, and you find that there isn't enough rice in the world to complete the sequence.
I don't want to think of the poster as an idiot, but he does seem like he's trying quite hard to be.