Drexler Clarifies Grey Goo Scenario

b00le writes "The BBC says that the scientist many regard as the father of nanotechnology has backed away from his famous claim that runaway nanomachines could turn the planet into 'grey goo'. Eric Drexler now says nanomachines that self-replicate exponentially are unlikely ever to enter widespread use. So that's all right, then, but he also said 'tiny machines would need close control' - which not everyone would agree with. I always imagined some kind of emergent behaviour would, er, emerge." Bill Joy is still suitably pessimistic.

Comments

FP?

[Ralph Spoilsport]

Someone will recombine DNA to make AIDS (or some other long term and fatal disease) as contagious as the common cold before the grey goo scenario plays out.

RS

Tone change...

[hot_Karls_bad_cavern]

...damn, there is *always* a tone change in the front page stories when Michael is up to bat. This is not a troll; it is an observation. When he is at the wheel, it's all end-of-the-world, privacy, government related stuff. Go ahead, check his history.

As for nanobots, honestly, we had this discussion and i hold the same view: tread lightly. You and i both know that if something were to become easily synthesizeable by the layman, nanoweapons in this case, and were to be exponentially self-reproductive, then...well, the human race would not survive it. Think about that, no one person in the human race could have "a bad day". Most are not intelligent enough to have a healthy respect for the miracle that is human life.

Re:Surely

[tsg]

The real problem with a grey goo scenario is that the nanobots would have to compete on a level playing field with organic life, which has had billions of years to get better at it then them.

Except the nanobots would have no natural predators (assuming they aren't organic).

Bill Joy is Risk Averse

[Dun Malg]

"Bill Joy is still suitably pessimistic."

Bill Joy, while clearly a genius, is (like any good genius) a nutcase. Seriously, the man is paranoid! He's a compulsive risk-mitigator:

"I was going through the books and found out there are only about 2,000 movies in history in which there's critical consensus that they're really good," he [Bill Joy] told me. "So I bought 600 of them." No bad movies, fewer possible bad outcomes.

This told to the reporter during the interview about nanotech risk-mitigation. Sure, it's a perfectly rational way to choose your movie library, but it's almost too rational. Most people don't consider watching a bad movie an outcome to be avoided at all costs. Mainstream critical consensus is a very conservative method of choosing movies. I've watched a lot of bad movies, but I've found a few that I really liked that were panned by critics. Is Mr. Joy so risk-averse that he needs his movies to be guaranteed satisfactory?