In connection with the earlier blog entry today, read this excellent new article for Reason Online by Ronald Bailey. He discusses the resistance of certain "intellectuals" to progressive ideas, and concludes:
I have my own nomination for an idea that, if embraced, would pose the greatest threat to the welfare of humanity: Banning technological progress in the name of "humility".
On the other hand, the usually progressive Jim Hightower of Texas makes a colossal blunder at his online Action Center. He warns that "tiny nanoparticles are big-time toxic" and that this raises "serious health issues for workers in nanotech factories".
Unfortunately, Hightower does not have a good understanding of the studies to which he refers, and his wild reaction is out of proportion to the real risk. Earlier we criticized investment advisor Josh Wolfe for derisively dismissing the fish toxicity study. Now we must issue the same condemnation to Jim Hightower for overreacting in the opposite direction. Although we urge reasonable and responsible caution when dealing with new technologies, CRN deplores scare tactics.
Mike Treder
Today I just want to continue the discussion we're having in reference to several subjects. 1 is the continuation of government. 2 is the continuation of the military. 3 is the creation of some sort of monitoring system to govern the acceptance of ongoing useful products developed by individuals post molecular assembler. 4 is the idea of restricting the technology in reference to MNT and the secondary issue of enforcement of these restrictions.
In each of these cases we see a situation where at most basic point individuals that is workers will be needed to maintain the status quo. I cannot speak for the rest of you but I do not believe for a moment that you are going to have the manpower to continue any of these current institutions. As we have been discussing to this point in assemblers/replicator equal anything it is independence. That means you me and everyone else will be independent not dependent on any need for money thereby not needing to hold a "job". And although many of you might think that the military or governmental or police are noble profession's they boil down to a "job". So any ideas that you have for controlling or monitoring or restricting this technology are unfounded and irrational.
Just if you would take a moment and look around your workplace and ask yourself one if you would go to work the next day if you did not have to and two do believe that person sitting next to you is coming in on Monday the day after he or she becomes self-sufficient and dependent. If you take the position that individuals and power will continue and wish to maintain this power you only have to look at their subordinates and ask how much power will these individuals have if none of their secretaries, lawyers, accountants, and yes taxi drivers show up for work on Monday the day after they become self-sufficient.
Just taking one example the police force one of the ideas we are kicking around here in the discussion is the idea of restricting the use of MNT. This immediately brings us to the idea that we will have some sort of response, outlined for the individuals who break or subvert the technology. As we discussed the likelihood of a black market is considerable given even a reasonable and rational defined restrictions to the production of certain products. We don't have to look far to see what happened when we had prohibition here in the United States and impact it had on the police and citizens. Indeed looking back I would be interested in hearing if there has ever been an instance in recorded history where a desired product was removed from a society through the use of policing and punishment. One possible example I seem to recall during the Mongolian empires a example where and then paraphrasing a virgin writing bareback naked carrying sacks of gold could ride from one end of the Empire to the other without being troubled. This was due to considerable legal ramifications for even the simplest of crimes, indeed almost all crimes carried the death penalty. So unless we in the future simplify the legal system and defined almost any crime as a crime carrying the death penalty we will see a general failure in monitoring and restricting of this technology. It should be noted I do not believe even the death penalty scenario would anyway restrict this technology but it's a thought.
Once again as a defined above if we see a situation where for some reason some police do go to work and do uphold the law they are still left with where to hold the individuals breaking the law. As I have spoken in the past with police officers in general the position of jailer is a extremely unpleasant and dangerous "job". Once again looking back at probation in United States the rest rate skyrocketed and considerable numbers of inmates where placed into the system in fact currently today we have almost one percent of adult males behind bars in the United States. So I ask you who is going to watch over these individuals post molecular assembler.
Posted by: todd | August 26, 2004 at 11:05 AM
Even if I have a nanofactory that meets my physical needs I'm going to keep going to work to earn some medium of exchange. That way I can pay other people to entertain me (plays, music), serve me (restaurant staff), give me new ideas (books, nanotech designs), and provide public goods (police, sewer maintenance). Turning my house into an autarky would mean giving up most of what I do for fun.
Posted by: Karl Gallagher | August 26, 2004 at 11:14 AM
Karl, you bring up a valid point that you will wish to continue to make money so that you can enjoy some of the benefits of having money. And I wish you the best. When one looks at entertainment including music there is a rich and diverse culture around music and indeed all of the arts. I do foresee in the future this continuing as many people will have much time on their hands and will continue to write and make music. As to being able to purchase the music at some arbitrary cost is where we differ. The given a excellent example of wishing to go to a restaurant and have individuals serve you thereby perpetuating the need for money. I would wonder if you ever worked in a kitchen it is a unpleasant job and requires considerable help including dishwashers and other support staff notwithstanding a cook. Most restaurants have a considerable turnover including McDonald's and other fast food chains this turnover is due to a perceived inequality amongst its workers and a desire to do better than working at McDonald's. It is my assessment that you will not have the option to go to a restaurant indeed or bookstore and by a book or to a police station and ask for help. As these positions will be vacant.
I in no way wish to be critical of anyone writing here or adding to the discussion but I do not see a scenario where a coal miner goes to work the day after he becomes self-sufficient. The majority of people work in less than glamorous jobs and pass their days waiting to retire. So I ask you if you could retire today and have everything you could ever think of and go anywhere you desire would you not retire. Also the majority of people today liveing in United States in cities where crime and pollution run rampant many many of these individuals wish to get away to a clean and safe area. As these people exercise the right to freedom and move away from the cities we see a situation where available workforce drops off and the result is no more cooks, waiters, coal miners, police, plumbers, and so on.
So my argument is not so much that you or other owners or managers or presidents or generals will not wish to continue their positions of power. But is more of the position of you cannot maintain your position of power without your subordinates.
Posted by: todd | August 26, 2004 at 12:01 PM
Certainly any job that's low paying, and carries little in the way of psychic rewards, is going to either vanish, or see it's pay rate skyrocket. Probably the latter until it can be automated; The guy with no particular skills is sure enough going to want to collect garbage, even if he's independent, if it means he can spend half his time lounging on a beach in Jamaca, instead of spending all his time on the couch watching TV.
Posted by: Brett Bellmore | August 26, 2004 at 01:05 PM
A slightly off-topic question: While browsing the NNI page I found this page, titled "NNI Grand Challenges", at
http://www.nano.gov/html/research/nnigc.html
Among them, as you can see, are
2. Manufacturing at the Nanoscale
and
8. Microcraft and Robotics
They also have, as someone noted earlier, removed the dismissive FAQ entry about nanobots. Does all that signal a kind of growing acceptance of MNT at NNI? Or do they even hope to resell the idea as their own, by moving towards the same old conclusions step by step?
Posted by: Matt | August 26, 2004 at 01:47 PM
Just so where clear on what independent means, I thought I would take a moment and look it up. I particularly liked number
6a. and b. :)
SYLLABICATION: in·de·pen·dent
PRONUNCIATION: AUDIO: n d -p n d nt KEY
ADJECTIVE: 1. Not governed by a foreign power; self-governing. 2. Free from the influence, guidance, or control of another or others; self-reliant: an independent mind. 3. Not determined or influenced by someone or something else; not contingent: a decision independent of the outcome of the study. 4. often Independent Affiliated with or loyal to no one political party or organization. 5. Not dependent on or affiliated with a larger or controlling entity: an independent food store; an independent film. 6a. Not relying on others for support, care, or funds; self-supporting. b. Providing or being sufficient income to enable one to live without working: a person of independent means. 7. Mathematics a. Not dependent on other variables. b. Of or relating to a system of equations no one of which can be derived from another equation in the system. 8. Independent Of or relating to the 17th-century English Independents.
NOUN: 1. often Independent One that is independent, especially a voter, officeholder, or political candidate who is not committed to a political party. 2. Independent A member of a movement in England in the 17th century advocating the political and religious independence of individual congregations. 3. Independent Chiefly British A Congregationalist.
OTHER FORMS: in de·pen dent·ly —ADVERB
Posted by: todd | August 26, 2004 at 02:25 PM
Realisticly, the first nanofactories are NOT going to render anyone self-sufficient. For that, you need:
Food. Can't eat buckyballs, after all, and the first nanofactories won't be capable of producing biological molecules. Probably could produce a food synthisizer, but that would be nearly as major a design task as the nanofactory itself was.
Power. If we're talking solar, that's a fair amount of area. Not a problem for me, on my country acreage, but you city folk would be pinched for it.
Reagemts. You'll need some source of the feedstocks. Again, the nanofactory could produce a feedstock factory, (Which would be a power hog.) but it would have to be designed.
Skilled designs. Even minimal self-suficiency would require a larger library of designs than the first nanofactory will probably have.
Medical care. The first nanofactory isn't going to come with a built in autodoc, you know.
And that's just a partial list.
What we'll see, I expect, is a rolling economic collapse as the products of one industry after another become nanofactory designs. A very early casualty would be the consumer electronics industry. Computers in particular would be perfectly suited for nanofactory manufacture. If you design 'em, you might be ok, if you build 'em, you're in trouble.
What will collapse last? Agriculture, because of that limitation on biological molecules. And medicine, because it's so darned complex to automate.
Posted by: Brett Bellmore | August 26, 2004 at 02:50 PM
By the way, anybody else considering going to the Advanced Nanotechnology conference Foresight is holding in October? I'm giving it serious consideration, but, MAN, $500 registration is steep! OTOH, the hotel rates aren't bad.
Posted by: Brett Bellmore | August 26, 2004 at 02:57 PM
Brett,
I agree with most of your reasoning, but I think that we will always be paying for protective services.
Posted by: jim moore | August 26, 2004 at 03:03 PM
Brett,
Yes I think that I will be going to the conference in October as well.
Posted by: jim moore | August 26, 2004 at 03:07 PM
Todd, thanks for lumping me in with owners or managers or presidents or generals, my cubicle seems so much grander now.
I've had a job as a dishwasher in a cafeteria. Not fun, but there's worse ways to earn a living. I suspect cooks and waitresses will see their pay increase dramatically as their profession becomes "live entertainment" instead of "service."
Brett, I think that's a good description of the economic impacts. Maybe you should elaborate it into a stand-alone essay?
The sectors I can't see ever collapsing--security, entertainment, system design, system operations/administration.
Posted by: Karl Gallagher | August 26, 2004 at 03:50 PM
Ok were are getting somewhere now we have identified the elements that are needed for independents. I agree with Brett on the issue of the rolling economic collapse as the products of one industry after another become MNT designs. Perhaps earlier in line comments I did not or I insinuated that they would be a an instantaneous transition post MNT. I did not mean to assess this idea believe there will be some time leading up to mutual independents. Given the construction time of greenhouses and the availability of land or the construction of underground or shipping greenhouses we should anticipate at least a six-month delay after receiving the first assembler before any individual would be independent. I expect there to be considerable resources and man-hours devoted to designs for useful products as one would assume tens of thousands of designers would come forward with useful products. In perhaps a more idealistic than factual prediction during this period of time a reasonable android/robot worker could be developed and designs completed.
Even without robotics independents is not prohibited there are currently a variety of reasonably complex robots available if integrated into the greenhouse one could envision food production greatly automated and required manpower to be diminished. I would envision a continuous rotating crop of the few hundred items where on any given day or week said items are ready for consumption. So individual would merely entered greenhouse walk up and down a few lanes and retrieve his or her food. This food could then be prepared or eaten off the vine. When referring to independents we would also look at a situation where food is prepared and capsulated in such away to be eaten later. This gives us the option to provision a voyage if one wished to take a trip.
As to the issue of medical care this is a valid and outstanding concern one I share and I hope for continuing access. Once again in a ideal situation the time frame for molecular manufacturing and post molecular manufacturing one could see android's becoming available to perform and carry out medical procedures. Also we would like to see continuing research in the medical industry to improve the standard of living for everyone. One point I would make given the number of doctors currently available I am encouraged an optimistic at what will be accomplished in the future. I would predict that a percentage relatively high of doctors and researchers will utilize the new technology to its fullest and continue their research even if they are researching alone. Because of the probable availability of equipment without regard to cost I envisioned a research lab containing the most current up-to-date equipment available in the hands of any and every researcher.
Posted by: todd | August 26, 2004 at 04:46 PM
Don't underestimate social friction. Maybe the whole transition could be done in six months, if it were all perfectly planned out in advance, and wonderfully executed without mistake.
And if pigs had wings, maybe they could fly.
It's going to be messy, and it's going to take years. You could build the greenhouses in a short while? But most people don't own that amount of land, while huge expanses of the land in this country are owned by a government that doesn't WANT it transfered to private ownership. Most of the people live on small plots that could never be self sufficient.
It could take decades to disperse the population to the point where most people could achieve self-sufficiency. Assuming people really wanted to be dispersed.
I don't think that would happen in any case. People will continue to specialize, some regions will be thinly populated, and export excess power and food, others will the thickly populated, and will export intellectual property.
And, frankly, it's going to take time to retrain all those designers. Most of the design talent in the country COULD be retrained, but don't expect it to happen over night.
Posted by: Brett Bellmore | August 26, 2004 at 05:30 PM
Once again my apologies I did not wish to say in the above post that everyone would be independent. I merely wish to point out that given a six-month period and a replicator some individuals could be independent. The issue with land has been and will continue to be discussed it is a primary concern and will need to be addressed based on my numbers each individual currently living in United States should be given a 8.7 acres of land a number slightly less say eight acres would be acceptable this would allow the government to continue some holdings for military and governmental properties. This is the only fair and equitable way for the current and future situations.
As to your issue with its going to be messy, and its going to take years, these two statements contradict each other. From my standpoint we're looking at the majority of people living in cities but if it gets messy and we lose a few cities I would be prepared to bet the other cities will empty out fairly quickly. That is to say if it becomes apparent that your personal safety cannot be guaranteed in a situation where you are surrounded by one million individuals radical or otherwise. It will not take you more than a few days and perhaps only a few hours together your possessions and a 40 foot mobile home and leave the cities behind.
To the issue of available land and self-sufficiency has been stated on another post and although I cannot confirm this estimate I cannot deny it either. The estimate is for 250 square meters of land needed for greenhouse to feed a individual. Whether this individual is a Iowan and eats well a lot or if this individual is a California and eats a little I cannot say. During the conversion this works out to 2690.9776 square feet. This area is available to most homeowners, utilizing a adition to the home this is reasonable even in metropolitan areas for production of food. One should immediately note this is square footage not cubic footage and with some careful design we can envision a extremely efficient greenhouse less feeding everyone. Indeed a greenhouse consisting of little more than a trailer bed and a few layers and we have a situation where we are now mobile and still self-sufficient. Also a scenario where on a transport ship again easily constructed using MNT we see available square footage obtained and self-sufficiency accomplished. Although the power requirements might exceed the possibilities we should not discount utilizing larger aircraft as well remaining in continuous flight as they to would possess the necessary space for self-sufficiency.
As to retraining the current designers we have all agreed on occasion that a simple AutoCAD program would be adequate for MNT. There are many thousands if not hundreds of thousands of individuals in United States familiar with these programs. I believe the certification class for AutoCAD is only a few months program and is routinely passed by many individuals of varying history and ability. It is my opinion that only a few products fall into the category of complex when the utilizing this design criteria. That is to say a knife, fork, plate and the like fall into the simple category of useful products. A combustion engine, windmill, mining equipment, buildings, and like fall into the reasonably complex category. Finally for the complex products requiring relatively large groups of designers and utilizing new technologies we see only a few products such as advanced robotics, spacecraft, supercomputers, and the like. As we have ruled out advanced robotics as the necessary component for self-sufficiency and I believe we can also a lemonade spacecraft and supercomputers from that list we see that the required list of products for self-sufficiency can be obtained without undue effort.
In the past I have noted my wish that on day one when the replicator is ready for deployment a existing list of useful products accompany that rollout attention should be given to products which the user gains independence.
Posted by: todd | August 26, 2004 at 06:39 PM
About greenhouses and solar cells, perhaps they could be placed in orbit, where there is more "space", more materials (i.e. asteroids, Venus's abundant carbon dioxide), and more sunlight. With MNT, making big things is many orders of magnitude cheaper than today. In fact, in Chapter 6 of Engines of Creation, Drexler mentions "worlds of continental scale" and "not only lands in space, but whole seas, wider and deeper than the Mediterranean." This implies that there could be solar panels each with thousands of square km. of area. These, however, may take a few years to develop since it may take time to find where the right resources in space are, how to process the raw material, how to make the solar cells and greenhouses withstand cosmic radiation and space debris, and how to transport/transmit the energy and food to Earth. However, I don't see why it cannot be done.
Posted by: nano123 | August 27, 2004 at 05:21 AM
I think the obvious course of action to take as soon as possible after the development of molecular nanotechnology and AGI is to take of all the extra-solar material in the system, all the planet, moons, asteroids, and comets, and construct a Dyson Sphere, thereby utilizing all of the energy output of the sun. There would be ample room and resources for ecosystems larger than the current Earth, in addition to environments for other types of life-forms, such as, nano-machinery based life-forms, and computationally based virtual life-forms. AGI sentry systems could maintain ubiquitous impersonal surveillance and security functions. From such a start, the effort to colonize the galaxy could begin.
Posted by: Mike Deering | August 27, 2004 at 11:50 AM
Dyson spheres aren't dynamically stable. Neither are ringworlds, at least as conceived of by Larry Niven. While I understand the appeal of a Dyson sphere, a cloud of much smaller, (But possibly comparable in surface area to Earth!) space habitats would be more reliable in the face of accidents.
And if you're talking about disassembling the solar system, you'd better be planning for the long haul.
As a compromise, from an engineering standpoint you have two contradictory drives: First, you want to tap the Sun's energy at the highest possible concentration, in order to achieve maximum thermodynamic efficiency. So an efficient Dyson sphere wants to be as small as possible.
On the other hand, you want to USE that power at as low a temperature as possible, again for maximum efficiency. So you need the largest possible area for heat radiators.
You can solve the contradiction by building an extremely small Dyson sphere purely for power production, which sends beamed power to a widely dispersed cloud of small habitats, which have the necessary large surface area. Surrounding the sun in a magnetic bottle would simultaniously drive up it's temperature, and thus the potential efficiency, while the reaction force would support the sphere.
Personally, though, I don't think we need to be in a hury to make such major alterations to the Solar system; We're unlikely to achieve such high population growth rates as to need more than the mass of Ceres in the next couple of centuries. In fact, advanced societies on Earth all have below replacement reproduction rates, although I suppose something like physical immortality would change that.
Posted by: Brett Bellmore | August 27, 2004 at 02:22 PM
I've registered for the Foresight conference, hope to see you all there! If the rest of you are as cheap as I, maybe we can hunt down some inexpensive grub while the more loaded among us are eating their $33.33 lunches. ;)
By the way, anybody know the HOURS the conference will be in session during? It seems to be "need to know" information, and I really need to know, to book my flight.
Posted by: Brett Bellmore | August 27, 2004 at 04:51 PM
I'll see you at the Foresight conference Brett.
Posted by: michael vassar | August 27, 2004 at 08:00 PM
Enjoy the conference, guys, I'm sure you'll have a great time. I've only been able to go to one so far but it was very informative.
Posted by: Karl Gallagher | August 28, 2004 at 11:10 AM
I'm inclined to think that living off-grid will be fairly easy, even with early nanofactory versions that can't directly produce food. Algae grows quickly with little infrastructure and is a decent food source in a pinch, especially with cheap DNA sensors so you can make sure there's no nasty organisms mixed in.
If land is a problem, move to the ocean. Ocean living today is difficult, dangerous, and tends to pollute. Molecular manufacturing would change all that.
The problem of course is policy.
Chris
Posted by: Chris Phoenix, CRN | August 31, 2004 at 12:10 PM
Brett wrote: "The guy with no particular skills is sure enough going to want to collect garbage, even if he's independent, if it means he can spend half his time lounging on a beach in Jamaca, instead of spending all his time on the couch watching TV."
American men spend 4.5 hours per day watching TV; women, 5 hours.
http://www.tvb.org/rcentral/mediatrendstrack/tvbasics/09_TimeViewingPersons.asp
If they spent half that time (900 hours) working a $6 per hour job, they would increase their annual income by about $5,000 a year (before tax; call it $3,500 after tax).
You can spend 4 days in Jamaica with lodging and airfare for about $800. At 16 waking hours a day and 4 trips per year, that's 256 Jamaica hours, vs. only 900 hours working instead of watching TV.
So don't be too sure that Americans know how to have a good time.
Chris
Posted by: Chris Phoenix, CRN | August 31, 2004 at 05:59 PM
Matt asks whether the NNI may be increasing their acceptance of MNT. Based on their recently published "responsible nanotechnology" study, it looks like they're just getting more sophisticated about denying it and hijacking the discussion. CRN will be responding to this.
http://www.nanodialogues.org/international.php
Chris
Posted by: Chris Phoenix, CRN | August 31, 2004 at 06:00 PM
Well, made my flight and hotel reservations for the conference. If anybody wants to save a few bucks sharing a room, I reserved one with two beds...
Figure I'll get in Thursday and take in the National Aerospace museum. I hear it's quite impressive.
Posted by: Brett Bellmore | September 01, 2004 at 02:05 PM