Note: These scenarios are not predictions, and do not represent outcomes desired by the Center for Responsible Nanotechnology. CRN intends the scenarios to provide a springboard for discussion of molecular manufacturing policies and societal responses. While each scenario can be understood individually, the real value of the process comes from the comparison of multiple scenarios. A strategic response that appears robust in one scenario may be dangerous in another; an organization, community, or polity using these scenarios to consider how to handle the emergence of molecular manufacturing should strive for responses that are viable across multiple scenarios. Finally, the numbering of the scenarios has nothing to do with importance or priority -- it's a simple reflection of the order in which they were completed.
Scenario #1: Secret Military Development
When the Democratic Party retakes the White House in 2009, most observers expect that how the new President deals with the implosion of Iraq and the ongoing "war on terror" will dominate the headlines over the course of her term in office. These observers are correct—but not for the reasons they believe. Terrorism and war would certainly remain vital national issues for the new administration, but they are overshadowed by the emergence of a provocative new tool for both the U.S. and its adversaries.
Primitive computer-controlled fabrication machines, often called "fabbers" or "3D printers," had been available to universities and commercial manufacturers since the mid-1990s, but over the new century's first decade, this technology sees a dramatic drop in price combined with an equally-dramatic increase in sophistication. By 2009, these devices can easily "print" inexpensive electronic devices, low-efficiency photoelectric materials, and most "dumb" plastic products. Moreover, they prove able to make most of their own parts, the remainder being easily and cheaply obtained from hardware stores or by online mail-order. Refrigerator-size 3D printers more powerful than the best industrial fabbers of a few years earlier can be had for the cost of a used car.
These systems operate at the "meso-scale" of small-but-not-microscopic raw materials—resins, powdered solids, and other forms of "fabber toner." This technology isn't even close to precise molecular manufacturing, but for the first time, industrial designers as well as "do it yourself" hardware hackers can treat the material world like just more software. By the end of the decade, most universities have fabber design classes, and the "open source objects" movement rapidly gains steam (along with concerns about "product design piracy"). TIME magazine puts a $1500 Hewlett-Packard ThingJet on its July 2, 2010, cover, asking "Is this the decade of fabrication?"
That same year, even as American forces complete their withdrawal from Iraq and redeployment to Afghanistan, consumers around the world buy desktop 3D printers by the truckload. Most buyers don't quite know what they'll use the devices for, however; by the beginning of 2011, the "3D printer" section of eBay is among the largest categories on the site. One group of consumers, however, knows exactly what they want to do with fabbers.
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