Prince Charles Strikes Again

From: Dave Farrance (DaveFarrance_at_OMiTTHiSyahooANDTHiS.co.uk)
Date: 07/11/04

  • Next message: John Larkin: "Re: Prince Charles Strikes Again" 
    Date: 11 Jul 2004 22:49:17 GMT

    Prince Charles strikes yet again. When Diana tackled topical issues like
    AIDS and landmines, at least she made sense, but the same thing can't be
    said for her ex.

    So Charles is going on about nanotechnology again.
    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3883749.stm

    BBC News24 is saying, at the moment, that he's asking scientists to
    urgently consider the possible risks. At least this time, he's been
    persuaded that the gray-goo scenario of self-replicating machines taking
    over the world is still firmly in the realm of science fiction.

    News24 is giving a skin lotion with "nanoparticles" as an example of
    nanotechnology. OK, so the lotion contains particles of a size that's
    measured in nanometres, and particles of that size can penetrate skin,
    but so what? Similarly sized smoke particles emitted from diesel engines
    are a problem for the lungs for the same reason, but nobody would dream
    of calling that nanotechnology. What actually happened is that some
    lotion manufacturer decided that "nano" was a suitably fancy
    pseudo-scientific term to add to their product, and had the misfortune
    to time the release just when Charles started fussing about the gray-goo
    last year.

    News24 has just had an "expert" saying that this is going to be as big
    an issue as genetic modification. Yeah, right. Since Green campaigners
    have mostly won public sympathy on issues relating to the buzzwords
    "nuclear" and "genetic", they've been thrashing around for a new
    buzzword to get their teeth into, and they've got their sights set on
    "nano". 

    -- 
Dave Farrance
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