Re: Nanobots Not Needed

From: Jim Logajan (JamesL_at_lugoj.com)
Date: 03/06/05 

Date: Sun, 06 Mar 2005 04:36:56 -0000

jsn@panix.com (John S. Novak, III) wrote:
> In article <112imdp3h89deb7@news.supernews.com>, Jim Logajan wrote:
>> In my humble opinion, nanotechnology's greatest benefits are in
>> improvements in medicine, the alleviation of poverty, and increase in
>> individual freedoms (due to possible decoupling from the global
>> economy).
>
> I am obligated to snort and chuckle.

Happy to have provided you a bit of mirth and merriment. ;-)

> Resources are not infinitie, even with molecular assembly.

Nanotechnology should make more resources accessible while at the same time
making the need for them, presumably, less.

> I see no decoupling from the global economy in the near future,

Well... I don't know how many pre-industrial tribes still exist, but I seem
to recall there were still quite a few extant not that many decades ago. I
believe they were effectively "decoupled" from the global economy. Except
for omni-present government presence, even today one can manage a modest
amount of decoupling, depending on the sacrifices one is willing to make.
That said, I don't see any mass outbreak of neo-rugged individualists armed
with nanobots making a break from the global industrial economy anytime
soon either.

> nor do I see it as desireable, unless one uses the technology
> to leave the globe.

The capability to decouple from the global economy would seem to be an
essential requirement for any sustained expansion into space, but I'm not
sure why you think any reduction of interaction with the global economy is
undesirable for those who remain on Earth. Obviously some aspects cannot be
decoupled (e.g. usage of real-estate) but certainly much economic
interaction can be reduced. Are you, perhaps, concerned about the onset of
a "tragedy of the commons" more severe than that which exists now?

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