nanotechnology

davej

Interesting reading:

http://www.etcgroup.org/documents/TheBigDown.pdf


It seems to me that the major barriers at the moment appear to be self-replication and finding a suitable power source. Not to mention the doomsday scenarios of "gray goo" where a rogue nanobot results in the destruction of our planet:

GRAY GOO What if nanobots start building chairs and
don’t stop? The self-replicating and assembly processes could
go haywire until the world is annihilated by nanobots or their
products. Gray Goo refers to the obliteration of life that could
result from the accidental and uncontrollable spread of selfreplicating
assemblers. Drexler provides a vivid example of how
quickly the damage could pile up beginning with one rogue
replicator. “If the first replicator could assemble a copy of itself
in one thousand seconds, the two replicators could then build
two more in the next thousand seconds, the four build another
four, and the eight build another eight. At the end of ten hours,
there are not thirty-six new replicators, but over 68 billion. In
less than a day, they would weigh a ton; in less than two days,
they would outweigh the Earth; in another four hours, they
would exceed the mass of the Sun and all the planets
combined.”45 To avoid a Gray Goo apocalypse, Drexler and his
Foresight Institute, a non-profit organization whose purpose is
to prepare society for the era of molecular nanotechnology
(MNT), have established guidelines for developing “safe” MNT
devices. Foresight recommends that nano-devices be constructed
in such a way that they are dependent on “a single artificial
fuel source or artificial ‘vitamins’ that doesn’t exist in any
natural environment.” Foresight also suggests that
scientists program “terminator” dates into their atomic
creations46 and update their computer virus-protection
software regularly?




But 42 million silicon transistors on today's pentium 4 chip versus the possibilty of having billions of nanotubes in the same space sounds promising.

davej

azezil

If nanities had a form of intelligence, sensors which made them aware of their surroundings and their own well being and could self replicate, would they be considered a lifeform?

stereo_steve

With an attitude like that azezil, you could write a star trek episode. God knows its been done to death!

I'd have to say yes. Self awareness alone even without the other qualities you mention would make them lifefrms in my opinion

daveirl

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