mark@unicorn.com wrote:
> I was talking about nuclear energy in the more general sense;
> not neccesarily controlled use. Personally I find the idea of a mosquito
> flying through my window carrying a multi-ton-yield fusion bomb rather
more
> scary than a nanobot running off a miniature nuclear reactor. People had
> previously assumed that any hostile nanobot would be limited to chemical
energy
> levels rather than nuclear..
Ah. I see your point.
Third, as you noted, there is a diminishing yield problem. Even nuclear weapons only produce so much bang per pound, and if you start measuring the bomb size in micrograms it gets pretty puny. A robot mosquito might carry as much punch as a truck bomb, if you could make a bomb that small - but that's no big deal with reasonably advanced nanotech. Anything much smaller than that won't even produce an explosion - it will simply produce a flash of radiation when it detonates.
Billy Brown, MCSE+I
bbrown@conemsco.com