Greg Burch writes,
> I have been convinced by some pretty rigorous reasoning,
...and then he goes on to discuss the idea in an open, public forum,
in enough detail to get the idea across:
> Suffice it to say, Lyle, that a technology capable of causing
Gee, thanks for the hint. I'll tell all my hacker friends
Seriously, I agree that it would be possible to cause
As for discussing it openly, I think any hacker who can attempt
If they really start doing this, God help us all.
> explained by some pretty smart people, that one does NOT need
> to make a "genie machine" or even a "general-purpose assembler"
> to cause Very Bad Things to happen with molecular
> In fact, I'm so convinced of this that I think it's irresponsible to
> discuss the details of such ideas in an open, public forum.
> severe destruction on a scale up to and including the level of
> a planetary ecology can be created with molecular technology
> well short of a general-purpose assembler. Here's a hint:
> consider the kind of havoc that computer virii can cause,
> even though we're nowhere close to "general-purpose
> artificial intelligence"; all that's required is the capacity for
> self-replication.