Robin Hanson <rhanson@gmu.edu> Wrote:
> To be clearer, I'll grant a largely-self-reproducing atomic precision factory,
Unless you mean more by "largely" than I think you do then that's Nanotechnology (big N).
> which implies the ability to manufacture the components of a factory,
And put them together.
>including simple computers and machine tools.
Why simple? I think you're assuming than a nanomachine assembling something
from atoms would need to be as intelligent as a human being on a assembly line putting
macroscopic parts together, but that's not true, dealing with atoms is much simpler.
I'll grant you that without AI designing a complex machine would be difficult just as it is now,
so even with Nanotechnology it might take a long time to build the first one and it might be
quite expensive, but you'd have the second one in a flash and it would cost almost nothing.
>This is still just "nanotech", not the magic Santas you envision.
I'm not at all embarrassed when somebody calls Nanotechnology a Santa Clause
Machine because that's certainly one aspect of it, the other aspect is Doomsday
Machine.
John K Clark jonkc@att.net
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