In a message dated 7/14/00 10:06:10 AM Pacific Daylight Time,
Point of interest. Nuclear scientist, Ted Taylor first came up with the
notion of Santa Claus machines. These were not micro constructs, but
massively, macro, devices. Their purpose was to slowly swing through the
solar system, encountering wandering asteroids and coverting the asteroidal
material to useful products in order to provide Earth's inhabitants with
goodies, as well as a collision-free inner solar system. Taylor is now
deceased, and was a good friend of Freeman Dyson.
hibbert@netcom.com writes
<< jonkc@worldnet.att.net said:
> 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.
This is missing Robin's point. When he uses the epithet "Santa Clause
machine" he wants you to address the magical nature of it. He doesn't
actually care whether it's white magic or black magic. >>
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