In a message dated 99-08-29 13:56:57 EDT, sentience@pobox.com writes:
> "Robert J. Bradbury" wrote:
> >
> > > If people are frightened to death I say "GOOD!" because that's less
> > > insane than the mind-boggling naivete exhibited by most researchers.
> >
> > Seriously Eliezer, could you explain a bit more what it is you are
> > afraid of --
> > (a) self-replicating machines;
> > (b) our ability to program such machines;
> > (c) the advanced materials properties allowed by hard-nanotech;
> > (d) every [sane] person being able to do (b) on (a) constructed from
(c);
>
> > (e) the dangers that result from (d) including not-quite-so-sane
people;
> > (f) the risks posed by allowing nanomachinery to "evolve";
> > (g) something I've missed?
>
> (e) - deliberately constructed nanoweapons. I'm not ecstatic about (f)
> but I don't visualize anyone being that dumb.
Because it's not hard to imagine scenarios with advanced nanotech in which
one or more Bad Crazies destroy the planet, I share the fairly common fears
associated with it. However, a point that a couple of experienced defense
professionals shared with me earlier this year is the fact that there are
astonishingly few examples of the kind of mass havoc that Bad Crazies could
be wreaking now with existing Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMDs). Consider
the old 1960s scenario of "Charles Manson putting acid in LA's water supply"
or similar biochemical attacks. The Om Yo Ricio attacks in Japan are the
only example of a terrorist chemical incident of which I'm aware. Likewise,
with the dissolution of the old Soviet Union, it seems like a seriously
committed band of well-financed terrorists ought by now to have been able to
have gotten a small nuke to use for terrorist purposes.
State terrorism has also been surprisingly limited. Saddam Hussein COULD
have used chemical or biological warheads in his SCUDs, but didn't.
I don't propose to have an answer for these questions, but they do point to some limiting factors that curtail the frequency with which WMDs are used. Of course, the problem with advanced nanotech is that it presumably lowers the threshold for an isolated Bad Crazy to build a WMD. If it only increases the danger by a factor of ten, the effect could be devastating.
Greg Burch <GBurch1@aol.com>----<gburch@lockeliddell.com>
Attorney ::: Vice President, Extropy Institute ::: Wilderness Guide
http://users.aol.com/gburch1 -or- http://members.aol.com/gburch1
"Civilization is protest against nature;
progress requires us to take control of evolution."
-- Thomas Huxley