Arkansas News Bureau - Nanotechnology breakthroughs on the horizon



From reading this article I cant help but feel that the future of nanotechnology does seem like an interesting one, but then again, in all realism, are people confusing science with science fiction? There is only so much which is medically and scientifically possible, personally I think these things are just false hopes. The idea of robots in my blood stream sounds toxic to me.

How would you feel if a hostile government had access to nanotechnology? Invisible spying machines and killer-nano-robots? Im not one who is scared of scientific advancement, I dont fear the person who has all of the nuclear weapons but the person who only wants one. Looking at our history the greatest advancements have been in warfare, humans could say "weapons r us." I think if anything the development of nanotechnology is not something, in my opinion, which we should currently be tampering with. We have not reached a point culturally where such technology would not be developed to be abused. Im all for a medical advancements, but I certainly would not want to fire off an EMP every day to stop a short circuiting nano-robot plague.

Your thoughts?

Nanotech + stem-cell = near immortality.

It is good.

Nano-machinery and nanotechnology are not the same. Nanotech is a huge field which involves quite a bit more than building small robots (which we're nowhere near doing).

Nanotech is responsible for things like more effective cancer drugs, bone replacements that mimic real bone better than titanium rods, better optics, potentially more efficient solar cells, fuel cells, catalysts, etc.

You're looking at it like a Popular Science reader + 100 years of hype, imagination, and a bit of tin-foil hat syndrome.

Sometimes.

Stem cells aren't gonna help people who get hit by a bus. (= huge blunt-force trauma, massive internal injuries, near instantaneous death etc.)

you could make people incredibly fat keeping them healthy at the same time, something like a transportable multiusable air....err..fatbag.

So getting hit by a car would only cause some rolling down the road.

rofl

I've heard Ray Kurzweil talk about using nanotechnology to develop artificial 'cells' that could replace/ augment red blood cells, and that they would do a much better job at it, too. He gave the example of being able to stay underwater for maybe about half an hour without any respiration aids. Just purely holding your breath. I think he said that, in his opinion, this would be reality in about fifty years' time.

"near immortality" + people continuing to breed like rabbits = major population problem

By stating "nanotech + stem-cell = near immortality" I only showed the frame of a picture. Imaginatively and theoretically this only "seems" true.

I am very well aware of the major environmental and resource based problems. It is also almost true that human race will be extinguished before the aforementioned accomplishments are done.

I am also aware that these research areas are in their premature periods. But they are promising "near immortality" so why not. The equation can be extended

"near immortality" + people continuing to breed like rabbits + major wars = "Then what good is near immortality"

I say just accomplishing is good. Also this near immortality may make it possible for settlement on external planets or even deep space voyages possible. But if I talk about all of these it will be science fiction.

So they are promising, but we should wait and see. It is good to accomplish something. We can never say a scientific research is useless.

We've been doing nanotechnology for a long time only we used to call it chemistry or physics. It's certainly the buzz word of the moment in a lot of fields.

A colleague of mine had a book called environmental nanotechnology on her desk. I borrowed it to browse one evening. It was essentially just another book on environmental chemistry but I doubt the publisher would have been as keen with such a prosaic title.

I really don't see that it throws up any profound ethical questions which we don't already face with the use of any technology. We already have dangerous regimes with technology which can do us harm, war and conflicts have always been a spur to faster technological development. To me it seems the important ethical questions are always about how a technology should be used or developed and this is a debate which has to encompass both the specialist and the layman equally.

Technology in and of itself is neither good nor bad. It's how it's used. Or, as the saying goes, guns don't kill people, I do. And since nanotech is already being fairly widely deployed, this conversation is a bit late. A better question might be; nanotech, will it be good or bad?

Technology in and of itself is neither good nor bad. It's how it's used. Or, as the saying goes, guns don't kill people, I do. And since nanotech is already being fairly widely deployed, this conversation seems to me to be a bit late. A better question might be; nanotech, will it be good or bad?