From: YakWaxx@aol.com
Date: Mon Aug 25 1997 - 14:10:49 MDT
Eliezer S. Yudkowsky <sentience@pobox.com> wrote:
> "Who will guard the guardians?" - maybe nanotechnology would give us a
perfect
> lie detector. Nanotechnology in everyone's hands would be just like
giving
> every single human a complete set of "launch" buttons for the world's
nuclear
> weapons. Like it or not, nanotechnology cannot be widely and freely
> distributed or it will end in holocaust. Nanotechnology will be
controlled by
> a single entity or a small group... just as nuclear weapons are today.
I have to disagree, I see the exact opposite. Putting destructive technology
in the hands of one person is asking for holocaust, putting it in the hands
of the masses is our *only* chance of survival.
> If that entity is benevolent and Libertarian, utility nanites would be
> released as they were programmed - to eliminate hunger, starvation, old
age,
> death, etc. The world would remain much the same, except most forms of
> physically based pain and coercion would be eliminated. Other utilities
might
> be more flexible. No utility will give access to the forbidden molecular
> level, but many might give access to higher levels. People might be able
to
> edit their synapses or their tissue-level body structure. (The former
> scenario might result in Singularity in fairly short order.)
Hmmm.. that or the possible chance of death.. death please!
Isn't spontaneous order an extropian principle?
--Wax
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