From: Mark Grant (mark@unicorn.com)
Date: Sat Sep 06 1997 - 06:00:12 MDT
On Thu, 4 Sep 1997, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote:
> Personal immune systems are feasible as defenses against death goo spores, but
> not death goo seas. Depends which is the island.
Depends also on the details of the technology. Drop me into a sea of
dangerous bacteria, and I'll die. Drop me into a sea of dangerous bacteria
in an environmentally controlled suit and I'll last as long as I have
energy. Drop me into a sea of dangerous bacteria in an environmentally
controlled suit which can obtain energy and raw materials from the
bacteria, and I'll last until the suit malfunctions. Drop me... etc.
We already have billions of years of experience of being 'islands' in a
'sea' of nanotech 'goo'. We *know* that evolution can produce effective
personal immune systems. The only question is whether design can produce a
more effective 'goo' than evolution, and a more effective 'attack goo'
than 'defence goo'. I haven't yet seen any good proof, and our experience
with smart, malicious programmers releasing computer viruses seems to show
the opposite.
Mark
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