[extropy-chat] Re: Social Implications of Nanotech

[Robin Hanson]

At 04:41 PM 11/17/2003 -0500, Chris Phoenix wrote:
>On Sat, 15 Nov 2003 13:36:05 -0500, Robin Hanson wrote:
> > We should consider both
> > conventional nanotech scenarios and radical ones, such as described in
> > Unbounding the Future and Diamond Age.
>
>Would this audience be completely lost if you referenced Nanosystems
>instead?

No.  I was just trying to point more to social scenarios than howto
scenarios, and I couldn't remember if Nanosystems discussed social scenarios.

> > As a prelude to future modeling
> > attempts, I here try to identify five key assumptions to bridge the > 
> chasm
> > between conventional and radical nanotech scenarios.
>
>Seems like you're outlining scenarios, not assumptions.  ...
>... Having gone ahead and done that, I'll come back and note that some
>of your five "assumptions" appear to be effects.

There can be different levels of analysis.  My assumptions are intended
to be at the "cost function" level, the usual point at which technical
processes start to have direct economic consequences.  Each of these
economic assumptions might indeed come about by a variety of different
specific physical arrangements or designs.

To someone like you who focuses on system design, you will want to
make assumptions about the parts you can work with, and statements
about cost would be the conclusion of an analysis you might do.  I
work at a level where cost assumptions are inputs and social implications
are outputs.

> > 1.  Atomic Precision:  Atom-scale manufacturing is feasible; we put some
> > atoms where we want.
>
>Assumptions:
>Mechanochemistry works to some extent.
>Mechanochemistry can't close the autoproductive loop, but it can build
>products.  (Questionble assumption IMO.)

I'm not making this assumption here; I'm just not making the opposite
assumption either.  Ditto when you repeat this in later sections.

>I recommend a different example.  Floating medical devices have been a
>poster child for the anti-MNT crowd.  Perhaps sensors cheap and small
>enough to integrate into all products would be more believable.

OK.  I just knew the medical examples have been pro-nano poster childs too.


> > 2.  General Plants:  ...
>
>Assumptions:
>It appears you're not assuming mechanochemistry for this one.

Right; that need not be required to get this.

> >From what you say later, it sounds like these general purpose plants are
>not assumed to be fully automated.  How can humans cope with machines
>with such flexible behavior?  (Note that automation is different from
>self-repair is different from high reliability, and I'm not sure which
>you're talking about.)

I'm not sure what you have in mind.

>This does not go very far toward analyzing the effects of MNT.  We
>almost have this technology today.

Perhaps, but many of the social implications claimed for nanotech are
actually social implications of this tech, so I want to distinguish it.

> > This requires that production processes be almost fully automated, with
> > human intervention rare. Such high automation seems harder to design.
>
>I still don't understand how a manufacturing system building nanoscale
>products or nanoscale components can hope to work without complete
>automation.  This seems to be a counterfactual scenario.

General plants might only very rarely use atomic precision, because it
is expensive.

>"idle" is a more accurate description than "off".

OK

> > For most products, the main marginal costs would be feedstocks and
> > marketing.  Fixed costs of design, regulation, and marketing would 
> dominate
> > total costs, as with software and music today.
>
>Um, what about profit-taking?  Remember I'm not an economist, so this
>may not be the right term.  What I mean is that if someone has a
>near-monopoly (e.g. the music industry) then they can simply charge
>higher prices and pocket the difference.  With the amount of regulation
>MNT may inspire, this seems like a very plausible source of cost.

Long story short, that just doesn't make sense in the terminology
economists use.  There are always fixed costs expended to become a monopolist
and when those are taken into account, there are no average net profits
to have to account for.

>I think the question of whether manufacturing plants are usually
>idle--whether they're cheap enough to exist for convenience in some or
>even many contexts--is a very important question to ask.  Am I right
>that if they exist for convenience, this completely removes many
>frictions that currently exist in our economy?

I'm not sure what you have in mind here.



Robin Hanson  rhanson at gmu.edu  http://hanson.gmu.edu
Assistant Professor of Economics, George Mason University
MSN 1D3, Carow Hall, Fairfax VA 22030-4444
703-993-2326  FAX: 703-993-2323