[extropy-chat] How The Schmirk Stole Nanotechnology

[Robert J. Bradbury]

On Wed, 31 Dec 2003, Damien Broderick wrote:

> From: "Hal Finney" <hal at finney.org>
> Sent: Wednesday, December 31, 2003 4:46 PM
>
> > the Schmirk (whose brain was "two sizes too small")
>
> >If the Schmirk is just an anonymous
> > character then the story reads as a good-natured satire; but when he is
> > based on a real person, it becomes a mean-spirited attack.
> >
> > Read it and see if I'm overreacting
>
> You're not over reacting.

I would disagree and I would cite the fact that I've been
to a few more nanotech conferences, both academic and business,
than Hal and Damien and have spoken directly with people
from the NSF to Bill Joy.  I've also read the ETC report
and a number of other luddite perspectives.  The points
about very popular views of MNT that Josh makes are by
no means confined to Smalley.  Smalley may have been one
of the first to speak out against MNT but there are
certainly other such as George Whitesides who is also
widely respected who have attacked the vision without
giving good solid reasons.

That is not good science and if one has to resort to
a little of creative license to get people to see past
their blinders and perhaps get others to consider that
they might be wrong then I'm all for it.  I'm not saying
that it will work -- but the "reasonable" efforts to
date by Eric, Ralph, Robert, etc. don't seem to have
worked very well.  When what you are doing doesn't work
it may be reasonable to try something different.  That
may not work either but as the old Chinese saying goes...
"If you do not change the direction in which you are
headed you are likely to end up where you are going".

And where we are now going is costing us 30-50 million
lives a year for each year MNT is delayed.  That puts
people who are responsible for the delays in a class
with Stalin, Hitler, Milosevic, Pot Pol, etc.

So Hal & Damien this goes back to the question recently
posed with respect to the promotion of transhumanism
and the technologies it may require -- what actions
are legitimate for Extropians/Transhumanists/etc
to engage in?  If we are only going to write SciFi
novels (I'm thinking (my paraphrasing) of I think
Charlie's recent comments about how this may spread
the ideas to people who may be more willing to accept
them) then we need to make a *strong* argument that
this is the best path or else we are as guilty as
Smalley and Whitesides and the NNTI directors & grant
review committees and many VC firms for slowing down
the development of MNT.  And we should acknowledge
the blood on our hands as well.

Robert