[ExI] The biggest advance in Nanotechnology in decades

[John Clark]

On Sun, May 31, 2026 at 1:39 PM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat <
extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:

* > For years a big question in my mind was which would come first, AI or
>> Nanotechnology, about four years ago I discovered that the answer was AI.
>> The problem with Nanotechnology was that although scanning tunneling
>> microscopes were able to give you complete control over atomic placement of
>> atoms, they could not simultaneously give you complete control over atomic
>> chemical binding, and many thought they never would because of the
>> so-called "Sticky Fingers" problem. But last Thursday a paper was published
>> that I thought proved that the Nanotechnology skeptics were wrong*
>
>
> * > Hm, I don't think that this shows you were wrong (and wasn't the
> 'sticky fingers' problem disposed of years ago anyway?*


*Not to everyone's satisfaction, but now thanks to this paper "sticky
fingers" is as dead as a doornail.   *


>
> *> I thought it was a non-issue now). It's an advance, certainly, but it's
> still not delivering nanotech (molecular manufacturing).*


*Of course not, an enormous engineering challenge remains, but once and for
all it proves that Drexler's vision is theoretically possible. We still
need to solve a very difficult engineering problem before mass scale
atomically precise manufacture is achieved, but unlike faster than light
spaceships or perpetual motion machines, there is no scientific problem
that needs to be solved. *


* > I think that our efforts would be best put into developing AI first.*


*Certainly today far more effort is put into AI than Nanotechnology and
that is likely to continue for some time, but the two things are not in
competition because I am certain AI will be very good at finding solutions
to difficult engineering problems. *



> *> Once we have it, then with the kind of thing we talked about previously
> (large-scale robotic biochemical experiments. which can be extrapolated
> into large-scale robotic experiments of any kind), a feedback loop can be
> started with AI driving advances in physical experimentation, driving
> advances in computing technology, enabling more powerful AI, etc.LLMs might
> be a start, or they might be a massive red herring, but I don't think
> there's any doubt that we need actual AI, as quickly as possible.*
>

*I agree with all of that except I don't think there's any possibility LLMs
will turn out to be a massive red herring, although I'm almost certain
there's more to learn about the fundamental nature of intelligence, things
that even Darwinian Evolution hadn't been able to figure out. *


*John K Clark*


>
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