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Gaming the Future: The Book!

Month: September 2000

Distributed Client for Protein Folding

from the ask-and-ye-shall-receive dept.
Chris Healey pointed out a Slashdot article about the Folding@Home client for distributed protein-folding computations, much like that recently called for by Foresight Sr. Associate Robert Bradbury.

Map of Transformational Technologies

from the you-can-get-there-from-here dept.
PatGratton writes "I've put together a map of transformational technologies and some of their consequences. If I'm missing an important technology or consequence, please let me know." This continues the discussion of the white papers project mentioned earlier.

(Click Read More… for notes on the diagram and the technologies mapped.)

More STM-driven Chemical Reactions

from the poke-n-prod dept.
Will Ware pointed out on slashdot that two phenyl (C6H5) radicals have now been pushed together to form a molecule of biphenyl.

Saw-Wai Hla, Ludwig Bartels, Gerhard Meyer, and Karl-Heinz Rieder, writing in [Phys.Rev.Lett. 85:2777-2780 25Sep2000] describe forming phenyl radicals from iodobenzene, pushing two radicals together mechanically, and forming a bond between them to yield a biphenyl molecule. All of this was done with an STM.

Transformational Technologies Questions

from the chin-strap-for-your-thinking-cap dept.
PatGratton writes "As Chris Phoenix previously described, four Senior Associates got together and began to outline an approach that would take us to the next level of work in resolving the issues raised by transformational technologies.

As one of our first steps, we sat down and tried to list all of the major questions facing us. The result is two sets of questions: one addressing technology, politics and ultimate goals, and the other addressing Foresight Goals. "

(Click Read More… to continue.)

Copying Virus Armor For Nanomachines?

from the what-the-well-dressed-virus-is-wearing-this-season dept.
Sentharus pointed out an article at ScienceDaily entitled "Discovery Of Armored Viruses May Inspire New Designs For Nanotechnology," on research reported in the September 22 Science (registration required): "Now scientists have discovered that one type of virus actually comes equipped with an armored coat made of interlocking rings of protein…. remarkably similar to chain mail suits worn by medieval knights…. The armored virus was detected by an international team of scientists from Stanford, the Scripps Research Institute, the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Uppsala in Sweden."

Salon article on "Techno-dystopia" ads

from the every-party-has-a-pooper dept.
SeanMorgan wrote to point out a Salon article on the Turning Point Project and their anti-technology ads in the New York Times .

"A mostly sympathetic [to Turning Point] article, but it does include some comments from Foresight Sr. Assoc. Eric Raymond.

They even have a problem with social software:

'Everyone should think different together,' quips the copy, suggesting that huge conglomerates rushing toward globalization are more likely to benefit from 'global computer networks' than individuals."

Controlling Position and Orientation of Molecules

from the keeping-the-little-ones-in-line dept.
alison writes "Scientists at the University of Bielefeld in Germany have come up with a new electromagnetic method of controlling the motion and orientation of polar molecules simultaneously. Control of the motion of Bose-Einstein condensates along wires had already been demonstrated by a group in Austria. Ewan Wright of the University of Arizona tells me that arbitrary hard-to-condense atoms can now be B-E condensed by placing them in a trap with an easy-condensing species to which they transfer energy. This is not unlike a common scheme in lasers where an easy-to-pump molecule transfers energy to another molecule with a desirable transition, e.g. N2 gas in with CO2 in a CO2 laser.

I'm convinced now more than ever that a potential 'assembler' will be a vacuum system with interwoven laser beams, electric and magnetic fields that energy-select species, orient them and transport them to a surface."

Infinite Data on an Electron

from the how-many-bits-on-the-head-of-an-electron dept.
Michael Dale noticed this in EETimes. "Interesting development in the quantum computer realm. '…Bucksbaum used a laser to encode parallel phase reversals along the waveform of an atom's electrons – a pulsating stream of 8-bit phase reversals. A second reference stream enabled the researchers to read back out the original bits by decoding the phase reversals, thereby recovering the stored information like a data register…'

Bucksbaum claims there is no 'theoretic limit to how long a string of 1s and 0s you can store in one'. "

Time to start writing

from the gigahands-make-nanowork dept.
ChrisPhoenix writes "(This was written as a letter to Foresight leadership; Chris Peterson asked us to get Nanodot feedback.)

In a spontaneous group that formed Sunday night after the recent Foresight Senior Associates Gathering, four of us discovered that we all felt similarly: that the time has come to build on the suggestions and issues produced by previous Foresight work and gatherings. Having attended several Gatherings and heard several issues from multiple perspectives, we are ready to start filling in the details. Although large and random groups are great for brainstorming, they are perhaps not the best structure for producing detailed, focused, mature work on specific issues. Small working groups or think tanks would be useful at this point, to begin processing the excellent suggestions that have flowed from the Gatherings." (Click Read More… for the rest.)

The Next Really Big Enormous Thing

from the a-singularity-is-coming dept.
Robin Hanson gave an informal talk titled "The Next Really Big Enormous Thing", which argues that there are reasons, based on historical models to expect that the pace of change may increase soon. He seems to be trying to convince economists and social scientists to take our concept of Singularity seriously, and to start doing active research into what the effects might be.

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