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Gaming the Future: The Book!

Author: Foresight Editor

Nano-action film: watch DNA unzip

from the early-nanovisuals dept.
From a San Francisco Chronicle article on work published in Nature: 'Using some extraordinary camera tricks, scientists at the University of California at Davis have produced Lilliputian action shots of molecular "motors" unwinding strands of DNA…The images underscore recent dramatic advances in the field of nanotechnology, a discipline that scientists hope will allow precise control over the very fabric of matter.' The story links to the 2.4 Meg MPEG movie.

Motley Fool has ongoing discussion of nanotech

from the nanonews-everywhere dept.
Senior Associate Brad Hein posts nanonews at his nanosite, e.g.: "The Motley Fool has a discussion board on nanotechnology at http://boards.fool.com/Messages.asp?bid=113628. The Fool is a web site for education and news on investing. Generally, I've found their message boards to be pretty civil with a fairly good signal to noise ration." CP: Read More for an excerpt on the Foresight Conference from the discussion board.

ZDNet on downside of AI

from the good-news-bad-news dept.
Robert Trombatore writes "ZDNet's UK edition has an interesting article about AI. It's fairly well balanced and makes mention of Foresight Institute and its role in raising public awareness of emerging technologies."

CP: Here's an excerpt: "Minsky agrees that extinction at the mechanical hands of a robot race may be just around the corner, but says that developments in the field of artificial intelligence call for considered debate. He says he is encouraging artificial intelligence experts to participate in the work of the Institute." You can do that here on nanodot, and at the upcoming Senior Associate Gathering.

Gilmore on nanotech & copy-protection

from the what-do-you-mean-replication-is-illegal? dept.
Senior Associate John Gilmore of EFF has written this item on the problem of copy-protection including the connection to nanotech. John prefaced it with: "My latest missive about copy-protection. I tie in the big nanotech angle toward the end. I have to sneak them up to it because they think I'm crazy if I lead with it. Feel free to reproduce this. If you publish it far and wide, let me know so I can feed you corrections as they come in from the critics…" Sounds like John would appreciate feedback, so add your comments below.

LA Weekly "disses" Tranhumanists

from the reactionary-media dept.
Martin Archer writes "Here's another myopic treatment of tranhumanists, from the LA Weekly, Jan 19-25, 2001. Say what you will about Natasha Vita More and Max More, but personally, I just don't understand the journalist's viewpoint: '…Perhaps one day we'll all be transhumans, or posthuman cyborgs, but since we're not cyborgs now, it's hard to get too worked up about it…' It's difficult bringing the subject of the impending technological life extension 'tsunami' even to close friends. How do you do it without coming across as a weirdo?" CP: Fortunately, with the web we can judge for ourselves, without intervening media bias: see Extropy.org and Extrodot.

Asian industries serious about nanotech

from the atoms-are-everywhere dept.
The latest Far Eastern Economic Review (January 18 cover date) has a well done article Designer Molecules: It's Time to Think Small by Charles Bickers on Asian companies seriously developing applications of nanotextured materials, nanotubes and other nano-scale technology. The article is also a good reality check for anyone inclined to think that the US (or any other nation) will be able to monopolize the technology.

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.)

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