(h/t Next Big Future) Tonight on Fast Forward Radio Economist Robin Hanson and futurist Brian Wang join us as we continue our special series leading up Foresight 2010. The conference, January 16-17 in Palo Alto, California, provides a unique opportunity to explore the convergence of nanotechnology and artificial intelligence and to celebrate the 20th anniversary… Continue reading Robin Hanson and Brian Wang Tonight on Fast Forward Radio
One more comment on the post by Mike Treder that I addressed last time. Recall he wrote Techno-rapturists among our reading audience might be quick to respond with glib answers about miraculous nanotechnology solutions that are just around the corner … To understand Foresight’s actual point of view on this issue (which is actually a… Continue reading Martian Graffiti
Mike Treder has a post at IEET that reads like a catechism of the Gaian religion. Now I’m a firm supporter of freedom of religion and Mike has a perfect right to believe what he does and indeed to preach it to whomever will listen. (And besides, Mike is a friend of mine.) But in… Continue reading Original Sin
Religious creeds are a great obstacle to any full sympathy between the outlook of the scientist and the outlook which religion is so often supposed to require … The spirit of seeking which animates us refuses to regard any kind of creed as its goal. It would be a shock to come across a university… Continue reading The Ministry of Truth
We here at Foresight are not particularly interested in climate change — the effects, even if you take the IPCC projections as gospel, are dwarfed by the capability of nanotech (for good or ill). But we are considerably more concerned about the way science is done, and whether it can reliably find the truth. So… Continue reading Feynman on Climategate
Technology Review: Complex Integrated Circuits Made of Carbon Nanotubes. The first three-dimensional carbon nanotube circuits, made by researchers at Stanford University, could be an important step in making nanotube computers that could be faster and use less power than today’s silicon chips. Such a computer is still at least 10 years off, but the Stanford… Continue reading Technology Review: Complex Integrated Circuits Made of Carbon Nanotubes
There’s an amusing cartoon at XKCD: … which underlines yet again how amazing the technology is beneath the abilities we take for granted everyday (and put to very ordinary uses). Back in this post: The heavily-loaded takeoff I pointed out that that was likely to be the fate of most of the to-us astounding capabilities… Continue reading nano-productivity
The Speculist blog’s FastForwardRadio podcast is featuring speakers from Foresight’s upcoming conference next month (January 16-17 in Palo Alto) for the next few weeks. Tonight: Futurist Michael Anissimov and nanotechnologist Ralph Merkle. 10:00 Eastern/9:00 Central/8:00 Mountain/7:00 Pacific.
One of the reasons I inveigh so heavily against the use of the word “nanotechnology” to mean merely stuff that’s measured in nanometers, is that while it focuses on the size — “nano” — it tends to ignore the function — the “technology.” Nanotech to me is about high-energy-density, high-frequency, eutactic machinery. To those focused… Continue reading "Nanotechnology" causes global warming
See this article at New Scientist Real red blood cells owe their astonishing agility to their “biconcave” or tyre-like shape. To create synthetic particles with the same agility, Samir Mitragotri of the University of California and his team got their inspiration from the way real red blood cells acquire their final shape in the body.… Continue reading Not respirocytes yet, but …
