Corwin

Why not? Quantum computers can store and manipulate a huge amount of information. Rod logic almost as much.

We don't actually have rod logic yet... (we know it's possible and we know how to do it, but with current technology a 486 would be the size of an average office building at least...) but we do have primitive quantum computers. (Prototypes... they can't actually DO much... yet. But then neither could the first conventional computers....)

Christopher Lord

even a plain old binary computer with 100,000 gigabytes of storage would be too small to see, and I'm fairly sure they can store a complete car blueprint in a gig or two.
Assuming every byte of blueprint needs 1000 bytes of index into a material database (thats WAY high, but what the heck, for instance, all the seconds for 136 years can be indexed with 32 bits, and each bit doubles that number), that still only works out to one or two terabytes, which aint all that bad. 10 times that much information could fit inside a computer the size of a blood cell, and thats nowhere near the theoretical limit of 1 bit-per-atom.

And even if the binary computer comes up short, we can turn to other, more dense technologies once it looses steam.

daemon

I think people are overlooking the most obvious possibility: a centralized overseer system. It would have the molecular blueprint; all the nanites would need to do is transmit and receive. I have the feeling this would be much easier to build than fully autonomous nanites.

Koyaanisqatsi

I think everyone is overlooking the most damning aspect (but that's ok, it's always overlooked): chaos/entropy (I combine the two since I'm not fully conversant in either, but I'm sure someone here is to help me along).

NO computer ever made funtioned according to the specifications it was meant to function under. At some point something breaks down in some unpredictable way and no matter how many checks and balances are employed, chaos/entropy always rears it's balancing effect head.

Think of it this way. We already have nano-technology, we just call it Wetware (thanks to Gibson) and it doesn't provide for immortality or any of the wonderful jetpack promises I've heard surrounding nano (though smart fog, I think it's called--a human sized cloud of nanos that surround you at all times providing literally anything you desire in a moment's notice, including a sort of protective force field--does sound cool).

Just like with atomic energy, there's no way to either predict or truly apply nano until we have nano, and just like with atomic energy, I guarantee you the impossible to foresee detriments will either far outweigh the controlled and heavily marginalized benefits or simply balance everything out per usual.

Not to mention the fact (though others touched on it), that I personally know a scientist who can right now convert your car's engine for about a hundred bucks to run more efficiently and last apporoximately two to three times longer than ever before on half gasoline and half water. Who here thinks he's been able to sell this technology to either the oil industry or to Government oversight committees?

Also (from out of my quantum physics ass), what about the Heisenberg uncertainty principle? How will the "unleashing" of what will amount to billions upon trillions upon quadrillions of little tiny "observers" collapsing all of those tiny little wave functions in order to turn your Buick into a Mercedes effect Shrodinger's Cat, capiche?

Or for superstring enthusiasts, what effect would possible discordant vibrations have to the harmony of the whole?

I predict (drumroll please): nano tech will balance itself out to an eventual zero-sum gain just like all of mankind's inventions do, most likely leaning more heavily to the detrimental, not the instrumental.

If you don't believe me, I've got some 8-track tapes and several hundred thousand shares of nineties internet IPO's.

But what I still don't have is my jetpack! Where the hell is my goddamned jetpack!?

Corwin

One major problem koy.... you're dramatically overstating the effects of chaos/entropy/uncertainty.

Is Heisenberg valid? Yes. (There's some new evidence that may give us a way around the uncertianty principle, but it's still very preliminary and not relevant to this point.) Does it matter? Not so much as you'd think. If I'm trying to assemble, let's say, a diamond out of cellulose.... do I really care what the quantum spin of the carbon molecules is? Nope. Not a bit. Heisenberg is there but the effect isn't enough to worry about. Likewise with your computer problem. Again.... do errors crop up? Yes, occasionally. Do computers still work? Clearly yes.

My statement would be.... relax....

Oh and don't worry about regulation either. All it takes is for ONE nanite to be released/stolen. This is a technology that, in the long run, can't be regulated. The comparison to atomic power isn't exactly valid. Fissionable matierial is inherently dangerous to be around, and you need a LOT of it to actually be able to do anything. This makes it easy to guard.

Nanotech won't be any easier to regulate than computers currently are. And look how much success people have had there? **cough cough NAPSTER cough cough KAAZA cough cough PORN cough cough FILTERING SOFTWARE cough cough**

Christopher Lord

Yes, there are the problems, "like how do you grab a carbon atom, since they are so dammed sticky?" and "Where exactly is an atom at any one time anyways?" Because of this we will probably be building things with large manipulators for the first few decades.

As to your other objection: The computer industry is already making plans about this, and by the time we see memory and chips this small its quite possible we could find the right element to store information with at such scales. For instance, (this is speculation on my part), we could build a small chamber of atoms (think bucky-ball), and then stick something in it to indicate the presence of data. command and data occurs via a distributed net of very simple computers linked with mechanical communication. This could be 6-way redundant and still keep a detailed plan for a large project at scales far below anything we can see.

At the very least its worth looking into...

daemon

You are correct, to a degree. This is why self-correction is a major requirement for operational nanotech.
This is because we don't know how biological systems work, precisely, in the first place, nor how to control them directly!
This is why groups like the Foresight Institute exist now.
So why doesn't he go into business for himself? If he can do it to an existing engine, he could easily charge $250+ for the operation. Within a year, he could start franchising, and start raking in cash. Somehow I doubt your scientist-friend's veracity, Koy.
Umm, I think you mean the Copenhagen Interpretation. The Uncertainty Principle has to do with electrons, which you really don't need to know too much about in order to build molecules. We already know we can construct (and have constructed) some structures atom-by-atom, so it doesn't seem unreasonable to assume we can scale this up. Neither the CI nor the UP would be a barrier or cause problems for this process.
What?
Actually, doesn't that just go to show how poor you are at prediction?
Well, the first prototype propeller-based packs (well, really frames) are in the works. I think they're supposed to be hitting the military in '05.

Soliton

Not to get off topic, but on the lines of a space elevator or beanstalk, again- Any tether-like system that reaches down into the level of the atmosphere at which planes fly should have its center of mass in geosynchronous orbit. Even if a terrorist armed with nukes trashed the bottom 3 miles, the remaining 35,997 miles would hover near-motionlessly above the ruins- because it is still effectively in orbit. However, if somwhere near the mid-point was severed, then there would be some real trouble.

Ragnarok

That's because wetware was "engineered" (cretinists notwithstanding) by genes who wanted nothing more than to copy themselves. We are their "side-effects" and suffer all the time as a result of it. Nano tech is designed by us for us, not some asshole strand of DNA that doesn't even know it's alive.

As for the magic car, I've heard these things before and they always turn out to be urban legend. If the engine mods worked, as another poster pointed out, the scientist would be rich.

Oh, and you can get a jetpack now. Had a coworker friend of mine who was a little nuts and wanted me to join him flying into football games at half time with one for like $10,000 a show. The only difficulty with today's jetpacks is they have two small things that can go wrong.

1) They like to explode
2) If you get out of control a little you can, um, sort of plummet to your death.

elwoodblues

Yeah. Just like penicillin. And iron smelting. And navigation. And rocketry. And electricity. And the integrated circuit. And the printing press. And crop rotation farming. And plastics. And vulcanized rubber. And scientific astronomy. And interchangable parts manufacturing.

You're right. We're just as well off with those as we would be without. Let's just chuck the whole lot and live off the bounty mother nature. Red in tooth and claw.