Nano-Bio-Technology

I recently read this article
www.kurzweilai.net.../articles/art0680.html?m%3D18


heres the nitty gritty. read the article for more detailed explanations-

the First Law of Nanobotics: The fusion of nanotechnology and biotechnology, now called nanobiotechnology, will result in the complete elimination of the barrier between living and nonliving materials.

The Second Law of Nanobotics: It is not possible to ensure that devices created using the techniques of nanobiotechnology will only transmit molecular information to the target system.

the Third Law of Nanobotics: The carbon barrier will be eliminated when humans create the first synthetic molecular device capable of changing the state of a living system via direct, intentional transfer of specific chemical information from one to the other.

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anyway from this article and others ive read about replacing biology with synthetic alternatives Im getting an interesting view of whats to come. muscles made from carbon nanotubes would be 100 times stronger than the muscles our body uses now
www.technologyreview.com...

I think id be cool with a 100% body replacement. Id call it an upgrade. Just give me a superconductive nervous system, a high capacity holographic superbrain, carbon nanotube muscles.

superconductors are great for magnetic levitation too
en.wikipedia.org...

so add the ability to levitate to my superstrong synthetic body.

ah the future looks bright indeed.
I just dont like the idea of my brain bieng able to interface with the internet. Big brother could hack in too easily. The risk of severe abnormalities and mutations on the chemical level are a concern too. oh well. shrug.

New advances in carbon-nanofiber research suggests it has interesting applications. You could put it into a pair of sneakers and the simple act of walking compressing the fibers would generate an electric charge. You could perhapse power a small device such as an MP3 player solely by the act of walking.

Digital ink is another interesting concept- You could in essence tatoo a super thin layer of electronics onto your skin. Nano scale technology could allow you to have a Tatoo which is a personal computer, cell phone, MP3 player etc. Japanese researchers have worked on cellphone devices that look like a standard watch however it sends vibrations through the bones in your hand and recieves vibrations the same way so basically you talk into your finger and listen into your thumb. Combine this technology with this digital ink and you'll see what im getting at.

Holographic storage devices are going to allow us to store terabytes in a fraction of the space conventional media requires. Its a death knell to CD/DVD based media capable of storing mere gigabytes of information. Even blueray disks look weak compared to holographic media.

everything is scaling down. Soon enough we will wear our technology like a second skin and never be far from our entire digital collection of information and our network of communication.

I've been reading about the lifter project. jnaudin.free.fr... With no moving parts and a decent energy source you can levitate a certain amount of material. a 90g rig lifts a 40g payload. Just scale up your power supply and your rig and its easy to concieve of a harness for human flight.

Here is a great use of Nano technology... Self cleaning underwear:
Weeks without Washing

I kid you not

lol
Rah, I think id still change my underwear even if it was self cleaning. Putting on the same clothes i just had on, after washing, just seems unhygenic.

in regards to your ben franklin quote- I read a really good book by Terrence Mckenna that theorized that the development of alchohol caused the pre-alchohol civilization of psychedelic mushroom warshipping peacefull naked happy humans to become the current overly aggressive and violent human civilization of warmongering racist facist assholes.

In essence, the 'garden of eden' was a magic mushroom inspired heaven compared to our alchohol soaked hell on earth. The apple.... well they fermented the apple cider and drank themselves into a stupor. Thats where it all went wrong.

Nanotechnology, in its various forms, is a PR tool for researchers, companies, corporations and other organizations to pull in consumers and money from either charity or state/national agencies.

Because it turns out that chemistry and engineering are no longer 'cool', so now we have to call it nanobiotechnolog, etc, etc.

Americans

Excellent OP guyopitz.

BTW - Nanobiotech will be used for bioweapons with killer DNA - as a delivery system, to create hybrids...???

Watcha think?

Its a scary concept, designing dangerous DNA. It doesnt exist for good reason. I would much rather see applications of our technology to improve our genome rather than to develop some sort of nanobiotech that causes our own genetic information to become deadly to us.

As a species we are doomed because the first thing we do is make a weapon of every new technology we ever master. wait, I take that back, We are even moreso doomed because we make weapons of technology we havent even begun to master. The margin for error that I see in this is like the grand canyon in scope. What are they thinking!?

oh well. Im not a scientist or a person of any political wieght. I just hope the people who ARE, use this research wisely and by wisely.. I mean not at all.

Id rather be an optomist and think of how in the far flung future of about 100 years from now I could completely replace my body with an upgraded synthetic posthuman body and potentially live forever in some star trek styled federation of space exploring synthetic immortal biengs. We have a long long way to go to reach that level and Moore's law is giving us very little time to adapt. But Im looking forward to the 'Singularity' Ray Kurzwiel and other futurists talk about.

anyway from this article and others ive read about replacing biology with synthetic alternatives Im getting an interesting view of whats to come. muscles made from carbon nanotubes would be 100 times stronger than the muscles our body uses now

Not many people I know would be willing to undergo surgery to replace anything in their bodies, regardless of wether it's better or not. There is a huge ick factor in any type of human modification. This could change as the culture changes, but will it be for better or for worse? A more feasible alternative in the near term is exo-skeletal technology. People are all into Robotics right now, but I think the near future(20 years) will be focused on Robotic assists(like an Exoskeleton, Tele-Robotic Arms, etc) rather than Autonomous Robots.

I think id be cool with a 100% body replacement. Id call it an upgrade. Just give me a superconductive nervous system, a high capacity holographic superbrain, carbon nanotube muscles.

I doubt 100% will be possible any time soon and such a process would have to be extremely gradual when dealing with the brain and it would have to mimick and enhance the human experience rather then creating a new realm of human experience altogether. We aren't wise enough to take that step yet IMHO. Humanity could surprise me, but it doesn't look good atm.

superconductors are great for magnetic levitation too

Superconducting nanowires to trasmit current is the killer app here.

I just dont like the idea of my brain bieng able to interface with the internet. Big brother could hack in too easily. The risk of severe abnormalities and mutations on the chemical level are a concern too. oh well. shrug.

Yeah, I would take extreme precautions to make sure my brain can't get hacked. If I were to get a direct neural interface I wouldn't want it to be wireless for one thing. It has to be a brain-jack style of technology. Physically connecting Optical Coax to connect my brain to a non-internet connected PC that only has clean software/hardware on it. I'm sure when the technology gets popular there will be places to go to get something like this.

As a species we are doomed because the first thing we do is make a weapon of every new technology we ever master. wait, I take that back, We are even moreso doomed because we make weapons of technology we havent even begun to master. The margin for error that I see in this is like the grand canyon in scope. What are they thinking!?

We shall see. We are a resilient species and has the ability to adapt within an extremely short timescale(as compared to other species that either adapt or die), we work together on a massive scale and sophistication. If the end does infact appear imminent and it's a slow creeping type of extinction, then I'm sure people would band together to either A. Fix the Problem or B. Get outta Dodge(Earth). Quick Mass Deaths we can only insure against by our actions today. There are lots of pockets out there that may survive. Who knows. But I believe we need to start spreading our seed into the Cosmos asap.

Originally posted by guyopitz
Digital ink is another interesting concept- You could in essence tatoo a super thin layer of electronics onto your skin. Nano scale technology could allow you to have a Tatoo which is a personal computer, cell phone, MP3 player etc. Japanese researchers have worked on cellphone devices that look like a standard watch however it sends vibrations through the bones in your hand and recieves vibrations the same way so basically you talk into your finger and listen into your thumb. Combine this technology with this digital ink and you'll see what im getting at.

great idea... until it's time to upgrade~ that could cause a few issues..

Imagine you live another 50 years. your heart starts to go on you so you get a pacemaker. You drink too much so you get a liver replacement. You get in a car accident and they amputate an arm and a leg. You get one of these shiny new prosthetics that has wires that run through your body into your brain and your brain can control the prosthetic as well as you would control your original arm after a while.

Given a long enough timespan, all your original parts will fail, and the technology for replacement parts will get better and better.

I figure eventually all you will need is a simple injection and the nanomachines will just gradually transform you into a posthuman bieng made of these living materials that are just flat out superior to what were currently made of. Eventually a whole species will emerge, with all the flaws erased. Humans will be obsolete.