What is grey goo?
The term “grey goo” is used to describe a theoretical event in which nanotechnology would run wild, consuming the natural environment and covering the Earth in a lifeless grey goo. The concept was first introduced in the 1980s book The Engines of Creation, and it was eagerly adopted by many science fiction creators. The actual probability of such an event occurring in the real world is extremely small, and many people including the originator of the grey goo theory have actually soundly debunked the possibility altogether. The idea behind grey goo is that self assembling nanoparticles could theoretically start to exceed the purposes for which they were designed, constructing a wide variety of things from the natural environment around them. These replicators would eventually start to break down the environment as they searched for building materials, and if they could move, they could slowly eat the environment, spreading ever more rapidly as they built more of themselves. According to
When nanotechnology-based manufacturing was first proposed in Eric Drexler’s Engines of Creation (1986), a concern arose that tiny self-contained manufacturing systems, “replicating assemblers”, might run amok and “eat” the biosphere, reducing it to copies of themselves. More recent designs by Drexler and others make it clear, though, that it would be rather easy to design manufacturing systems that would not malfunction and so therefore the larger concern is that grey goo would be designed on purpose instead of by accident. Many people have noted that creating grey goo which simply destroyed the world would have no purpose. However, computer viruses are also useless and destructive, and people have created thousands of them. When grey goo becomes technically feasible, a hobbyist might destroy the world. For more detailed information on the subject of grey goo and its devastating effects, read Some Limits to Global Ecophagy by Biovorous Nanoreplicators, with Public Policy Recommendatio
Grey goo is journalistic shorthand for the hazards of nanotechnology: engineering at the scale of a billionth of a metre. Researchers have begun to exploit the unique properties of matter at the finest detail, fashioning tools a few molecules at a time, to produce objects so small you could line up half a million on a millimetre. According to Friends of the Earth, more than 100 products available in the UK – antibacterials, agricultural chemicals, baby food – contain nanoparticles, and no one knows how toxic they might prove. Chemists and pharmacologists will argue that they have always used nanotechnology – all chemical reactions happen at the scale of atoms – but they just didn’t have the word for it. And, they add, think about the benefits that might follow: little bits of molecular machinery designed to repair heart lesions, destroy cancer cells, detect and kill pathogens, and so on. This is where the grey goo scenario begins. Twenty years ago, in his book Engines of Creation, scie
It is a very small (think cell sized) robot that takes apart the biosphere to make copies of itself. Why am I posting here? Because Pamela, who is on our advisory board invited me. Do Pamela or other board members agree with me that the world will end in about 13.5 years? No, but they are concerned enough about bad things coming our way to help us fight the good fight against evil forces coming our way. Is Lifeboat Foundation a right-wing organization? No, our cause is too important for just right-wingers to be involved. People from across the planet with a wide range of views are joining our cause. Our board is brimming with top scientists, Nobel Laureates, deep thinkers, and other influential people. In fact more people wish to join than I have time to type in bios for. Although I am a bit of right-winger (think InstaPundit to guess my political views), our advisors range from right-wingers such as Pamela, Jim Hoft of Gateway Pundit, and Jim Pinkerton from Fox News Watch, to left-win
