You’re driving a car, very fast, on a poorly marked road, in the pitch-black darkness.
There are no streetlights, there is no moon out tonight, the only illumination you have is your car’s headlights…you’re in uncharted territory; you have no roadmap, no way to know for sure where you are going…but you’re driving very fast, into the pitch-black darkness…
That’s the state of nanotechnology today. We’re advancing rapidly into uncharted territory. The changes this technology will bring may arrive sooner than we are prepared to respond effectively to them.
When we hear people talk about risks of nanotechnology, they often speak only of the short-term hazards caused by today’s practices and products—mostly nanoparticle toxicity. But that’s like driving with the low beams on. They’re not looking far enough ahead, toward more serious potential dangers.
Most of the work being done today that carries the name ‘nanotechnology’ is not nanotechnology in the original meaning of the word.
Advanced nanotechnology promises the ability to build atomically precise machines and components of molecular size. Using mechanically guided chemistry, rapid prototyping, and automated convergent assembly, an integrated system of productive nanosystems—what we call a nanofactory—could combine these molecular components into large and complex products, including additional nanofactories.
Unfortunately, a technology this powerful could easily be misused. The rapid development cycle and massive manufacturing capability may lead to an unstable arms race between competing powers. Excessive restrictions that limit access to the technology or limit distribution of the benefits may lead to an inhumane gap between rich and poor, and may encourage a black market in unsafe molecular manufacturing. Insufficient restrictions may allow small groups and even individuals to produce undesirable products or terrorist tools.
Advanced nanotechnology, along with other technologies that it will enhance or enable, will create new problems and new opportunities that require new solutions. These technologies will be more transformative than most people expect, and could develop too rapidly for reactive policy to succeed. We urgently need a better understanding of numerous factors related to molecular manufacturing, to prepare for its possible development sometime within the next decade.
General-purpose molecular manufacturing appears to be inevitable. It might become a reality by 2010, likely will by 2015, and almost certainly will by 2020. When it arrives, it will come quickly. To be prepared for the coming development of molecular manufacturing technology, we must start planning for it immediately.
Molecular manufacturing represents power: political power, military power, and financial power. Who controls that power and how widely—how democratically—it is distributed will make all the difference when the technology is developed
Full report here: Source