Nanotechnology
Nanotechnology—also called molecular manufacturing—is the precise manipulation of matter at the atomic and molecular level. Mature nanotechnology will bestow almost magical powers on its possessor:
- The pollution-free production of any material structure consistent with physical law, at virtually zero cost
- Palm-size computers vastly superior to current supercomputers
- Nanomedicine capable of curing all known diseases and ailments, including aging, leading to indefinite lifespans in a state of permanent health
- Many things we haven’t thought of yet
Because of nanotechnology’s far-reaching implications, many people have difficulty accepting its feasibility. Before dismissing nanotechnology as mere fantasy or science fiction, it is important to note that most of our contemporary technology already approaches magical levels by historical standards: manufactured goods are incredibly plentiful and cheap compared to those in (say) antiquity; today’s palm-size computers have already surpassed early room-size computers; modern medicine has already achieved miraculous results in the curing of disease and the extension of healthy human lifespan. In many ways, nanotechnology represents the next logical step.
The web is an incredibly rich source of information on nanotechnology, including the classic visionary book on the subject. Some good places to start:
- There’s Plenty of Room at the Bottom: a famous talk by physicist Richard Feynman on the small-scale manipulation of matter, given at Caltech during the 1959 meeting of the American Physical Society
- Engines of Creation: Eric Drexler’s articulate and accessible introduction to nanotechnology (alluded to above), built on the foundation of Feynman’s vision
- Ralph Merkle’s nanotechnology page: a brief introduction to nanotechnology with lots of links to further information
- Foresight Nanotech Institute: an organization dedicated to preparing society for anticipated advanced technologies (especially nanotechnology)
The WSVP 6
Public education is bad. This problem has been around for years, and people have complained about it for years, but nobody ever seems to do anything about it. (Sounds kind of like the post office, doesn’t it?) I’d like to mention here a proposal which is not original, but bears repeating. Let’s implement the world’s simplest voucher program: calculate the per capita expenditure in each public school, and instead of giving that money to the school, give an educational voucher in exactly the same amount to the parents of the students.
The most common argument against vouchers is that they “drain resources from the public school system”. Obviously, the WSVP is immune to this argument, since any “drain” is a direct result of parents making choices on behalf of their children. If parents are satisfied with the public education system as it currently stands, nothing would change, since they would simply send their children to the school they currently attend. Given the widespread dissatisfaction with public schools, it is more likely that many parents would choose to send their kids to alternative schools—in which case you might as well argue that Toyota drivers drain resources from Ford.
The WSVP is also immune to populist arguments that the public school system is necessary to provide opportunity to poor people through a redistribution of wealth. By construction, the world’s simplest voucher program is exactly as redistributive as the current public school system.
Why has no school district implemented the WSVP? I think it is a combination of an almost religious devotion to public education combined with incredibly effective teachers unions.
First, for some reason to be counted as a “supporter of public education” is an unmitigated virtue in America—but this conflates education with public education. It’s as if the government ran the grocery stores, and anyone opposed to public grocery stores were branded as being against food.
Second, the teachers unions exert enormous control over the political process, especially through their influence on the Democratic Party. The world’s simplest voucher program would expose teachers to competition from which they have been insulated for decades. The best teachers have nothing to fear, of course, but most teachers are not particularly good. And so they have consistently and successfully blocked any serious attempt to break their monopoly on education.
The time for the WSVP has come. Won’t you join me in supporting it?
Crazy futurist stuff
Warning: may cause future shock
I’m interested in a variety of (possibly not-so-)crazy futurist stuff. Most of it falls under the category of “transhumanism”, a philosophy that emphasizes the value of human beings (as in classical humanism) together with the transformative power of technology (which may eventually allow humans to transcend their current biological and cognitive limitations). The World Transhumanist Association FAQ is an articulate and mind-bending introduction to transhumanism and related ideas, and it greatly repays careful study and contemplation. My favorite brand of transhumanism is extropianism, which emphasizes the spontaneous emergence of order and the importance of individual liberty.
The Two Big Things in this area (in my view) are nanotechnology and artificial intelligence. In both cases, there is an essential theme:
Many proposed advanced technologies (including nanotechnology and artificial intelligence) are consistent with physical law. Their successful realization is hence a problem of practice, not principle—and therefore probably a matter of when, not if.
Often, arguments against the “feasibility” of nanotechnology and artificial intelligence—that is, against the possibility of the short-term development of these technologies—imply that the technologies themselves are impossible. This is reminiscent of early arguments against heavier-than-air flight or rocketry: well-meaning scientists and engineers pointed out that, e.g., a heavier rocket would need more fuel, which would further weigh down the rocket, requiring still more fuel, etc., etc. These arguments were perfectly correct, since the technical barriers were indeed high, but they obscured the underlying issue: no physical principle prohibits the existence of airplanes or rockets. Eventually, advances in technology answered all their objections, and many ended up looking foolish.
Of course, simply because a technology is possible doesn’t mean that it will be developed on a reasonable timescale. Making timelines and projections is a tricky business, but there are many reasons to believe that the technology envisioned by transhumanists will arrive some time this century. A good web resource on this subject is Ray Kurzweil’s essay on the Law of Accelerating Returns; I also highly recommend Kurzweil’s books The Age of Spiritual Machines and The Singularity Is Near. I would be surprised if Kurzweil’s predictions are correct in their details, and he may be off by decades in some of his bolder claims, but he marshals convincing arguments in support of his central thesis: our naïve linear intuition leads to systematic underestimates of exponential technological change. As a result, many dramatic technological advances will happen much sooner than most people expect.
Class of '96
Sorry for the long hiatus. I was gone for five days for my 10-year college reunion. It was great, but I’ve got a backlog of work for a while.
I’ve got ideas for a lot of new posts, but first I’m going to recycle some of the futurist writing from my personal site. After that, I’ve got a series on politics/economics that is really going to kick things into high gear.
How much worse it can get 2
There are many things that frustrate and disappoint me about the United States (and Western society in general), but every once in a while something comes along that reminds me to be grateful for everything that is right. The article below appears only in the subscriber’s area of The Economist, but I think it’s too important not to post. It’s a blatant copyright violation; so sue me.
Inside the mad despot’s realm
May 25th 2006 | ASHGABAT
AND MARY
From The Economist print edition
A rare visit to one of the world’s most secretive and repressive countries
THERE is not much to laugh about on state television in Turkmenistan. But viewers may be forgiven for feeling a little quiet satisfaction at the spectacle, late last month, of Gurbanbibi Atajanova, the former chief state prosecutor otherwise known as the iron lady, tearfully begging not to be sent to prison after being accused of possessing 25 houses, 36 cars and 2,000 head of cattle. Ms Atajanova led the purges that, in recent years, systematically removed anyone who tried to challenge, or simply to rein in, President Saparmurat Niyazov, the self-styled Turkmenbashi, or “father of Turkmen”.
Not, of course, mentioned by state television was the fact that, on the very same day, Mr Niyazov was himself under attack. A London-based human-rights organisation, Global Witness, was accusing him of siphoning off most of the country’s estimated $2 billion a year in gas revenues and concealing them in offshore accounts. One of these contains $4 billion, alleges one well-informed insider.
Such topics cannot be discussed in Turkmenistan. Any criticism or dissent is defined as treason and is punishable by long prison terms, confinement to psychiatric hospital or internal banishment, mostly to arid salt flats by the Caspian Sea. Private conversations everywhere are monitored by eavesdropping informers, as well as bugs and phone-taps. E-mails are monitored (there is only one service-provider) and internet access rare: a trawl of the capital reveals not one functioning public outlet. Surveillance, already tight, has been ratcheted up after a failed coup attempt in 2002.
Yet there is much that needs to be discussed. Ashgabat, the capital, is a surreal showpiece of grandiose, neo-Stalinist buildings of gleaming white marble, with giant portraits and gold statues of the Turkmenbashi everywhere—including one, arms aloft, that constantly revolves through 360 degrees, so that it always faces the sun. Behind the glitz lies a grim reality; rutted tracks leading from four-lane highways to windowless, one-room homes, including converted railway containers, surrounded by debris and animals. Some of these are inhabited by those whose homes—and entire neighbourhoods—were razed to make way for “renovation” and offered no compensation. In one, a middle-aged woman struggles to bring up her nephew (her sister, a heroin addict like many in Turkmenistan, is too ill). But Olga has lost her job under new laws because she is of Armenian and Ukrainian descent.
Such are the priorities of a regime that squanders money on prestige projects of dubious benefit, including an ice-rink, a huge half-finished artificial lake, vast mosques, gold-domed palaces and soon a new zoo, complete with penguins, in a country where the summer temperature tops 50°C. At the same time, public health and education—the only worthwhile legacies of the Soviet Union, from which Turkmenistan became independent in 1991—have been all but dismantled.
This year’s outlook is even grimmer than last’s. In January, 100,000 people had their pensions cancelled, those of another 250,000 were severely cut back, and sickness and maternity benefits were ended. Unusually, the decrees led to protests, including demonstrations in the port town of Turkmenbashi, while a Niyazov statue in the city of Mary (once known as Merv) had its arm sawn off and a bucket of human faeces thrown over it.
Then, in April, Mr Niyazov announced a further “reform” to the already crippled health service, adding new charges that will make its few remaining services yet more inaccessible. Most hospitals outside the capital have closed and the remainder offer only rudimentary care, lacking staff, equipment and medicines, condemning thousands to death from common, treatable illnesses such as tuberculosis.
And education is even worse
Every Monday at 8am, Turkmenistan’s schoolchildren line up to recite the oath of allegiance to the president, part of a youth-indoctrination programme that is progressively replacing the conventional curriculum. Its core is the two-volume Ruhnama, “The Book of the Spirit”, a homespun collection of thoughts on Turkmen history and culture that pupils are required to spend hours studying. Visits to bookstores reveal shelves lined with nothing but the president’s works. Meanwhile, mandatory education has been reduced from ten years to nine and most rural kindergartens have closed, as have all libraries outside the capital. Russian-language teaching has been largely phased out, music and ballet schools closed and almost all teachers of ethnic-minority origins sacked under rigorously enforced “Turkmenisation” policies that demand racial purity, traceable back three generations, for all workers in state institutions, including hospitals.
Higher education is severely run down. The annual intake is now under 3,000, a tenth of the pre-independence figure, courses have been cut to two years and standards are so poor they are unacceptable abroad. Worse, the president has ordered that no foreign degrees will henceforth be recognised. Anyone with a qualification gained abroad is either being sacked or refused a job. One economist says that all but two of her high-school class of 30 have emigrated because they see no future at home. “You have students returning with degrees from the world’s best universities—MBAs from Stanford, for instance—who can’t get jobs,” she says. “We are the last educated generation,” sighs another professor.
In rural areas, the problems are different. Cotton is the main crop, but the past three harvests have been catastrophic because of a requirement to sell at state-set prices so low that farmers are left with annual incomes of around $100. Unemployment is estimated at over 70%, exacerbated by public-sector layoffs, and by laws restricting job-seekers to their home towns. Such is the pressure to obtain work that bribes are standard. Even the scarf-swathed army of women sweeping Ashgabat’s streets with twig brooms have to pay officials, Turkmen say.
Despite widespread unhappiness with the regime, most Turkmen do not see a way out. Rebellion looks impossible, given the level of repression and fear; and state benefits (free gas and electricity and highly subsidised fuel, since plentiful gas and oil are Turkmenistan’s only blessing) take some of the edge off discontent. Besides, people are brainwashed by a relentless propaganda machine orchestrated by four state-television channels, two radio stations and several newspapers propounding the idea of a “golden age”. Exiled opposition groups have little influence, and pressure from the outside, given Turkmenistan’s large mineral reserves, is shamefully muted.
There is, though, much speculation about the 66-year-old Turkmenbashi’s health. He has had heart surgery, and has a team of eight top-notch German doctors constantly on call. This raises other problems, most obviously the lack of a mechanism for an orderly transfer of power, coupled with the lack of any democratic tradition in a conservative, tribal society. Pessimistic Turkmen fear that a lost generation, uneducated beyond the Ruhnama, may fall prey to Islamic radicalism—and create a nasty failed state that could destabilise an already volatile region. A fine mess for a father to leave to his children.
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