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Others have written about the coming nanotechnology revolution but since the concepts associated with nanotechnology are still not understood by the vast majority of people, I will repeat the major points here.

The nano in the word nanotechnology means one billionth of a meter, referring to the construction of structures with atoms and small molecules which are close to a billionth of a meter in size. Nanotechnology itself is a direct result of the natural laws of the universe. All life on Earth already uses nanotechnology of some sort in every living cell. Only the timing of the arrival of human invented nanotechnology upon the human scene, what path we will take to achieve nanotechnology, what we will choose to do with nanotechnology when we have it, are in dispute.

When closely examined the workings of a single human cell doesn't involve any type of magic. Cells are nothing more than very small machines, truly the most amazing machines ever built, but still in essence, blind, unthinking machines, almost totally unaware of the larger human body they are part of, doing their jobs by rote until they no longer can. In effect nanotechnology already exists in a state of non-conscious use by humans. All humans have to do is: recognize nanotechnology for what it is, our future, and will nanotechnology into an existence we have conscious control over, the nanotechnology revolution.

Nanotechnology refers to the entire field of technology concerned with building things out of matter with very precise control. This control is made possible by fine control of the building process at a submicroscopic level, usually the molecular or atomic level of matter.

Nanites refer to a particular type of nanotechnology. Nanites are small machines used to manipulate small amounts of matter. Nanites range in size from dust-sized down to submicroscopic. Nanites are being built right now in the USA, Japan and many other places the world over but, are not yet of sufficiently advanced design to be useful for much. Nanites will, however, become so useful they will totally change the economic systems and even the social structure of every country on Earth. Nanites will build consumer goods and control processes on a much smaller level and with much greater precision than the macro-machines we now use, as well as accomplish tasks that are now impossible. Some of the many types of nanites humans will invent and use are :

1. Medical nanites - one of the first type of nanites to be widely used.

Surgical nanites will eventually perform most of the non-emergency surgeries. One example of a surgical nanite is a cancer killing nanite. Millions of cancer killing nanites, each nanite about the size of a red blood cell, would be injected into the patient's blood stream near the site of the cancerous tumor. The nanites could be controlled by a human surgical physician who can guide the actions of the nanites by radio control or the nanites may be smart enough to do their job without being told. The nanites would locate the cancerous cells from the chemical markers all cancer cells display on their outer surfaces. Depending upon how the nanite is designed to work, it may kill the cancer cell directly by injecting the cell with a toxic substance or may just mark the cancer cell with a chemical marker so the body`s own defenses will destroy the cell, or the nanite may join with the other nanites to shut off the blood supply to the whole tumor killing the entire tumor at once. When their job is done the nanites may be extracted by ordering them to leave the patients body by an exit route, i.e. through the needle of a nearby syringe or they may stay in the patient's body to kill any new cancers that may form during the patient's lifetime.

2. Nanoprobes - are a very important type of nanite. Nanoprobes are designed to determine the structure of matter on a submicroscopic level. Optical microscopes use the deflection of light photons against matter to see, but are unable see clearly any structure that is smaller than the smallest wavelength of light the microscope is capable of using. No optical microscope available today can see atoms or most molecules. Very large molecules are large enough to be seen under an optical microscope but only in outline, never in fine detail. Other non-optical types of microscopes exist which can see smaller structures of matter (in some cases atoms), but are of limited use because of their large size, high costs, and difficulty of use.

Nanite nanoprobes will be very useful when they become available. Imagine a molecular-sized machine small enough to crawl on the exterior of a cell membrane recording the number, size and make-up of every structure on the membrane. A nanite could be small enough to swim inside a cell recording all structures therein. All this can be accomplished while the cell is alive and functioning. With such capabilities, it would be possible to figure out exactly how life works in a very short time. Now we make guesses based on whatever second hand information we can obtain. Nanoprobes will give us first hand information in real time.

Nanoprobes will speed up the advance of technology enormously. With the ability to see atoms and molecules as they interact with one another, researchers won't have to guess what reaction just occurred in their experiment nor will they have to design another expensive time-consuming, experiment to find out.

Medical drugs can more easily be designed to do a job if the designers know what the receptor site or the shape of the molecule to which the drug will bind looks like. Nanoprobes will show the drug designers what the receptor site looks like; and show them in real time if the drug they designed to fit the site fits properly and if the drug or it's metabolites interfere with the operation of any other machinery in the body, without waiting for the physical manifestation of physical side effects in the body as a whole. Nanoprobes should also increase the speed of the new drug approval process as well as make obsolete medical experimentation upon animals. With nanoprobe technology, new drugs could be tested upon a single cell within a human body, then tested upon a single cell in each and every body organ; if the new drug passes these tests you can be sure it will work properly in this person. A test in which the drug failed to work properly, would be less harmful to that person's body, than pricking that persons finger with a needle.

3. Gene sequencing nanites - The advancement of nanite technology, initially, will depend upon the ability to sequence genes. Most of the first and second generation nanites will be artificial life forms created within a living organism by gene sequencing nanites. These artificial life forms will, in the first generation of a particular type of nanite, be a modified bacterium. The bacterium's DNA will be changed step by step until the micro-organism has the capabilities the nanite designer wants it to have to fulfill it's job description. The resulting nanites would be alive in the same way a bacteria is alive. They multiply by making copies of themselves, can extract energy from the environment around themselves, will have a means of locomotion and will have a small memory and the ability to solve problems associated with performing the task for which they were designed.

First generation gene sequencing nanites already exist in the laboratory. They are viruses designed to target and change the sequence of specific genes within the genome. These viruses are usually referred to as artificial life forms (rather than nanites). Because they are artificial they can be patented. These artificial life forms have in some cases reached the clinical trial stage of development and it won't be long before they will be in common usage within medical and agricultural institutions.

The technology used to produce first generation artificial life form nanites will rapidly improve. It won't be long until a first generation artificial life form is invented that is capable of creating a more sophisticated and versatile second generation artificial life form. Eventually after several generations of steady improvement the artificial life form, now called a nanite, will have the ability to monitor the progress of genetic transformation as the nanites work, i.e. A nanite that is designed to resequence the genes within the pancreatic cells of a diabetic in order to restore normal insulin levels. This nanite would not only have the ability to reprogram the genes within the pancreatic cells to produce insulin, but would also be able to monitor the patient's insulin level and automatically stop ordering the resequencing of the pancreatic cells when insulin levels reached normal levels.

The gene sequencing nanites will of course be used for a wide range of tasks other than creating artificial life-form nanites. They will make possible perfect designer babies by sorting and selecting the best sperm and egg cells. Once the selected sperm and egg are joined, the embryo would be frozen at the single cell stage. The embryo's DNA would then be resequenced to give the baby any new characteristics the parents wish the baby to have and remove any imperfections there may be in the embryo's DNA.

Gene sequencing nanites will also be used to correct genetically-based disease or build artificial antibodies on demand: you may never get sick again.

The ultimate gene sequencing nanites will be small enough to crawl along the DNA double helix comparing the base pair sequence with a master copy in it's memory. When the nanite finds a break in the DNA strand or a base pair out of proper sequence, the nanite will repair the damage by reattaching the broken DNA strand or snipping out a base pair and replacing it with another. With a DNA sequencer this advanced, you would be able to do anything you wanted with your body; you could reverse your physical age to an age of your own choosing and keep your body that age as long as you wanted; you want big, showy, rock hard muscles, you got it; see a face you like, you can tell your gene sequencer what you desire and within a few days your face will look like you want, no operation, no pain, no problem; you want to be smarter, ok, a little harder but still very doable; you're a man but you really want to be a woman, completely a woman all the way down to your genes, or was it a dog, maybe a dinosaur, still doable, though it will take a while to complete the transformation.

Unfortunately gene sequencers will also be used to create super biological weapons. Even worse, it won't just be the militaries of the world building these super biological weapons. The technology is so versatile that terrorist groups or even individuals who understand genetics would be able to build such a weapon.

Imagine a worker in a genetics lab who gets fired from his job. He steals a single undetectable nanite his last day, takes it home and resequences a common cold virus by adding some especially nasty gene sequences (from a genetic project he worked on a couple of years ago) he has stored on his home computer. He cultures the virus and releases it in the air ventilation system at his former place of employment. His former colleagues don't get sick until they go home and have already infected their families. The families don't get sick until the next day when they are at the hospital, school, work or shopping and they infect the people with whom they come in contact, and before you know it there is a world wide epidemic of a new type of "killer cold virus." Only one person knows where the virus came from. There is no cure for the new cold virus, either you survive it or you don't. The guy who designed the virus probably never meant to kill 20% of the Earth's human population (or maybe he did), but the dirty deed is done, and the world is unprepared to deal with that type of threat.

4. Computation nanites - a revolution within a revolution. Computation nanites will change the computer revolution by changing the way computers are built and eliminating the need for most types of software and in the end, change the direction which the computer revolution is headed towards .

Some computation nanites will be designed to act like neurons in an organic brain. They will be smarter neurons than the natural variety with a small amount of memory and programming built into each nanite. Computation nanites can be arranged into neural nets just like natural neurons to mimic the function of an organic brain. Computational nanites do not, however, have to remain in a particular configuration. They can rearrange themselves into the best configuration to most efficiently solve whatever problem they are faced with. Computers built from computational nanites will function quite differently than computers we now use. Within a computational nanite computer one group of a billion or so submicroscopic computational nanites may be arraigned as a organic net while an adjacent set of 200 million computational nanites are arranged as a digital computer and another adjacent group of a trillion or so nanites are arranged as a massively parallel computer, and other nearby groups of nanites are arranged in ways we humans haven't even thought of yet, because each computational nanite by virtue of its internal hardware, internal memory and internal programming can return a wide variety of signal types for any type of input signal.

The different groups of computational nanites that make up the computer would take the place of most computer software. Software after all is just a path the computer follows to solve a problem. So in a computer made up of computational nanites that have the capability to rearrange themselves in any order, the path, would be a semi-hardwired path composed of nanites. In operation the semi-hardwired paths of a nanite computer will function very similarly to the semi-hardwired neural pathways in an organic brain, and organic brains come with very little software, most of what brains can do is learned.

A computer formed of computational nanites would definitely be self-aware if the structure of the appropriate parts of a self-aware brain such as a human brain were copied by the computation nanites.

Computational nanite computers will also be built differently than computers we now use. The nanites that make up the computers will be built by other types of nanites. Most early types of computational nanites will be built within living organisms by gene sequencing nanites. The completed computational nanites would be harvested from the host organism ( probably bacteria ) and then placed in a container and trained to work together as a computer. The baby computational nanite computer would have very little initial programming because most of it's programming will be learned. The computational nanite computer would be given problems to be solved and given hints on how to arrive at a solution. When the baby computer gives the right answer it will be rewarded, or perhaps punished for a wrong solution. After the computer's basic training is completed it would be sold and it's new owner would complete the computer's training.

Computational nanite computers may be incorporated into a child's toy. The toy would grow and learn with the child as they play and solve problems together. The toy would also provide protection for it's child by alerting the parents when the child was doing something dangerous or was in danger some other way. As the child grows up the computer will switch from being a playmate and protector to a partner in later life. The computer should never wear out over a person's lifetime.The computer's partner should never need to purchase another computer either, as long as he provides periodic maintenance and upgrades for the computer's nanites to keep his partner on the cutting edge of nanite technology.

Another very important member of the computational nanite group is the nanocomputer. Nanocomputers are extremely small computers, so small that they will be the built-in brains of nearly every type of advanced nanite. Though small, nanocomputers will have very impressive computational abilities. Nanocomputer main processors will usually operate at speeds greater than 1 trillion operations per second; memory could easily exceed 1 gigabytes; and the fully functional nanite, nanocomputer and all could be made smaller than a single red blood cell. Not all nanites will need such impressive computational abilities; most nanites can perform their duties with much less. The smallest nanites with brains will be the size of a large molecule, but even these smallest of nanites could have 10k memories and processor speeds greater than 10 trillion operations per second giving them an intelligence equivalent to that of an ant.

5. The builder nanite group - the ultimate method of manufacturing anything imaginable. The ultimate builder nanite is an atom stacker which can build absolutely anything physical one atom at a time. (Atom stacker is something of a misnomer. Atom stacking is a job description, not how the job is accomplished. Stacked atoms would for most purposes be useless. In order to be useful atoms must form bonds to one another. Therefore, atom stacker nanites will not only move and stack atoms, but also create bonds between those atoms.)

Trillions of atom stacking nanites would be used in unison, controlled by nanocomputers and supplied with energy by energy producing nanotechnology. The builder nanites would completely undo every economic system devised by man. You could give the atom stacking nanites a pile of garbage and a steak dinner with all the trimmings. You would give the nanites instructions to create six identical steak dinners to be ready at a certain time. One group of dissembler nanites would take apart the original steak dinner to supply the pattern. Other dissembler nanites would forage through the garbage collecting the necessary atoms, passing the atoms along from nanite to nanite till the atom is passed to the builder nanites that are building the six identical steak diners. The six groups of builder nanites (consisting of a trillion trillion nanites each) building the six steak diners would then put the atoms in place one by one, each atom's place being determined by the dissembler nanites that are deconstructing the original steak dinner. Things happen very rapidly at the scale of atoms. Therefore each nanite can put in place over a million atoms per second. The six steak dinners would be ready at the designated time, piping hot, and complete with newly constructed silverware, plates, and napkins that were also built from garbage.

Anything else you wished to have could be built by atom stacker nanites. As well as destroying all the worlds economic systems, the atom stackers will make physical money and collectibles of every type nearly worthless.

A perfect ten carat diamond ring could be built by atom stacker nanites from the gold atoms in old gold tooth and carbon atoms from a dog turd. Atoms are atoms, it doesn't matter where they come from.

A priceless oil painting that was copied by atom stacker nanites wouldn't just look the same as the original oil painting and be in every way indistinguishable from it, but would BE the original painting in every way except it wasn't painted by the original artist.

And of course any type of physical money would have very little value with atom stacker nanites available to copy it.

One very important aspect of nanotechnology that is many times overlooked by other books and articles that deal with the subject of nanotechnology is: nanotechnology will make common devices that operate by utilizing the laws of quantum mechanics. Nanotechnology will be capable of building architectures so small that the principle forces acting upon these architectures will be quantum-mechanical effects. Some of these quantum level architectures will form the basis of quantum computers, very efficient lasers, very efficient photovoltaic devices...and possibly even devices that can cause an action to occur a great distance away or even in another time (hyper-light drives for spacecraft?). The quantum level devices that can cause an action to occur a great distance away or even in another time, are at this time pure speculation. Quantum computers and very efficient lasers that are physically smaller than the wave length of light they emit, are already a reality, at least in the laboratory. Nanotechnology will make these and other quantum level devises not yet invented, easy to manufacture and bring their operating efficiencies to nearly 100%. Nanotechnology that operates on the quantum mechanical level will have stunning capabilities.

Energy producing nanites and nanotechnology in general, will make energy cheap and plentiful. Abundant energy in the form of heat, and sunlight is all around us.

The problem with heat is that the energy is in the form of random motion of atoms and molecules. In order for thisrandom motion to be useful it has to be derandomized or converted to another form of energy such as electricity. Sunlight also usually needs to be transformed into a more useful form of energy.

Energy producing nanites will be capable of absorbing energy from photons, magnetic fields or from the impacts of atoms and molecules with which the energy nanite makes physical contact. The energy of each impact will be transferred from the impacting molecule to the nanite and stored in the nanite in the form of a stressed bond or electrical charge. When the energy stored in the nanite reaches a certain value it would then be released by the nanite as a mechanical motion, a photon, or an electric current. The energy released by the nanite would be transferred to the site that needs the work performed. Energy producing nanites would in effect be like little heat pumps except their output is usually some form of energy other than heat.

For something like energy production, it would probably be more advantageous to use a bulk-production nanotechnology process. Energy producing nanites will have their uses supplying energy to processes that need only small amounts of energy.

Bulk-process nanotechnology can be used to produce panels capable of converting sunlight to electricity, with a conversion efficiency of at least 70%. Bulk-produced nanotechnology can also be used to produce panels that can remove some of the heat energy from the local environment and turn that heat energy into electrical energy. Homes built with these two types of panels would be energy self-sufficient. The home owner would never have to purchase electrical power or gas for heating or cooking. Homes built with energy producing panels in hot, sunny desert environments, instead of requiring hundreds of dollars per month in electricity for cooling, would instead produce enormous amounts of excess energy. Cities built with energy producing panels would switch from being heat islands to heat sink islands or even to places with no temperature changes at all. With such enormous amounts of power available, an incredible increase in the rate of technological advance would occur.

Many other types of nanites will incorporate energy producing nanotechnology into their make-up to provide the power they need to perform their respective jobs.

Humans also will incorporate energy producing nanotechnologyinto their bodies when they have committed themselves to becoming more than human. Energy nanotechnology will free us from having to eat (we may still eat because we enjoy eating but we won't need to eat), and will provide the energy for all the other nanites our bodies will eventually host. When we humans make the evolutionary leap to a multitude of transhuman life-forms it will not be in our old "limited" bodies. Our new bodies will be immortal, stronger, smarter, more aware, and of course not limited to the human shape, with energy producing nanotechnology and multitudes of nanites incorporated into our macrobodies, providing for the body's energy needs, repair needs, and giving us perfect control over every body function. It is hard to imagine what it will be like. Perhaps something like being totally aware of every cell in your body and your cells in turn aware of the larger you.

Many other types of nanites and bulk-proccess nanotechnologies will be invented and used by humans in addition to those mentioned. Admittedly, the examples given for each aria of nanotechnology are from a time which nanotechnology is an mature technology, perhaps decades from now. But nanotechnology is coming on the human scene faster than most people would wish for. All nanotechnology, whether it be the primitive versions or the advanced versions, posses great potential for both constructive and destructive uses. It may be possible to slow down nanotechnology for a few decades but it will be absolutely impossible to hold back nanotechnology for long.

I believe humans are incapable of using responsibly such a powerful technology. Are we humans just going to resign ourselves to a future here on Earth in which we just hope for the best as the Earth is shaken by wave after wave of war, terror, environmental catastrophe, economic collapse, and plague as each higher level of nanotechnology is developed.

My opinion is humans should leave this Earth before nanotechnology is advanced enough to wreak havoc on the Earth's ecosystem and ourselves. Man can build a large number of self contained space colonies separated by great distances. These colonies will communicate and trade with one another and with Earth, but the distances between the colonies will tend to limit each disaster caused by the development of nanotechnology to just one colony. The other colonies will then learn from that one colony's mistake. Alarge number of space colonies will also serve to reduce tensions among different factions of humanity because the actions and needs of one faction, need not interfere with any other colony, within limits of course. Nanotechnology can provide every colony with almost limitless material goods at very cheap prices. Earth is a closed system; Earth will never get any larger; because the Earth is of limited area each person in all fairness will have to settle for a small piece of a limited pie, and some people will always want more than their fair share.

Nanotechnology could create Paradise here on Earth, an Earth in which everyone has enough of everything they need because nanites recycle everything humans throw away, an Earth where nobody has to work hard to make a living and people have nothing better to do but play and discover new things their entire immortal lives. Give humans the ultimate power to rearrange the physical universe - nanotechnology - and humans will be certain to abuse that power. At this time on Earth, there is no reason for the continued existence of starving people, repressive governments, racial hatred, posturing politicians, etc. What kind of people are capable of planting a computer virus, committing genocide, throwing their new born baby in the trash, or gunning down a room full of people they don't even know? The answer is: rather ordinary people, people who are really no different from you and me, except for the circumstances of their lives.

The reasons humans do the bad things they do will not change as long as humans remain human, and nanotechnology will make it much easier for humans to do bad things to each other.

However, we do not need to remain human. We could use nanotechnology to advance humanity to the next stage of evolution wherein we no longer have human needs and no longer think like a human desiring to possess and control everything we see. Despite what many religions teach, man is not made in the image of God. However, we should be trying to get closer to that ideal.

Nanotechnology is a step in the right direction, if properly utilized, to advance human evolution to the next stage, far removed from what we are now. It is difficult to imagine what it will be like. A time far in the future, Earth having been outgrown, having learned all we can in our small sector of the universe, we that were once human will leave our solar system to soar through space, not in space ships, but in our own immortal bodies, naked to space. We will no longer eat, sleep or drink, except to drink in the beauty of the universe with our fully heightened senses which can see the full electromagnetic spectrum, sonar, gravity waves, and other beauties we do not yet know. When we reach a distant shore that appeals to us we will not destroy it with terraforming. We will merely change our bodies to something that can survive the local environment. We will walk this new shore in our new bodies for awhile, until something else beckons us from afar. Then we will travel on, always searching for the realization of beauty and perfection in ourselves, as we see that beauty and perfection expressed in the cosmos around us.

© 1999-2003 Rex Stephens

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