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| Jason Silva |
A couple of weeks
ago I came across a YouTube video from Singularity University entitled "Nanotechnology- Future of Everything." A minute and 24 seconds long, it features
Jason Silva, who, according to his web site, has hosted a National Geographic
series called "BrainGames" and a YouTube series called "Shots of
Awe." Silva calls himself a futurist and a philosopher. On his web site he
adds "storyteller" and "keynote speaker" to the list. His
web site provides no credentials that attest to any particular expertise in
technology, but what he lacks in degrees he makes up for in breathless
intensity.
It's hard to
overemphasize Silva's manic, almost hysterical delivery, which is further
intensified by swooshing sound-effects and gee-whiz animations, all rushing by
at breakneck speed. Silva seems to believe that excitement equals veracity. It
doesn't, or shouldn't, but like all carnival barkers, his spiel isn't about
facts. It's about sales, and what he's selling is technological utopia.
Silva starts his
video by stating (breathlessly) that "nanotechnology is about to transform
the world in ways we can hardly even fathom." It will allow us, he says,
to pattern atoms in the physical world much as computer technology allows us to
pattern information in the digital world. "All of a sudden we can have
buildings that assemble themselves, all of a sudden we can move beyond
scarcity…We can turn anything into anything else."
What this means, he
continues, is that all our problems will soon be solved. "The age of
fighting over scarce resources, the age of scarcity, is upended. We move into a
world of infinite abundance. This changes the nature of economics, the nature
of manufacturing. It essentially makes the world a programmable medium that can
be shaped by thought and intentionality. It turns the physical world
increasingly into a condensation of human imagination. It's going to change the
game."
Silva cites a
single source for these predictions: Eric Drexler's 1986 book, Engines of Creation: The
Coming Era of Nanotechnology. Drexler's no slouch when it
comes to technological utopianism, but he's no match for Silva when it comes to
sheer hype. The claim that nanotech "turns the physical world increasingly
into a condensation of human imagination" is one of the best examples of runaway
technological hubris I've ever heard.
Watching Silva's
video made me so angry that I unleashed a series of tweets that were probably
as nasty as anything I've ever posted on line. I said the video earned him the "Biggest
Asshole Enthusiast Award," and I went on to post several quotes from scientists
who said the predictions in Engines of
Creation—the same predictions Silva repeats as gospel in his video—have no
basis in reality. My source was a 1999 article in MIT Technology Review entitled "Will the Real Nanotech Please Stand Up?"
Here are the quotes
I tweeted:
Engines of Creation is "a utopian vision that few
researchers doing experiments on the nanoscale have bought into."
“There
has been no experimental verification for any of Drexler’s ideas."
"Few
chemists, physicists or materials scientists see any evidence that [Drexler's
predictions] will be possible."
"[Drexler]
has had no influence on what goes on in nanoscience." His ideas are
"nanofanciful notions that are not very meaningful."
That
might have been the end of it, but someone named Diego, whose Twitter handle is
@FutureBuckNasty, posted two replies to my series of tweets. The first read,
"A lot has changed in 18 years [since the MIT article was published].
Smalley's critique of atomically precise manufacturing has been thoroughly
discredited."
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| Richard Smalley |
Diego
referred to the late Richard Smalley, a Noble prize winner for being one of
the team of scientists who discovered the molecule buckminsterfullerene (popularly known as buckyballs) and a leading figure in
the development of nanotechnology. He was one of the scientists critical of
Drexler's theories quoted in the MIT
Technology Review article, but only one of several. He was not the source of
any of the quotes I tweeted.
Diego's
second tweet read, "Drexler's vision is now seriously being funded this
year by the [Department of Energy's] advanced manufacturing office." The
tweet linked to an announcement of a DOE workshop, held in August of 2015,
entitled "Integrated Nanosystems for Atomically Precise Manufacturing."
A brief review of the materials posted for that
workshop suggests that Diego's claim that the DOE is funding Drexler's vision
may be overstated. The workshop was a discussion of research underway into
integrated nanosystems and atomically precise manufacturing, but it was
specifically defined as "informational only, and not as a binding
commitment to develop or pursue projects." I don't know what projects DOE
was funding at the time of the workshop, or what it has funded since then.
My guess is that this workshop was part of the
federal government's goal to keep abreast of ongoing research in cutting edge
technologies, at times helping fund that research, to ensure that the United
States doesn't fall behind other countries in developing potential
blockbusters. I would also guess that the amount of funding dedicated to this
effort by the DOE department that sponsored the workshop does not signal a
particularly aggressive interest in atomically precise manufacture. [1]
Note that the previous paragraph contains two
guesses, and I admit I shouldn't be writing tweets or blog posts based on guesswork,
especially when I'm attacking someone as vehemently as I attacked Jason
Silva. Fortunately, one of my best friends knows infinitely more about
nanotechnology than I do, so I asked him to comment on both Silva's video and
on the DOE workshop.
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| Roger Cubicciotti |
My friend is Roger Cubicciotti. Roger is President
and CEO of NanoMedica LLC, a nanobiotechnology company focused on molecular
scale medical technologies. He has a Ph.D. in pharmacology and cell biophysics from the University of California, Berkeley, and a number of patents in
nanotechnology-enabled molecular devices for drug discovery, drug delivery and
diagnostic applications. This profile will tell you more about Roger
and his current collaboration with colleagues from the Department of
Microbiology and Immunology at Wake Forest University.
Here is Roger's response to Silva's video:
Well, Jason is certainly enthusiastic! He does get beyond the lame characterization of nanotech as "really small stuff."
However, his arguments that an ability to manipulate matter at the atomic level—by moving individual atoms—will provide us with control over matter is fundamentally flawed, in my opinion. The reason? Because matter is not just orderly assembly of atoms into macroscale objects. Atoms, subatomic particles, molecules comprising multiple atoms and supramolecular complexes are not just lumps of matter. They have shape, charge and other "personality traits" that preclude their being assembled manually like Legos without attention to the electrical and chemical properties of the atoms. They are not just billiard balls.
We do not yet comprehend the essence of matter, or energy for that matter. To presume the ability to manipulate matter at will is to presume we have sufficient comprehension of its properties to supervise it. This premise is simply not true.
Roger added that we may some day develop the
capacity to manipulate matter at will, providing we don't pursue that goal so greedily
and carelessly that we "blow ourselves up in the meantime." This points to the most significant omission of Silva's video: He never
mentions the substantial risks that nanotechnology might pose, especially if and
when it becomes anywhere near as powerful as he assumes it will. Once you let
the genie out of the bottle, unintended consequences inevitably abound, as Eric
Drexler himself acknowledged. "Arabian legend and universal common sense," he wrote in his book, "suggest that we take the dangers of such engines of creation very seriously indeed."
Here's Roger's comment on Diego's suggestion that
the DOE workshop is evidence that Drexler's ideas are now being taken seriously
by the scientific community:
[Diego] is very much correct that much of Drexler's insights have been validated in specific areas and that nanotech has achieved credibility in the scientific community. There has been substantial funding of nanotech by federal and state granting agencies, including NIH, NSF, DOD, DOE, NASA and others, most prominently through the National Nanotechnology Initiative with its billion dollar budget (though the purveyors of that program will likely concede that the impact of this investment is less significant than desired).
Due to this funding, nanotech has attracted a large academic following, as researchers are substantially funded by government grants. These academics have demonstrated technical feasibility of many nanotech applications, although technical feasibility is a far cry from commercial viability or success.
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| Nanotech researchers at work |
The bottom line here, I think, is yes, there's
progress being made in nanotechnology, but it's a long way from producing the
miraculous powers that Silva so confidently predicts. To say without
qualification that nanotechnology is "about to transform the world in ways we can hardly even fathom," or that "it essentially makes the world a programmable medium that can be shaped by thought and intentionality," is not only false, it's irresponsible.
To inspire is one
thing, to encourage technological intoxication is another. For centuries we've
been told that this or that technology will deliver us to utopia. The condition
of the world today affirms that while technology has indeed delivered many
miracles, not a few of them have come with nightmares attached. Past experience
teaches us that you don't plunge drunkenly forward without considering the
consequences. Silva ignores all that to assure us that we'll be able to turn
the world "increasingly into a condensation of human imagination."
Whose imagination, he doesn't say.
Common sense and
restraint are qualities the carnival barker habitually avoids. For Singularity
University to promote the
sort of over-the-top claims that are Silva's stock in trade doesn't do much
for its credibility, although it's fair to wonder whether common sense and
restraint are especially prized there.
1. As Diego noted, the workshop was sponsored by the
DOE's Advanced Manufacturing Office, which in 2015 distributed $200 million in
grants aimed at increasing "U.S. manufacturing competitiveness." Of
that amount, $84 million was dedicated to R&D projects, $92.5 million to
R&D facilities and $23.5 million to "technical assistance." How
much of these funds went to nanotechnology research and development is not
stated in the overview provided for the nanotech workshop.
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