Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!seismo!dimacs.rutgers.edu!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!nanotech From: dan-hankins@cup.portal.com Newsgroups: sci.nanotech Subject: Re: Nanotech Economy Message-ID: Date: 5 Nov 90 23:27:56 GMT Sender: nanotech@athos.rutgers.edu Lines: 76 Approved: nanotech@aramis.rutgers.edu In article , pwh@bradley2.bradley.edu (Pete Hartman) writes: >it's quite likely that serious restrictions will be placed on who can or >can't own/use such technology This will be even harder to enforce than current copyright laws on software. Note that the only people who get nailed for this are those who make copies and then sell them to others, not people who just allow their stuff to be copied or who make copies for their own personal use. If something is wanted, people -will- get it. And while the products built by nanotech may be hard to hide, it won't be hard to hide the production machinery itself. Human DNA has more information than in the Encyclopedia Brittanica, but look at the space it fits in. >and the actual nanomachines themselves will likely be quite expensive. Even >if you make machines that build copies of themselves, do you really think >that the person who creates them is going to let them go? S/He could make >major bucks instead by tightly controlling the technology.... What material goods is the creator of the technology going to spend the money on that he can't get just as easily by using the technology itself? How's he going to control it? See remarks re software piracy above. As nanotech is gradually introduced into the economy, the value of material goods decreases. Therefore the value of money to trade for them also decreases. Material goods (i.e. wages, money) provide three basic needs: 1. Survival 2. Trade for survival 3. Accumulation is a measure of one's status; the more competent one is, the more material goods one can get in return for competence. As the means of production gradually shifts to the individual, (1) can be fulfilled by the individual without money, and (2) becomes less necessary. And the status afforded by the accumulation of material goods beyond that needed for survival decreases directly with the decrease in the value of the material goods for trade. Since the creator of the technology can take care of all of the above without ever selling the technology, the remaining thing that he can trade the technology for that he would want is status. The more people use and like his nanotech, the greater his reputation and hence his status in the community. So it is therefore in the best interest of the nanotech creators to spread the technology as widely as possible, in order to reap the greatest possible increase in reputation. When material goods are too cheap to charge for, the main form of wealth becomes competence, and the main form of payment is appreciation and use (i.e. status, reputation). So I think that the more nanotechnology that is created, the cheaper it is likely to get, in material terms. Dan Hankins dan-hankins@cup.portal.com dan-hankins@pro-realm.cts.com Freedom: I won't. [This scenario recalls James Hogan's "Voyage from Yesteryear", which was discussed here just about yesteryear! I do have to inject a note of dissension: There's no limit to the amount of paperwork necessary to accomplish anything, and there are many things that have value outside of production costs (land, for example). --JoSH]