Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!seismo!dimacs.rutgers.edu!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!nanotech From: dmocsny@minerva.che.uc.edu (Daniel Mocsny) Newsgroups: sci.nanotech Subject: Re: Nanotech Economy Message-ID: Date: 5 Nov 90 22:56:17 GMT Sender: nanotech@athos.rutgers.edu Organization: University of Cincinnati, Cin'ti., OH Lines: 67 Approved: nanotech@aramis.rutgers.edu >>The Nanotechnology Revolution will bring the means of production themselves >>within the reach of _every_ individual. So far, this statement has prompted objections based on: (1) political barriers, (2) social/psychological barriers, and (3) material/energy barriers to the nanotechnological material independence of Joe Average. But now I will raise another question: the ability of Joe Average to manage complexity. Just now, any number of amazing technological feats are possible. For example, a person of average means (by western standards) may purchase a personal computer, and then download 1 GB of free software, compile it, and run it to advantage. In practice, however, only the tiniest minority of persons of average means are actually doing this. Why? Because it is too hard for most people to do. Thousands of software packages exist, but who can effectively use more than 1--20 of them? Before a technology can become pervasive, it must be completely simplified, standardized, and relatively idiot-proofed. Consider all the popular contemporary consumer products that embed significantly advanced technology: the telephone, the television, the automobile, etc. (I neglect to mention the computer because it isn't quite yet a consumer product in the same class yet, it is more of a specialist tool requiring a major commitment from the user.) Each of these products has (1) a standardized user interface that presents a simplified functional abstraction to the user, (2) protection for its standards in the form of laws and governing bodies, and (3) a huge infrastructure to support and regulate it. The need for these restrictions stems from the very limited human capacity to deal with complexity. Make something slightly more complicated, and you automatically cut off whole segments of the potential user base. So the real barrier to widespread use of nanotechnology will probably not be energy, laws, raw materials, or whatever, but rather, how simple it can be made to use. If the technology requires time, patience, years of training, etc., to exploit, we will still need elaborate division of labor and massive organizations to use it. This will keep it out of the hands of Joe Average more effectively than any other factor. -- Dan Mocsny Snail: Internet: dmocsny@minerva.che.uc.edu Dept. of Chemical Engng. M.L. 171 dmocsny@uceng.uc.edu University of Cincinnati 513/751-6824 (home) 513/556-2007 (lab) Cincinnati, Ohio 45221-0171 [99.9% of the people who drive cars couldn't fix them if they had the tools and parts, much less could they be said to understand the engineering that went into the design. People were reproducing themselves long before Crick and Watson discovered the structure of DNA. There's really no need for people to be able to understand a technology in order to use it. It is simply the responsibility of the designer to build a system that not only works, but that can be used. Any successful technology has by definition accomplished just that. I see no reason why nanotech should be different. --JoSH]