X-Message-Number: 25494
From: Tim Freeman <>
Date: Sat,  8 Jan 2005 15:11:59 -0700

Subject: Not a citation yet; what needs an assembler? (was The Singularity Is A 
Fantasy)

From: Peter Merel <>
>... No one has the foggiest idea how to command, control, or 
>even orient just a single robot in a physical environment anywhere near 
>as complex and demanding as that of an assembler.
>
>The nanotech apologists' counter to this is that, with the advent of 
>assemblers, real AI is just around the corner, and this AI can easily 
>handle the command and control issues of an assembler. Or a pound of 
>assemblers together. No worries.

Tim Freeman writes,
> Strawman argument.  Cite a credible nanotech apologist who says this.
> The actual counter is that controlling an assembler is fairly easy,
> once you know how to build and operate one.

From: Peter Merel <>
>Drexler said that. Or isn't he credible any more? Doesn't the foresight 
>institute still distribute Engines of Creation?

"Drexler" isn't a citation.  For example, claiming that he said it on
page 374 of Engines of Creation would be a citation.  The entirety of
Engines of Creation is online, so you can cite it by URL if you like.
Start here: http://www.foresight.org/EOC/

Let's get clear on what the task is.  I've asked you to cite a
credible nanotech apologist who says you need real AI to command,
control, and orient a single robot in an environment as complex and
demanding as that of an assembler.

>But the Drexlerian scenarios - autodocs inside each cell, utility fog,
>cheap food synthesis machines, the backup and repair of frozen human
>brains, Moore's Law bootstrapping humanity to the stars - The
>Singularity - is fantasy.

Maybe you're confused about what needs an assembler and what doesn't?
If you wanted to build any of this stuff, you'd need an assembler to
build it, but except for the food synthesis the things themselves
don't need to be assemblers.  Given the variety of artificial food
already available to eat I doubt you're claiming that food synthesis
is a hard problem.  In any case, food synthesis isn't on the critical
path to anything else that I can see.

So maybe you mean that nobody knows how to design the autodocs,
utility fog, etc?  I agree that those problems are harder than
orienting an assembler, but they aren't on the critical path to real
AI so problems with these devices don't support your argument that
there's an unresolvable dependency loop at the beginning of the
scenario.

The dependencies are: Someone builds an assembler that works in a
controlled environment.  The assembler builds more assemblers, still
in a controlled environment.  The group of assemblers builds a large
computer, still in a controlled environment.  The large computer is
either programmed with uploads (which requires new neurobiology) or
programmed with custom code (which requires new AI).  The large
computer helps design the autodocs, utility fog, etc., if mere humans
aren't up to the task.  Assemblers build the autodocs, etc., in
controlled environments.  Then we get to play with all of these toys,
assuming they don't start playing with us first.  

Nowhere in this scenario do we need to orient an assembler in a
challenging environment.

-- 
Tim Freeman               http://www.fungible.com           
Programmer/consultant in the Sunnyvale, CA area.    I'm presently available.

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