None taken Warren, I was smiling when I sent it (not smirking either!) I'm sort of interested in a scenario where the next Thomas Edison(s) pop up in places other than the USA. Technical (bio or otherwise) renders US "superiority" obsolete. Consider the harware and info, both new and surplus, just out there for the purchase. Also, there are place where respect for patent law and government restrictions are non-existant or winked at. Innovation and reverse engineering are cheap. It doesn't have to something "grand" either. Consider the new LED flashlights. My understanding is that LEDs are nanotech devices. These things will practically blind a person on a pitence of power. We are then left as a nation of lab rats, dedicated to the adverse effects of overindulgence. All of our intrigues, our plotting, and our fears will eventually melt into a historical tribute to Ozymandous (sp?) (oh F-ing yeh. We'll also likely continue to be the f-ing keepers of *ckSukNG-ing "Team America World Police", YAH! ) and I can LIKE or DISlike that. It doesn't change the high probability that it will be true. Oh well, that's life Leonard Matusik [EMAIL PROTECTED] (a handle, incidentally, which has nothing to do with nanotech; hell, I won't even own a cell phone)
Warren Ockrassa <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:Tue, 31 May 2005 17:35:14 -0700 On May 31, 2005, at 5:20 PM, Leonard Matusik wrote: > Ah yes.... Never mind then. sorry.... > I shall look for another list to bother with those things. Now now, don't take personal offense where none was intended. There'll be plenty of opportunity for that later. What kinds of futurist scenarios were you looking for? F'rinstance you mentioned nanotech. My personal feeling on that is it's limited. I mean, what we'll be able to do with it is limited. I have a pretty strong hunch that the future really lies in biological engineering. The characters I write in one future universe, for instance, live in a time when infectious diseases are all virtually wiped out by -- get this -- a modified version of an HIV-like virus. It lives in the body and augments the immune system rather than destroying it. Fast-moving cancers are still a problem, though -- because of course they don't track as an infection. Slower cancers can be diagnosed and treated. And you don't get IVs out of bottles. You get a *slug* on your arm instead, one that determines what's wrong with you based on how your blood tastes to it, and synthesizes necessary compounds, feeding them into your system directly. (Shock, pain treatments, etc.) Of course we're not talking the next few decades here... > In the mean time, I shall do my best to behave on this one. Why buck the trend? -- Warren Ockrassa, Publisher/Editor, nightwares Books http://books.nightwares.com/ Current work in progress "The Seven-Year Mirror" http://www.nightwares.com/books/ockrassa/Flat_Out.pdf _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
