Thaths <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > On Thu, Sep 18, 2008 at 6:43 AM, Perry E. Metzger <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >> Eugen Leitl <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: >>> Why, if you have nanotechnology, you can do everything by brute-force. >> Expanding on what Eugen says (which I agree with): there is no >> shortage of water on the planet, there just is a shortage of fresh >> water in particular places. If you have nanotechnology, you can pretty >> readily turn sea water into fresh and pump it a thousand miles. Heck, >> with enough energy you can do that even without nanotechnology. > > And feed five thousand with five loaves and two fish, turning bayse > metals into golde.
If someone had told you in 1950 that by about 2000, teenagers would get into trouble for making pornographic films of each other with their pocket sized mobile telephones and posting them on "social networking sites" (I don't even know how to explain that one), would you have believed them, or would you have laughed? So, instead of thinking about what is plausible with one's "gut reaction", which is largely predicated on one's all too human instinct to think the future will look like the present, try going through the physics and the engineering challenges involved, and try to figure out what is possible on that basis. Physics doesn't make turning lead into gold particularly simple, but I can turn salt water into fresh water in my kitchen. The only problem is power, and there is a lot of that around. Indeed, today, almost all the water you drink was originally salt water that got distilled and moved to your location using solar power -- the solar power was just not being directed by people. Perry
