Comment Re:Argh (Score 1) 236
"You say nature has had billions of years to evolve into something that would... what? destroy everything on the planet? What good would that do a species? "
Evolution doesn't care about what "good" something does to the species. Selection occurs on the individual level, and doesn't plan ahead.
Several species HAVE evolved that more or less wiped out other species. An estimate puts around 90% of all species ever to have inhabited the planet to be extinct now.
And self-replicating nanites WOULD inevitably evolve. If they somehow selfreplicate, they will inevitably make mistakes once in a while. Some of these mistakes would be better at reproducing, and these would proliferate. That's evolution. If the speed at which they evolve is dramatically faster than carbon based lifeforms, we might even have a problem. More realistically, if they produce some nasty sideeffect that is bad for us and good for them, then we might have a serious problem.
Luckily, selfreproducing nanites are extremely tough to make.
Evolution doesn't care about what "good" something does to the species. Selection occurs on the individual level, and doesn't plan ahead.
Several species HAVE evolved that more or less wiped out other species. An estimate puts around 90% of all species ever to have inhabited the planet to be extinct now.
And self-replicating nanites WOULD inevitably evolve. If they somehow selfreplicate, they will inevitably make mistakes once in a while. Some of these mistakes would be better at reproducing, and these would proliferate. That's evolution. If the speed at which they evolve is dramatically faster than carbon based lifeforms, we might even have a problem. More realistically, if they produce some nasty sideeffect that is bad for us and good for them, then we might have a serious problem.
Luckily, selfreproducing nanites are extremely tough to make.
