Well some viruses are "nano" according to all sensible definitions, but I'd not consider them "gizmo" not being artificial in the sense a nano robot would be.

Yes. I noticed the mistake too late to edit.

Exactly. Whenever I see the word phage I go, okay when will we get artificial phages to kill bacteria with?Perhaps even attack cancer cells, though that'd need to be done with precision... Or control fermentation, or whatever. It'd perhaps be cheater than a lot of the nano gizmo ideas that are circulated more.

You are right. I expressed it very poorly I meant it does not spread that very quick, so it is a bit early to panic provided you live several thousand miles away, divided by sea. One can't do anything anyway at this stage except for proper sanitation, since there is no vaccine.

Ignorance is just as dangerous. And it isn't really the family's or the victim's fault, but the local administrations? Why wasn't the populace properly informed trough radio broadcast. Why there weren't guards there, if they know that the populace can not be expected to handle the situation well? This event is a…

I just can't even begin to understand this. Someone is infected with pretty much death itself and goes off to wander around town. Human stupidity is truly limitless.I get that these people aren't very educated, but I suppose the doctors told her and her family that about every second person she touches could be placed…

It hasn't reached Europe yet and I highly doubt it will. It is not a very infectious disease, however horrible it is.

It'd be interesting to snip away multiple random pieces of junk DNA in different species and see what happens. Me thinks this calls for experimental confirmation.Though it sounds perfectly sensible to me, that some or most of the "junk" DNA might be a sort of chemical "whitespace". The notion that it might be pure…

Interesting I Imagined him always even before seing a picture with a stylized third eye tattoo and slightly greying hair of an indeterminable original colour that has been dyed platinum. And also simultaneously looking 27 and 56.

All hail the Glow Cloud!

A 5 kilowatt laser trough a cable? It sounds very inefficient. Is there a reason why regular electric cable's or a chemical fuel such as ethanol wouldn't work? For the prototype, I mean, the actual space probe should be nuclear.

The obvious thing to do would be a rotating habitat. It'd probably be feasible by the time we had to worry about birth in space.

I was in Basic Physical Measurements lab and we were in the nuclear chemistry lab tasked with measuring a bunch of stuff with set ups based around a gamma detector. We had a small chunk of a radioactive sample in a lead casing, and we had to basically test the equipment for detection range and minimum detectable…

I would not rely on cats.They don't really like to work. They don't even know that word. However giant space cats would make high powered laser weaponry utterly futile. All you'd need to kick space pirate ass is a slightly larger than normal laser pointer and a cargo bay full of giant space cats.

Certainly, but if we create an intelligent being we cannot ensure it's safety in any way.There is no perfect solution or there is no intelligence. just a very complex conventional program. They'll circumvent or misapply one liners and ethics can't be perfect. What I'm saying it's catch 22, but AGIs could be made…

And is anyone grasping to the point of being able to at least draft a language and program that at least bears resemblance to an AGI?

Well our ethical constraints are bypassed are riddled with loopholes and bypassed routinely as well as the three laws are bypassed again and again in Asimov's works. That's the point I'm making. No where near perfect, but better than nothing.

You fell off the other side of the horse. Why couldn't dogs have secondary emotions? They not human smart, but they are nowhere near as dumb as to be treated as walking, drooling computers with a fifty line program.

It is true, but it still also includes my statement. Again I did not stae this kind of AGI would be safe, just safer than the rest of the popular concepts. Very probably safer than us if we we'd go clever about it and make sure it behaves ethically. See Asimov's robots. Definitely unsafe, but safer than us.

Yes, I did not say it would not be dangerous. I am guilty of forgetting to explicitly state my core assumption that the AI I'm talking about would not have an all important primary goal that defines the whole of it's existence. I think that would make it safer than if it had not one, not safe. I think they should have…