An Open Letter to Richard Smalley
Dr. Richard Smalley has voiced criticisms of Dr. Eric Drexler's concept of molecular assemblers, which could be used to implement self-replicating nanobots. Smalley, who discovered "fullerenes" (aka "buckyballs"), is Chairman of the Board of Carbon Nanotechnologies, Inc. and former director of Rice University's Center for Nanoscale Science and Technology. Drexler, who coined the term "nanotechnology" and is Chairman of the Board of Foresight Institute, responds to these criticisms.
Published on KurzweilAI.net April 16, 2003.
Prof. Smalley:
I have written this open letter to correct your public misrepresentation
of my work.
As you know, I introduced the term "nanotechnology" in
the mid-1980s to describe advanced capabilities based on molecular
assemblers: proposed devices able to guide chemical reactions by
positioning reactive molecules with atomic precision. Since "nanotechnology"
is now used label diverse current activities, I have attempted to
minimize confusion by relabelling the longer term goal "molecular
manufacturing." The consequences of molecular manufacturing
are widely understood to be enormous, posing opportunities and dangers
of first-rank importance to the long-term security of the United
States and the world. Theoretical studies of its implementation
and capabilities are therefore of more than academic interest, and
are akin to pre-Sputnik studies of spaceflight, or to pre-Manhattan-Project
calculations regarding nuclear chain reactions.
You have attempted to dismiss my work in this field by misrepresenting
it. From what I hear of a press conference at the recent NNI conference,
you continue to do so. In particular, you have described molecular
assemblers as having multiple "fingers" that manipulate
individual atoms and suffer from so-called "fat finger"
and "sticky finger" problems, and you have dismissed their
feasibility on this basis [1]. I find this puzzling because, like
enzymes and ribosomes, proposed assemblers neither have nor need
these "Smalley fingers" [2]. The task of positioning reactive
molecules simply doesn't require them.
I have a twenty year history of technical publications in this
area [3 - 12] and consistently describe systems quite unlike the
straw man you attack. My proposal is, and always has been, to guide
the chemical synthesis of complex structures by mechanically positioning
reactive molecules, not by manipulating individual atoms. This proposal
has been defended successfully again and again, in journal articles,
in my MIT doctoral thesis, and before scientific audiences around
the world. It rests on well-established physical principles.
The impossibility of "Smalley fingers" has raised no
concern in the research community because these fingers solve no
problems and thus appear in no proposals. Your reliance on this
straw-man attack might lead a thoughtful observer to suspect that
no one has identified a valid criticism of my work. For this I should,
perhaps, thank you.
You apparently fear that my warnings of long-term dangers [13]
will hinder funding of current research, stating that "We should
not let this fuzzy-minded nightmare dream scare us away from nanotechnology....NNI
should go forward" [14]. However, I have from the beginning
argued that the potential for abuse of advanced nanotechnologies
makes vigorous research by the U.S and its allies imperative [13].
Many have found these arguments persuasive. In an open discussion,
I believe they will prevail. In contrast, your attempt to calm the
public through false claims of impossibility will inevitably fail,
placing your colleagues at risk of a destructive backlash.
Your misdirected arguments have needlessly confused public discussion
of genuine long-term security concerns. If you value the accuracy
of information used in decisions of importance to national and global
security, I urge you to seek some way to help set the record straight.
Endorsing calls for an independent scientific review of molecular
manufacturing concepts [15] would be constructive.
A scientist whose research I respect has observed that "when
a scientist says something is possible, they're probably underestimating
how long it will take. But if they say it's impossible, they're
probably wrong." The scientist quoted is, of course, yourself
[16].
K. Eric Drexler
Chairman, Foresight Institute
1. Smalley, R. E. (2001) Of chemistry, love and nanobots - How
soon will we see the nanometer-scale robots envisaged by K. Eric
Drexler and other molecular nanotechologists? The simple answer
is never. Scientific American, September, 68-69.
<http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~smalleyg/rick's%20publications/SA285-76.pdf>
2. Drexler, K. E., D. Forrest, R. A. Freitas Jr., J. S. Hall, N.
Jacobstein, T. McKendree, R. Merkle, C. Peterson (2001) A Debate
About Assemblers.
<http://www.imm.org/SciAmDebate2/smalley.html>.
3. Drexler, K. E. (1981) Molecular engineering: An approach to
the development of general capabilities for molecular manipulation.
Proc. Natnl.
Acad. Sci. U.S.A.. 78:5275-5278. <http://www.imm.org/PNAS.html>
4. Drexler, K. E. (1987) Nanomachinery: Atomically precise gears
and bearings. IEEE Micro Robots and Teleoperators Workshop. Hyannis,
Massachusetts: IEEE.
5. Drexler, K. E., and J. S. Foster. (1990) Synthetic tips. Nature.
343:600.
6. Drexler, K. E. (1991) Molecular tip arrays for molecular imaging
and nanofabrication. Journal of Vacuum Science and Technology-B.
9:1394-1397.
7. Drexler K. E., (1991) Molecular Machinery and Manufacturing
with Applications to Computation. MIT doctoral thesis.
8. Drexler, K. E. (1992) Nanosystems: Molecular Machinery, Manufacturing,
and Computation. New York: John Wiley & Sons.
<http://www.foresight.org/NanoRev/Bookstore.html#anchor1025139>
9. Drexler, K. E. (1992) Molecular Directions in Nanotechnology.
Nanotechnology (2:113).
10. Drexler, K. E. (1994) Molecular machines: physical principles
and implementation strategies. Annual Review of Biophysics and Biomolecular
Structure (23:337-405).
11. Drexler, K. E. (1995) Molecular manufacturing: perspectives
on the ultimate limits of fabrication. Phil. Trans. R. Soc. London
A (353:323-331).
12. Drexler, K. E. (1999) Building molecular machine systems. Trends
in Biotechnology, 17: 5-7. <http://www.imm.org/Reports/Rep008.html>
13. Drexler, K. E. (1986) Engines of Creation: The Coming Era of
Nanotechnology. New York: Anchor Press/Doubleday.
<http://www.foresight.org/EOC/index.html>
14. Smalley, R. E. (2000) quoted in: W. Schulz, Crafting A National
Nanotechnology Effort. Chemical & Engineering News, October
16.
<http://pubs.acs.org/cen/nanotechnology/7842/7842government.html>
15. Peterson, C. L. Testimony before the Committee on Science,
U.S. House of Representatives, 9 April 2003.
<http://www.house.gov/science/hearings/full03/apr09/peterson.htm>
16. Smalley, R. E. (2000) quoted in N. Thompson, Downsizing: Nanotechnology---Why
you should sweat the small stuff. The Washington Monthly Online,
October. <http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2000/0010.thompson.html>
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