Perplexed comments on The hard limits of hard nanotech - Less Wrong

19 Post author: lsparrish 07 November 2010 12:49AM

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Comment author: Perplexed 07 November 2010 01:37:57AM 6 points [-]

If, for example, such devices can function only at low temperatures and in a vacuum, their impact and economic importance would be virtually nil.

Yeah, they would be limited to unimportant, fringe activities like:

Scanning cryogenicly preserved human brains prior to uploading
Repair and maintenance of deep space probes
Isotope separation of deuterium, tritium, and He3 for fusion power.
Mining operations on asteroids, comets, and gas-giant moons.
Fabrication of carbon-nanotube-based structures for use in space-elevator and tether propulsion applications.

Minor, unimportant stuff like that. ;)

Well, impact and economic importance would be "virtually nil" until the second half of this century, maybe.

Comment author: Snowyowl 07 November 2010 01:43:38AM * 6 points [-]

Isotope separation of deuterium, tritium, and He3 for fusion power.

Technically, that's more easily done with a centrifuge, or perhaps distillation. But I agree with your other points. Carbon nanotubes, here we come!