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Xachariah comments on Why space stopped captivating minds ? - Less Wrong
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Self replicating (with remote human supervision) robotics for base on the moon is merely a very big engineering project. I'd say somewhere on the scale of modern operating system with the associated software (word processor, web browser, etc). Perhaps that plus the hardware and fab plant design, on the high estimate side.
But we have plenty of unused land and sea floor on Earth; the least hospitable place on Earth (excluding active volcanoes perhaps) is much easier to live in, than the moon.
I don't think so. Software is much easier than hardware. In fact the "self-replicating robots" problem probably contains a specialist operating system subproblem in it! One thing I learned watching collaborations between mechanical and electrical engineering PhD students, is that mechanical engineering goals are generally much more humble.
Mechanical E: build a good helirobot engine, Electrical E: build a fancy helirobot controller. (Building a new OS is also a PhD thesis in software, e.g. of roughly comparable difficulty).
Exactly. Self-Replicating robotics on Earth is a global instant victory condition. Completion of one would result in machines that could double their production exponentially, leading to practically infinite production capability within no time.
Suggesting self-replicating robotics is akin to saying we should just solve this whole not being post-scarcity problem.
This does not follow. This depends on a lot of conditions, such as how fast the robots replicate, what resources they need, and how broad the circumstances they can replicate are. If for example someone could make a self-replicating robot but the robot required boron in some critical part, its replication would be severely hampered.
Moreover, even having a self-replicating robot isn't by itself necessarily useful if you can't control it in detail or get them to then do exactly what you want. And a self-replicating robot with no control could be quite bad.
But these are essentially minor nitpicks, and I agree with your point if one adds the appropriate minor disclaimers.
I was thinking more in terms of the original claim. Self replicating robots able to replicate quickly enough and flexible/controllable enough to make a permanent colony on the moon for us.
I mean, I assume that was the original point instead of sending very large, slow Von Neumann machines to tile the moon with copies of themselves. That would be cool but probably not worth the expense, and it'd carry such an awful risk of backfiring on us.
Per Robin Hanson, a machine shop can put out its own mass in equipment in roughly a month or two. And yet, the economy doesn't double every month, or even every year. Why not?
There seems to be a fair chance the reasons are mostly rooted in cognitive biases, cumulative coordination mistakes, economic rent-seeking, and so on -- not anything technological.
A well planned lunar or orbital mission might well be free of these issues. Space conditions are mechanically simpler in some respects, so there's a stronger case for pre-planning everything rather than requiring a market economy to make it work. Supporting structures are less needed, transit is less two dimensional, and solar energy can be harvested at scale with low costs in equipment density. There is also instant access to ultra-high vacuum conditions which are useful for refining. And in addition to the endless cheap sunlight, there's no anti-nuclear lobby which can claim it's in their back yard.
Maybe we should solve this whole not being post-scarcity problem...
If we switch the example to an excavator which outputs its own mass in an hour or two, does the answer to your question become clearer?
A quick process like that is pretty much insignificant compared to a month or two, let alone 15 years. Unless there are tens of thousands of other steps in the chain of comparable length, it doesn't come close to explaining it.
As I see it, there are roughly four steps:
The ones towards the end seem to be the biggest time sinks. However, power collection should not raise it by more than a factor of two or so. I don't think it takes many months to mine enough coal to pay for the energy costs of coal mining equipment, for example.