When Nanobots Can Accomplish Anything, What Will Happen to the Global Economy?
October 15 2008 / by John Heylin
Category: Technology Year: Beyond Rating: 5 Hot
Let’s say, for the sake of argument, that a successful nanobot design goes into production. These little guys can build just about anything you want, including more of themselves. But, barring an end-of-the-world scenario where the world gets covered with self-replicating nanobots (Grey Goo), what can we expect in the world around us?
The one thing that popped into my head last night was the idea that if nanobots could remove elements from their surroundings to build themselves, than means they could potentially mine areas for precious metals too tiny for us to mine ourselves. Nanobots could scour the dust, deserts, forests and hills for single-atom particles, a million of them being able to amass enough for a fifty-pound ball of plutonium.
So what about other precious metals?
The worlds oceans contain an estimated 20 million tons of gold. Washed down from land over billions of years and sitting in a suspended solution (salt water), it could be ripe for the taking. In fact, if people were able to mine all the gold out of the Oceans and it were equally dispersed to the global population, we’d all be stinking rich. “If all the gold suspended in the world’s seawater were mined, each person on Earth could have about 9 pounds of gold.” It would change the face of the world.
There are a few different things that could happen from this. Firstly, the worlds banks could finally base all of their currency on a gold standard. The US Dollar, for instance, only has value because we believe it to have value. Gold backing is an incredibly small part of America’s economy. Would this mean an economic boom? Pumping nine pounds of gold per person into an economy would be very good.
But it could take another turn.
Gold has increased in value over the last ten years at an incredible rate. But as everyone knows, if you flood the market with something in excess the price will go down. Gold could drop so low in value that it would be about as expensive as Steel.
So if you’re imagining a world where nanobots take care of everything in the world, just stop and think what kind of a world would be created if we all got our wish.
Comment Thread (7 Responses)
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So if you’re imagining a world where nanobots take care of everything in the world, just stop and think what kind of a world would be created if we all got our wish.
Was the world the same when we made spears? Was the world the same when we found fire? Was the world the same when we built machines to do our work ? Was the world the same when we found oil? No. The human species changed because this is our destiny, I think.
Posted by: Covus October 16, 2008
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I don’t want to think I am hostile about this but what I said above has merit: The world is not going to be the same comfy state we’re in today. We are not going to be the same forever. It is a nice state to be in, but we came from the Savannah of Africa to the metropolises we inhabit now. Did they stop to think ” what kind of world would be created if we create the tools to make our lives better?” Probably not. We are the victors and now we get the spoils.
Posted by: Covus October 16, 2008
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Not to join the brutality bandwagon or anything, but:
Pumping nine pounds of gold per person into an economy would be very good.
No, it wouldn’t. In fact, it is the very definition of fiscal inflation. Let’s examine this idea a bit deeper. There are 12 troy ounces to a standard pound, so at US$1,000/oz 9 pounds of gold (12×1,000×9) equals US$108,000 per person by your calculation above. Even if you use the non-gold measure of 16 ounces to the pound (16×1,000×9) the sum increases to US$144,000/person.
It’s a lot of money, but hardly “rich” I think.
It also assumes that gold will remain at that US$1k/oz figure once it loses it’s present scarsity valuation. It also assumes that the rest of the market won’t increase it’s product valuation to accomidate the availability of customers (an action all markets have displayed for as long as there have been markets in recorded human experience). Further to all of that, your idea supposes that any single-commodity currency entails some increase in valuation security over a currency valuation based on the (equally hypothetical) valuation of an industrial economy’s total financial worth (as determined by it’s combined productivity). Your equivelancy to steel doesn’t hold up since gold is not subject to corrosion and thus must have a different value from a refined metal that is. Finally, since both currency models are equally vulnerable to dishonest manipulation by their issuing authority, the balance has to tip in favor of the more broadly backed currency valuation method which is less subject to external manipulations (though admittedly it’s a close decision).
Sorry John, I don’t think this one holds up well. The so-far hypothetical nanobots presumably work under someone/things direction in response to percieved requirements (however ephemeral or transient those might prove to be). Such an economy would be radically different from any human’s have experienced to date, but an economy of some description would continue to exist since a fundimental aspect of human nature is to exchange – genetic material and individual stimululation, if nothing else.
Unless your nanobots turn us all into non-corporeal sentient beings somehow. Then all bets are off. :)
Posted by: Will October 16, 2008
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I guess my hope was that the population would get so high that gold would be worth what it was centuries ago since by then maybe instead of nine pounds per person it would end up being a few ounces. But, if nanobots could build anything, why would you need money to begin with? The whole thing is just plain batty.
Posted by: John Heylin October 16, 2008
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gold aside, if you assume that at least some of the basis of the value of something is in how much time and energy it takes to make, nanobots would drop the “price” of many commodities at least, which would radically effect the economy. however i do tend to think that at least some exchange would exist—so i agree with both john and will.
Posted by: Mielle Sullivan October 16, 2008
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@ John – But, if nanobots could build anything, why would you need money to begin with? The whole thing is just plain batty.
Have you never seen an episode of Star Trek? Heh.
Money does not give life any value. We only use money to exchange goods and services.
Money has-
probably- just been a temporary mechanism to get to this point. I try to think about the “big picture” but that is just me.Posted by: Covus October 17, 2008
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This may be pushing the boundaries of propriety, but I examine the tech/economic interface in almost Den Bestian length here.
Basicly, the concept of “money” is one of the primary formative benchmarks in human history, in my opinion. How that extends from pre-history to post-singularity is an interesting intellectual exercise. Here’s a teaser: the common assumption of gold having intrinsic value is a pre-historic fallicy that influences the singularity’s very possibility of being attained at all.
Posted by: Will October 17, 2008
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