Volume 4, Issue 2 
December 2009


Application of Asilomar Guidelines to Self-replicating Machines

Martine Rothblatt, Ph.D

Page 2 of 3

Self-replicating nanobots would be really helpful for space colonists who are trying to create worlds, either planetary worlds or free floating island worlds in deep space. Again, it’s possible that everything can be purpose built one at a time, but self-replicating nanotechnology would allow entire planets like Mars to be re-made into habitable worlds much more quickly. If you just think about the Kuiper belt [1] (or the Edgeworth-Kuiper belt) alone, the belt of planets around the orbit of Pluto, there’s over 100,000 minor planets there. Self-replicating nanobots could rapidly make all of those planets habitable whereas if you had to land a special package one at a time to make them habitable, it would take a lot longer.

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Ultimately, on this space day, we should really talk about what started Apollo 11. Apollo 11 began the process of the colonization of the galaxy, beginning with just our Moon. This 40th anniversary we should focus on what the ultimate goal would be - which I believe should be colonizing the entire galaxy.  It’s almost impossible to imagine how we could colonize the galaxy without self-replicating nanotechnology because if we did it without self-replicating nanotechnology, it would take countless eons and we would proceed just one start at a time. With self-replicating nanotechnology we could launch a robot space craft to a planet, have it make a number of copies of itself, ten of those copies would launch to ten other planets, make ten copies of themselves, and the entire project would be accomplished much, much quicker.

I believe on this Space Day, on this anniversary, we need to use the Apollo 11 mission as inspiration to doing an Apollo 11 for the whole galaxy. It’s going to happen more quickly with self-replicating nanotechnology.

Let’s apply some practical biotechnology guidelines to artificial self-replication and see if it makes much sense. We’ve seen the issues that arose with recombinant biotechnology, which led people to the desire to use self-replicating biological systems in order to create medicines and research tools. The real question is: Can we apply the rules of the Asilomar Guidelines to nanotechnology? This slide summarizes what the Asilomar Guidelines [2] are and they basically say that you have to employ a containment level that is appropriate for the risk level. Some things are so risky, that they should not be done at all. There are minimal and low risk activities which can have a minimal and low risk level of containment. Examples of minimal risks are things that are not likely to cause harm to humans and that do not involve taking things into new ecological environments. On the other hand, there could be moderate and high risk environments where the risks to humans are high and those things should be contained very seriously.

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What would really be relevant to bionano? Basically, unless we’re making a pathogenically dangerous product, the Asilomar guidance is that self-replicating bionano systems can move forward at a low level containment. Since none of us are thinking of making pathogenically dangerous devices, a low level of containment is the appropriate guidance to bionano self-replication. A mechanical analog recombinant DNA is mar2all we’re trying to do, and recombinant DNA is considered a low risk example if the inserted gene is non toxic. None of us would want to be dealing with toxic elements. It may be said that changing the nature of an uninhabited world is changing the environment and therefore we should be talking about a high risk Asilomar regime, but I would argue that changing the nature of an uninhabited world doesn’t count as changing the ecology. If it’s an uninhabited world, it’s there for us to do what we want to with it, and therefore a minimal risk regime would apply.

What rules would be needed for self-replicating nanobots? The necessary rule could include: using biological barriers to limit the harm; biological self-replicating nanobots should failsafe disable in the atmosphere; robotic nanobots should failsafe disable in biochemistry; and planetary nanobots should failsafe disable by negative gravitaxis. However; a lot of these rules start to beak down if you’re taking about galactic colonization.

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Let’s start with the Foresight differentiation between autonomous and non-autonomous self-replication. The Foresight Institute doesn’t have a problem with non-autonomous self-replication. Non-autonomous self-replication is self-replication that ultimately is in some way, under the control of humans. Autonomous self-replications is when humans give up some of the control. If you think about galactic colonization, we’re talking about autonomous self-replication because there would be no way for humans to continue to control what went on hundreds of light years out into deep space. Even if humans wrote the original programs, a human written program that was designed for autonomy creates autonomous self-replication, not non-autonomous self-replication.

[1] Kuiper belt or Edgeworth-Kuiper belt – the disk-shaped belt of billions of small icy bodies orbiting the Sun beyond the orbit of Neptune, mostly at distances 30–50 times Earth's distance from the Sun. Gerard Peter Kuiper (1905–73) proposed the existence of this large flattened distribution of objects in 1951 in connection with his theory of the origin of the solar system.http://encyclopedia2.thefreedictionary.com/Kyper+belt  August 11, 2009 2:28PM EST

[2]Asilomar Guidelines –the Asilomar Conference on Recombinant DNA conference was an influential conference organized by Dr. Paul Berg discussing the potential biohazards and regulation of biotechnology held in February 1975 at a conference center Asilomar State Beach. For further info, please visit:  
http://www.wikidoc.org/index.php/Asilomar_Conference_on_Recombinant_DNA  August 12, 2009 1:23PM EST

 

 

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