WDW Nanotech Aff

Wildcat Debate Workshop 08 <Nanotech Aff/Neg>
Nanotech Aff/Neg
Nanotech Aff/Neg..............................................................................................................................................................................................1
1AC....................................................................................................................................................................................................................4
Solvency- Plan  nanotech investment .........................................................................................................................................................11
Solvency- Short term goals lead to long term developments..........................................................................................................................12
Solvency- AT: Can’t Make Nano Solar...........................................................................................................................................................13
Solvency- AT: Nanoassemblers not possible...................................................................................................................................................14
Solvency- AT: Grey Goo..................................................................................................................................................................................15
Solvency- EXT: AT: Grey Goo........................................................................................................................................................................17
Solar Nanotech- More efficient ......................................................................................................................................................................20
Solar Nanotech- provides energy independence..............................................................................................................................................21
Solar Nanotech- effective, reliable, provides world electricity ......................................................................................................................22
Solar Nanotech- AT: not reliable, no production at night................................................................................................................................23
Solar Nanotech- AT: no mass production........................................................................................................................................................24
Solar Nanotech- AT: Costs too much...............................................................................................................................................................25
Global Warming – Nanotubes/NanoBatteries..................................................................................................................................................26
Global Warming- Sequestering........................................................................................................................................................................27
Global Warming- Renewables Solve...............................................................................................................................................................28
Sun Death-2AC Add On..................................................................................................................................................................................29
Sun Death- Sun Death Soon............................................................................................................................................................................30
Space- Teleportation........................................................................................................................................................................................31
Space- Space Elevator ....................................................................................................................................................................................32
Space- Better Ships..........................................................................................................................................................................................33
Space- Astronaut Health .................................................................................................................................................................................34
Space – Terraforming ......................................................................................................................................................................................35
Space- Time Travel..........................................................................................................................................................................................37
Space- AT: Radiation.......................................................................................................................................................................................38
Space- Impact- Prevent Extinction-Disease....................................................................................................................................................39
Space- Impact- Prevent Extinction-Militarism................................................................................................................................................40
Space- Impact- Prevent Extinction-Overpopulation........................................................................................................................................41
Space- Impact- Prevent Extinction-Meteor.....................................................................................................................................................42
Space- Impact- Solves Environment ..............................................................................................................................................................43
Space- AT: Colonization = Imperialism ..........................................................................................................................................................44
Space- Impact- Solves Everything .................................................................................................................................................................45
Aliens- 2AC Add On.......................................................................................................................................................................................46
Aliens- Aliens Exist.........................................................................................................................................................................................48
Aliens- Will be more advanced........................................................................................................................................................................49
Aliens- Want to kill us.....................................................................................................................................................................................50
Aliens- Nano provides invisibility ..................................................................................................................................................................51
Utopia – Nanotech provides............................................................................................................................................................................52
1
Utopia – Solves Capitalism  Nirvana...........................................................................................................................................................54
Utopia- Nanotech gives us everything we need and provides freedom...........................................................................................................55
Utopia – Aging ................................................................................................................................................................................................56
Utopia- AT: People will be bored....................................................................................................................................................................57
Health Add On.................................................................................................................................................................................................59
Health- restores body.......................................................................................................................................................................................60
Health- Solves Disease....................................................................................................................................................................................61
Health- Solves Cancer.....................................................................................................................................................................................62
Health- diagnosis ............................................................................................................................................................................................63
Water Wars Add On.........................................................................................................................................................................................64
Hydrogen – Nanotech key to hydrogen economy...........................................................................................................................................65
Environment – Nano Solves it.........................................................................................................................................................................66
Environment – Oil Spills Add On....................................................................................................................................................................67
AT: Topicality- Alternative energy .................................................................................................................................................................68
AT: Deep Eco- Need Tech funding..................................................................................................................................................................69
Federalism 2AC block.....................................................................................................................................................................................70
Federalism – Innovations key to nanotech......................................................................................................................................................72
Federalism Crushes Science Education...........................................................................................................................................................73
Kritik-AT: Consumption K- ............................................................................................................................................................................74
Neg- AT: Solvency ..........................................................................................................................................................................................75
Neg- Grey goo 1nc..........................................................................................................................................................................................77
Neg- Grey Goo Impact- 72 hours extinction...................................................................................................................................................78
Neg- Nanotech kills the environment..............................................................................................................................................................79
Neg- AT: Sun Death.........................................................................................................................................................................................80
Neg- AT: Sun will explode in six years...........................................................................................................................................................81
Neg- AT: Utopia...............................................................................................................................................................................................82
Neg- AT: Health...............................................................................................................................................................................................84
Neg- AT: anti ship weapons.............................................................................................................................................................................85
Neg- AT: Anti personnel weapons...................................................................................................................................................................86
Neg- AT: Space................................................................................................................................................................................................87
Neg- EXT: Space Bacteria bad........................................................................................................................................................................89
Neg- AT: Space- Wars Prevent.........................................................................................................................................................................90
Neg- AT: Space- Econ key to exploration.......................................................................................................................................................91
Neg- AT: Aliens will attack..............................................................................................................................................................................92
Neg- Nano Tech inevitable..............................................................................................................................................................................93
Neg – Kritik Links- Capitalism.......................................................................................................................................................................94
Neg- Kritik Links- Biopower..........................................................................................................................................................................95
Neg- Kritik- Deep Eco.....................................................................................................................................................................................96
Neg- Timeframe ............................................................................................................................................................................................101
Neg- AT: Time Travel ...................................................................................................................................................................................102
2
3
1AC
Observation 1- Inherency
Nanotech needs governmental support now
Carlstrom, 2005
(Paul, Special to the Chronicle, “As solar gets smaller, its future gets brighter. Nanotechnology could turn rooftops into a sea of power-
generating stations”, July 11, 2005, Accessed 7/13/08, http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-
bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2005/07/11/BUG7IDL1AF1.DTL&type=tech) KMH
Industry watchers like Wooley of the Energy Foundation say that some kind of government assistance is necessary to make alternative
sources of energy viable. "The (solar) industry has grown and expanded through incentives. The technology doesn't need government
support forever, but it's at a crucial point," he said. Investors, however, are quick to distinguish between grants and regulations mandating
alternative forms of energy. "The bet was not made with the regulation market," said Gurley of Benchmark Capital.
Plan- The United States Federal Government should substantially increase alternative energy incentives in
the United States by providing government incentives and tax benefits for solar nanotechnology
development for companies in the United States. Funding and Enforcement guaranteed.
Observation 2- Solvency
Government incentives and tax benefits provide heavy investment into solar nanotechnology which is the
only way for solar to become cost competitive, provide 75 percent of electric needs to the United States and
promote the entire nanotech industry
Power Nanotech, Nanotechnology trends. June 05, 2008 http://www.nanosolsystems.com/trends.html accessed July 12, 2008
A study released by the Energy Foundation suggests that the United States could produce 2,900 new megawatts of solar power by 2010
and enough to power 500,000 homes if the cost is significantly reduced. The Energy Foundation report also says that solar energy could
furnish much of the nation's electricity if available residential and commercial rooftops were fully utilized. According to the Energy
Foundation, using available rooftop space could provide 710,000 megawatts across the United States, whose current electrical capacity is
950,000 megawatts. The market is obviously huge, demand is huge. Alternative energy is imperative in the world we live in. As for recent
growth in solar energy, Paula Mints, a senior analyst at the technology research firm of Strategies Unlimited in Mountain View, says that
14,000 photovoltaic megawatts were sold last year, representing 54 percent growth in the industry. Why The Golden Age of Solar is
Around the Corner It took 20 to 25 years to commercialize conventional photovoltaics. High production costs are among the reasons
solar energy hasn't become a major source of electricity. The black, glasslike photovoltaic cells that make up most solar panels are usually
composed of crystalline silicon, which requires clean-room manufacturing facilities free of dust and airborne microbes. Silicon is also in
short supply and increasingly expensive to produce, so high manufacturing costs are the main reason behind high wattage prices. Silicon
is very capital-intensive. With nanotechnology, tiny solar cells can be printed onto flexible, very thin light-retaining materials,
bypassing the cost of silicon production. Solar Nanotechnology will reduce the time it will take consumers to recover production and
installation costs to a matter of months. In addition to being able to manufacture photovoltaic cells more quickly through printing, the
companies also say that manipulating materials 100,000 times smaller than the width of a human hair will provide more light- collecting
capabilities. Each printed nanostructure solar cell would act as an autonomous solar collector, and sheets of these products would have
more surface area to gather light than conventional photovoltaic cells. Printed rolls of solar cells would be lighter, more resilient and
flexible than silicon photovoltaics. Conclusion It would be hard to imagine a better time to participate in Solar Nanotechnology Energy
investments. The shift into a responsible development of America's resources is eminent and the current demand is ever increasing. Power
Nanotech has brought all aspects of the solar industry into the 21st century with clear benefits and inherent potential for multiple
commercial spin offs of the new nanotechnology applications. The financial rewards are galvanized with government incentives and tax
benefits.
4
Current nanotechnology industry needs something to spur research

Glen Golightly, Houston Bureau Chief. Nanotechnology: Rebuilding All the Sciences, Space.com. January 28, 2000
http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/technology/nano_last_000128.html accessed July 14, 2008
Dr. Carlo Montemagno of Cornell University said he already sees scientific disciplines blurring as technology advances. "In my own
group, mathematicians, engineers and molecular biologists work with one another," he said. "They all have a stake in the core project and
must know the capabilities and limitations of other areas." Smalley added that nanotechnology is critical to the space agency’s future
missions. "I believe that NASA and 'nano' potentially have a vital, special relationship between one another," he said. "I can’t imagine
ever accomplishing a portion of that mission without 'nano' becoming a reality." Smalley’s research concentrates on development for
carbon nano-tubes, which are lighter and stronger than steel and could be used to produce super-light spacecraft or a space elevator on the
Earth. Montemagno said he was concerned that the United States maintain its lead in nanotechnology and hopes something akin to the
Soviet launching of Sputnik, which spurred the space race, will inspire students and researchers. "Nanotechnology is really a new
frontier," he said. "If we fail to live up to the call, we may not feel the effects, but our children and grandchildren will."
5
Advantage 1- Global Warming

First, burning fossil fuels is causing Climate Change, Multiple factors prove.
Spaulding 3
(Raci Oriona, J.D. @ the U of Iowa College of Law, “Fuel From Vegetables? A Modern Approach to Global Climate Change”, 13
Transnat’l L. & Contemp. Probs. 277, Spring, accessed online p. L/N) DMZ
Perhaps the most serious consequence of the ever-increasing global reliance on the products of industrialized economies is the problem of
global climate change. This change in global climate has been largely attributed to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions - carbon emissions
caused by burning fossil fuels such as oil, gas, and coal. n21 Most available evidence suggests that there [*281] is a detectable human
influence on the global climate. n22 For instance, the U.S. Climate Action Report of 2002, written by the Environmental Protection Agency,
indicated that "greenhouse gases are accumulating in the Earth's atmosphere as a result of human activities, causing global mean surface
air temperature and subsurface ocean temperatures to rise." n23 Additionally, Christopher Flavin, President of Worldwatch Institute, has
noted that: From the ice cap at the North Pole, which has lost 40 percent of its thickness in the last decade, to the coral reefs near the
Equator, one-quarter of which have been killed by rising ocean temperatures and other stresses, the Earth is telling us that we are entering
an era of dangerous climate change that is already threatening populations around the world. Already, economic damages from natural
disasters has reached $ 608 billion over the last decade - as much as in the previous four decades combined. n24 Humans magnify these
effects by increasing the global economy's dependence on fossil fuels. As more fossil fuel is demanded by automobiles, factories, and
power plants, more fossil fuel is burned, thus emitting more carbon dioxide into the Earth's atmosphere and exacerbating global warming.
The effects of global warming, while still somewhat uncertain, are expected to do damage around the globe by causing excessive droughts
in some areas while increasing rainfall in others, exacerbating coastal damage like erosion, and increasing instances of heat stress and
respiratory illness in many nations. n25 Statistics from nations around the world demonstrate the truth of this statement. For instance:
Dramatic examples of the human health impacts from severe flooding can be found in China. In 1996, official national statistics showed
200 million people affected by flooding. There were more than 3,000 deaths and 363,800 injuries; 3.7 million residences were destroyed,
with 18 million damaged. Direct economic loses exceeded U.S. $ 12 billion. n26Chinese statistics have further shown that "200 million
people [were] affected by flooding, more than 3,000 [were killed], and 4 million homes [were] damaged; direct economic losses exceeded
U.S. $ 20 billion." n27 While Chinese scientists could not prove [*282]
that all of these impacts are directly attributable to human-induced climate change, [they could] say that the heating of the planet that has
already occurred is likely to be at least partially responsible for the severity of these human health impacts. Moreover, [they could say
that] future heating will make such adverse impacts more probable. n28
Second, There is a scientific consensus that CO2 is causing warming

Doughton 4
(Sandi, Seattle Times staff reporter, “The truth about global warming”, October 11, accessed online June 12, 2008, p. L/N) DMZ
"With each passing year the evidence has gotten stronger — and is getting stronger still." 1995 was the hottest year on record until it was
eclipsed by 1997 — then 1998, 2001, 2002, 2003 and 2004. Melting ice has driven Alaska Natives from seal-hunting areas used for
generations. Glaciers around the globe are shrinking so rapidly many could disappear before the middle of the century. As one study after
another has pointed to carbon dioxide and other man-made emissions as the most plausible explanation, the cautious community of
science has embraced an idea initially dismissed as far-fetched. The result is a convergence of opinion rarely seen in a profession where
attacking each other's work is part of the process. Every major scientific body to examine the evidence has come to the same conclusion:
The planet is getting hotter; man is to blame; and it's going to get worse.
6
Third, Studies disprove sun as the source of warming

Johansen 2
(Prof of Comm @ UNO, “The Global Warming Desk Reference”, p. 87, NetLibrary) DMZ
G L O B A L - W A R M I N G S K E P T I C S A N D T H E S U N S P O T C Y C L E Many global-warming skeptics argue that the

sunspot cycle is causing a significant part of the warming that has been measured by surface thermometers during the twentieth century's
final two decades. Accurate measurements of the sun's energy output have been taken only since about 1980, however, so their archival
value for comparative purposes is severely limited. Michaels, editor of the World Climate Report, cites a study of sunspot-related solar
brightness conducted by Judith Lean and Peter Foukal, who contend that roughly half of the 0.55 degree C. of warming observed since
1850 is a result of changes in the sun's radiative output. "That would leave," says Michaels, "at best, 0.28 degree C. [due] to the
greenhouse effect" (Michaels 1996). J.J. Lean and her associates also estimate that approximately one-half of the warming of the last 130
years has resulted from variations in the sun's delivery of radiant energy to the earth (Lean, Beer, and Bradley 1995). While solar
variability has a role in climate change, Martin I. Hoffert and associates (writing in Nature) believe that those who make it the primary
variable are overplaying their hand: "Although solar effects on this century's climate may not be negligible, quantitative considerations
imply that they are small relative to the anthropogenic release of greenhouse gases, primarily carbon dioxide" (Hoffert et al. 1999, 764
Fourth, Solar Nanotechnology solves global warming

US Fed News, April 16, 2008
(“BUSINESSES ON EDGE OF APRIL 17 GET JUMPSTART AT APRIL 26 COMPETITION”, April 16, 2008 Wednesday, Accessed
7/13/08, lexis) KMH
Solar: Nanotechnology has been integrated in many different disciplines including energy resources. This company will incorporate
nanostructures into the existing solar cell technology to make solar panels more efficient, allowing a shorter time to recover costs to the
consumer. With this particular nanotechnology that absorbs light even when there is cloud cover, the solar panels may be used in
areas that have not embraced the sun as an energy source. Utilizing this product can reduce energy costs to consumers and help to
negate global warming. "This technology for enhancement of conventional solar cells is a novel and unique approach which does
not have large implementation costs," said Jamie Hass, a senior in physics from Pinehurst. "By retrofitting the new technology to the
existing solar cell, this would decrease start up costs. The new technology adds much more surface area to absorb the light and also would
absorb infrared light which is not being utilized now to make the solar cells 30 percent more efficient."
Fifth, Any leftover CO2 that is causing problems can be removed by Nanotechnology
K. Eric Drexler, visiting scholar at Stanford University’s Department of Computer Science. Nanotechnology; Research and Perspectives,
edited by BC Crandall and James Lewis. 1989 p. 344
It should come as no surprise that self-replicating molecular machines can build big, and at low cost. After all, this is the way redwood
trees come into existence. And like plants, nanomechanisms will be able to use solar power, but at least an order of magnitude more
efficiently. With efficient solar-electric energy converters as inexpensive as grass, and with strong, tough diamond-fiber composite
hardware as inexpensive as wood, much will become possible. Inexpensive fuel and efficient spacecraft, for example, should eventually
make space flight less expensive than air travel is today. Parallels with other products of natural molecular machinery suggest further
applications. For example, plants gave Earth its oxygen atmosphere and created the carbon found in coal and oil. Today, people fear that
rising atmospheric carbon dioxide levels from the burning of fossil fuels may overheat the Earth through the greenhouse effect. If the so-
lution does not come first in some other way (perhaps by the planting of more trees), solar-powered nanomechanisms could reverse the
carbon dioxide buildup, taking a few years of operation to turn all the excess carbon dioxide back into carbon and oxygen.
7
Sixth, Global Warming turns the planet into a fiery Mars – all life will end
Dr. Brandenberg, Physicist (Ph.D.) and Paxson a science writer ’99 – John and Monica, Dead Mars Dying Earth p. 232-3
The ozone hole expands, driven by a monstrous synergy with global warming that puts more catalytic ice crystals into the stratosphere,
but this affects the far north and south and not the major nations’ heartlands. The seas rise, the tropics roast but the media networks no
longer cover it. The Amazon rainforest becomes the Amazon desert. Oxygen levels fall, but profits rise for those who can provide it in
bottles. An equatorial high pressure zone forms, forcing drought in central Africa and Brazil, the Nile dries up and the monsoons fail.
Then inevitably, at some unlucky point in time, a major unexpected event occurs—a major volcanic eruption, a sudden and dramatic shift
in ocean circulation or a large asteroid impact (those who think freakish accidents do not occur have paid little attention to life or Mars),
or a nuclear war that starts between Pakistan and India and escalates to involve China and Russia . . . Suddenly the gradual climb in global
temperatures goes on a mad excursion as the oceans warm and release large amounts of dissolved carbon dioxide from their lower depths
into the atmosphere. Oxygen levels go down precipitously as oxygen replaces lost oceanic carbon dioxide. Asthma cases double and then
double again. Now a third of the world fears breathing. As the oceans dump carbon dioxide, the greenhouse effect increases, which
further warms the oceans, causing them to dump even more carbon. Because of the heat, plants die and burn in enormous fires which
release more carbon dioxide, and the oceans evaporate, adding more water vapor to the greenhouse. Soon, we are in what is termed a
runaway greenhouse effect, as happened to Venus eons ago. The last two surviving scientists inevitably argue, one telling the other, “See!
I told you the missing sink was in the ocean!” Earth, as we know it, dies. After this Venusian excursion in temperatures, the oxygen
disappears into the soil, the oceans evaporate and are lost and the dead Earth loses its ozone layer completely. Earth is too far from the
Sun for it to be the second Venus for long. Its atmosphere is slowly lost—as is its water—because of ultraviolet bombardment breaking up
all the molecules apart from carbon dioxide. As the atmosphere becomes thin, the Earth becomes colder. For a short while temperatures
are nearly normal, but the ultraviolet sears any life that tries to make a comeback. The carbon dioxide thins out to form a thin veneer with
a few wispy clouds and dust devils. Earth becomes the second Mars—red, desolate, with perhaps a few hardy microbes surviving.
8
Advantage 2- Space
Nanotech is key to space travel and colonization
Cynthia Kuper. Space Travel Has a Small Future, Space.com. 19 April 2000
http://www.space.com/opinionscolumns/opinions/kuper_000419.html accessed July 14, 2008
President Bill Clinton has deemed nanotechnology the next industrial revolution. NASA has publicly embraced nanotechnology. The
agency sees it as the future, not only of space travel but of space living. This is excellent news. But to make the most of it, it is important
to ensure that everyone involved has an agreed-upon understanding of what nanotechnology is and is not. What is nanotechnology?
Researchers in the field, such as myself, as well as the National Science Foundation and indeed the people who founded the field define it
as follows: Nanotechnology is the manipulation of matter on the molecular and atomic level. It is the technology of building architectures
from the bottom up with the precision of molecular and atomic control. Such technology is crucial to the future of space exploration.
NASA needs lighter and stronger spacecraft. Carbon nanotubes, a leading material in nanotechnology, provide the highest strength-to-
weight ratio of any material ever seen, some 50 to 100 times stronger than steel and one-sixth the weight. Nanotechnology will
revolutionize sensors and actuators, synthetic devices that mimic biological processes like the sense of smell and muscle contraction. The
field could make possible craft with warping wings, noninvasive medical testing in space and materials that self-repair. The materials of
nanotechnology promise to avoid degradation from radiation exposure, a common problem in space. Nanotechnology holds the key to the
next century and a true revolution in the way we live and travel -- on Earth and in space. It's no wonder that interest in this new
technology has spread from the academic research lab to the industrial sector to the investment community.
Asteroids will cause extinction – space exploration necessary– and space exploration will unify nations
stopping countries from fighting in the first place
Sagan a professor of Cornell quoted in a book review from 1994
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/stores/detail/-/books/1578150000/reviews/103-0095255-1695077 from Kirkus Reviews
This logical successor to Cosmos (1980) offers the characteristic Sagan blueprint for humankind's long-term vitality. In 1990, while
speeding out of the solar system, the Voyager 1 spacecraft snapped photographs of the planets. From a distance of 3.7 billion miles, the
Earth appears as a ``pale blue dot''--a metaphor Sagan (Astronomy and Space Sciences/Cornell Univ.) employs to underscore the utter
insignificance of our home world in relation to the great expanse of space. In his usual eloquent and impassioned language, he builds a
cogent argument that our species must venture into this vast realm and establish a space-faring civilization. Fully acknowledging the
exorbitant costs that are involved in manned spaceflight while we concurrently face pressing social, economic, and environmental
problems at home, Sagan asserts that our very survival depends on colonizing outer space. Astronomers have already identified dozens of
potential Armageddons in the form of asteroids that will someday smash into Earth. Undoubtedly, many more remain undetected. The
only way to avert inevitable catastrophe, Sagan argues, is for nations to join together and establish a permanent human presence in space.
Ultimately, he predicts, humans will conquer space because, like the planets that roam the sky (``planet'' means ``wanderer'' in Greek), we
too are wanderers. Deep within us lies a spark that compels us to explore, and space provides the new frontier. The exploration of space
will inspire the world's young people and unify quarreling nations. Technology has brought humanity to its moment of truth: Our species
has the capability either to annihilate itself or to avoid extinction by journeying to other worlds.
9
Advantage 3- Utopia
Nanotech solves for war

Gudbrum, 1997
(Mark , Superconductivity Researcher at the University of Maryland, “Nanotechnology and International Security,” Accessed 7/14/08,
http://www.foresight.org/Conferences/MNT05/Papers/Gubrud/index.html) KMH
The nanotechnic era will be fundamentally different from the era in which nuclear weapons were developed and came to
dominate the possibilities for global violence. The bombed-out cities of the Second World War, and the nuclear holocausts of our
imagination, have persuaded rational minds that there can be no expectation of a meaningful victory in total war between states
armed with hundreds of deliverable nuclear weapons. From that point of view, war is obsolete, at least direct and open war
between great powers. Nanotechnology will carry this evolution to the next step: deterrence will become obsolete, as it will not be
possible to maintain a stable armed peace between nanotechnically-armed rivals. The implications of this statement stand in
sharp contradiction to the traditions of a warrior culture and to the assumptions that currently guide policy in the United States
and in its potential rivals.
Nanotech can solves social inequalities while still protecting the environment
Wilson, Kannangara, Smith, Simmons, and Raguse, 2002
(Michael, Kamali, Michelle, Burkhard, Professors at the College of Science, Technology and Environment in Sydney, Australia,
“Nanotechnology: Basic Science and Emerging Technologies” page 237. KMH
There is no question that the greatest threat to the future welfare of mankind and to future political stability is our own impact on the envi-
ronment coupled with the depletion of natural resources. Most of these activities are essential to our economic and physical well-being.
Some problems are hangovers of our earlier ignorance and carelessness, and some persist through selfishness and greed, but in the main
we have a dilemma: improving the life of everyone on earth without degrading the earth itself. Is it possible to do both at affordable cost
and in the time scale needed — starting now and finishing the job this century? We believe there is good evidence that it can be done
using existing and expected new science and engineering. For this purpose alone nanotechnology could not have come along at a better
time, since it will dominate the solutions by providing the right combination of economics and technical capability. The main cost will be
investment in the necessary and appropriate research, development, education and training. Business opportunities in these technologies
will be vast — nanotechnology will be one of the major industries of the 21st century, since cleaning up existing pollution problems and
stopping new ones occurring is one of the major tasks facing humankind in the next few years. The quality of life can improve
dramatically for many billions if this can be done well and cheaply. Life will also noticeably improve (or stop getting worse) for all those
who are currently living in accept-able environments, so everyone on earth stands to benefit. The problem is the scale of activity needed
and hence the cost.
Nanotechnology would provide a utopia

Drexler, 86
(Eric, Nanotechnologist, “Engines of Creation,” Accessed 7/13/08, http://www.e-drexler.com/d/06/00/EOC/EOC_Chapter_15.html) KMH
This, then, is the size of the future's promise. Though limits to growth will remain, we will be able to harvest solar power a trillion
times greater than all the power now put to human use. From the resources of our solar system, we will be able to create land area
a million times that of Earth. With assemblers, automated engineering, and the resources of space we can rapidly gain wealth of a
quantity and quality beyond past dreams. Ultimate limits to lifespan will remain, but cell repair technology will make perfect
health and indefinitely long lives possible for everyone. These advances will bring new engines of destruction, but they will also make
possible active shields and arms control systems able to stabilize peace. In short, we have a chance at a future with room enough for
many worlds and many choices, and with time enough to explore them. A tamed technology can stretch our limits, making the shape
of technology pinch the shape of humanity less. In an open future of wealth, room, and diversity, groups will be free to form
almost any society they wish, free to fail or set a shining example for the world. Unless your dreams demand that you dominate
everyone else, chances are that other people will wish to share them. If so, then you and those others may choose to get together to
shape a new world. If a promising start fails - if it solves too many problems or too few-then you will be able to try again. Our
problem today is not to plan or build utopias but to seek a chance to try.
10
Solvency- Plan  nanotech investment

Government incentives of _________ will foster massive investment in broad based nanotechnology
NCMS. Nanotechnology Survey Results For The Use of Nanotechnology Within The 2005 US Manufacturing Industry. 2005
http://www.azonano.com/Details.asp?ArticleID=1668 accessed july 12, 2008
Government can lead by defining and funding National priorities, and creating meaningful grand challenge incentives for early industrial
adopters of nanotechnology. This will accelerate the broad-based translation of nanotechnology advances across multiple industry sectors.
Areas where greater government involvement in nanotechnology can have high National impact while leveraging substantially larger
private investments include: · Incentives favoring longer-term investments (e.g. tax-free bonds for financing, tax credits for capital
investments, reduced capital gains tax rates, investment-specific loan guarantees, etc.)
11
Solvency- Short term goals lead to long term

developments
There needs to be long term investment into nanotechnology—near term goals will ensure public support
NCMS. Nanotechnology Survey Results For The Use of Nanotechnology Within The 2005 US Manufacturing Industry. 2005
http://www.azonano.com/Details.asp?ArticleID=1668 accessed july 12, 2008
It is unlikely that the vast field of nanotechnology would reach the levels of maturity (like other traditional physical science-based
industries did) within our lifetimes. This justifies the case for long-term government investment in nanotechnology. Private and
institutional investments would grow faster when some of the fundamental technical issues of process scalability and cost of production of
new nano-components as well as associated risks have been more comprehensively addressed.
Public-private collaborations in applied nanotechnology will hasten societal support when targeted towards nearer-term national concerns
such as:
· Increasing productivity and profitability in manufacturing
· Improving energy resources and utilization
· Reducing environmental impact
· Enhancing healthcare with better pharmaceuticals
· Improving agriculture and food production
· Expanding the capabilities of computational and information technologies.
Short term successes and investment are key to building the foundation and economic muscle for the entire
nanotech industry
Matthew Fordham, AP Technology Writer. Nanosys: Nanotechnology May Change Lives, Space.com. December 08, 2003
http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/technology/nanotechnology_031208.html accessed July 14, 2008
Nanosys Inc., a 35-employee Silicon Valley startup quickly gaining strength in the nascent industry, isn't banking on marvels of
nanotechnology stitching themselves into reality any time soon. It's building instead on near-term possibilities, hoping to make money and
lay a foundation. The pragmatic approach may not be as dramatic as some sci-fi visions -- but it's attracting considerable attention and
investment. That doesn't mean the company's view is narrow -- Nanosys is working on applications as diverse as solar cells, sensors and
nano-engineered fibers and electronics while developing and licensing core technologies it hopes will build business muscle. "Today, our
focus is on very simple things," said Stephen Empedocles, a co-founder and director of business development. "Things that we can do in
the next couple years to get into the market so that people will have valuable nanotechnology at their fingertips."
12
Solvency- AT: Can’t Make Nano Solar

Nanotech solar panels could be here within 5 years
Power Nanotech, Nanotechnology trends. June 05, 2008 http://www.nanosolsystems.com/trends.html accessed July 12, 2008
Investors are pouring money into solar nanotech startups, hoping that thinking small will translate into big profits. Both inventors and
investors are betting that flexible sheets of tiny solar cells used to harness the sun's strength will ultimately provide a cheaper, more
efficient source of energy than the current smorgasbord of alternative and fossil fuels. Power Nanotech is developing solar solutions in
nanotechnology and will position itself for growth through acquisition. Watch the CNN video Nanosys and Nanosolar in Palo Alto,
along with Konarka in Lowell, Mass. say their research will result in thin rolls of highly efficient light-collecting plastics spread across
rooftops or built into building materials. These rolls, the companies say, will be able to provide energy for prices as low as the electricity
currently provided by utilities, which averages $1 per watt. Other uses of nanotechnology foreseen by Konarka, Nanosolar and Nanosys
include form-fitting plastic batteries for electronic devices like cell phones and laptops. While all three companies provide prototypes for
large corporate research labs and government agencies, company representatives and investors are reticent to predict when
nanotechnology-powered solar systems will be commercially available. Industry watchers, however, say that achieving mass production
of these products may take five years or longer.
13
Solvency- AT: Nanoassemblers not possible

Nanoassemblers will be ready within the next 20 years
Bill Joy, cofounder and Chief Scientist of Sun Microsystems, was cochair of the presidential commission on the future of IT research.
Why the future doesn't need us, Wired News. April 2000 http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/8.04/joy_pr.html
Then, last summer, Brosl Hasslacher told me that nanoscale molecular electronics was now practical. This wasnew news, at least to me,
and I think to many people - and it radically changed my opinion about nanotechnology. It sent me back toEngines of Creation. Rereading
Drexler's work after more than 10 years, I was dismayed to realize how little I had remembered of its lengthy section called "Dangers and
Hopes," including a discussion of how nanotechnologies can become "engines of destruction." Indeed, in my rereading of this cautionary
material today, I am struck by how naive some of Drexler's safeguard proposals seem, and how much greater I judge the dangers to be
now than even he seemed to then. (Having anticipated and described many technical and political problems with nanotechnology, Drexler
started the Foresight Institute in the late 1980s "to help prepare society for anticipated advanced technologies" - most important,
nanotechnology.)
The enabling breakthrough to assemblers seems quite likely within the next 20 years. Molecular electronics - the new subfield of
nanotechnology where individual molecules are circuit elements - should mature quickly and become enormously lucrative within this
decade, causing a large incremental investment in all nanotechnologies.
14
Solvency- AT: Grey Goo

There will never be grey goo – safeguards will be built which will allow counter-measures
Webb, 2002
(Stephen, Physicist at Open University of London, “If the Universe Is Teeming with Aliens... Where Is Everybody? Fifty Solutions to
Fermi's Paradox and the Problem of Extraterrestrial Life”, Accessed 7/14/08, lexis) KMH
The young boy in Woody Allen's Annie Hall becomes depressed at the thought that the Universe is going to die, since that will be the end
of every-thing. I am becoming depressed writing this section, so to cheer up myself — and any young Woodys that might be reading — I
think we have to ask whether the gray goo problem is even remotely likely to arise. As Asimov was fond of pointing out, when man
invented the sword he also in-vented the hand guard so that one's fingers did not slither down the blade when one thrust at an
opponent. The engineers who develop nanotechnology are certain to develop sophisticated safeguards. Even if self-replicating
nanobots were to escape or if they were released for malicious reasons, then steps could be taken to destroy them before
catastrophe resulted. A population of nanobots increasing its mass exponentially at the expense of the biosphere would
immediately be detected by the waste heat it generated. Defense measures could be deployed at once. A more realistic scenario, in
which a population of nanobots increased its mass slowly, so the waste heat they generated was not immediately detectable, would
take years to convert Earth's biomass into nanomass. That would provide plenty of time to mount an effective defense. The gray
goo problem might not be such a difficult problem to overcome: it is simply one more risk that an advanced technological species will
have to live with.
Grey Goo wouldn’t destroy the universe even if it happened

Webb, 2002
(Stephen, Physicist at Open University of London, “If the Universe Is Teeming with Aliens... Where Is Everybody? Fifty Solutions to
Fermi's Paradox and the Problem of Extraterrestrial Life”, Accessed 7/14/08, lexis) KMH
This solution to the paradox, which has been seriously proposed, suffers the same problem as many other solutions: even if it can
occur it is not convincing as a "universal" solution. Not every ETC will succumb to the gray goo.
Nanobots wouldn’t be able to find enough energy to produce grey goo

Freitas, 2000
(Robert, Research Scientist, “Some Limits to Global Ecophagy by Biovorous Nanoreplicators,” with Public Policy Recommendations,
Accessed 7/14/08, http://www.foresight.org/nano/Ecophagy.html) KMH
5.0 Energy and Materials Requirements Limitations. The need for energy is another fundamental limit on the speed at which
biospheric conversion can take place. During ecophagy, the richest source of energy is likely to be chemical energy derived from
the assimilation of biomolecules found in the biosphere. For example, a biomass density of ~10 kg/m2 on land [20, 21] typically
having ~107 J/kg of recoverable chemical energy [6] implies an available energy density of ~108 J/m2 at the terrestrial surface. By
comparison, visible-spectrum sunlight at noon on a cloudless day (Isolar ~ 100-400 W/m2 [6]) may provide at most ~107 J/m2 over the
course of an 8-hour work day. Other sources of scavengable energy such as radionuclides are much scarcer (Section 2.0). Note that the
complete combustion in air of a mass of glucose equal to Mbio would consume ~5.3 ×1015 kg O2, only 0.5% of the ~1.1 ×1018 kg of
oxygen contained within Earth's ~21% O2 atmosphere. Hence oxygen-dependent ecophagy will not be oxygen-limited. Interestingly,
diamond has the highest known oxidative chemical storage density because it has the highest atom number (and bond) density per unit
volume. Organic materials store less energy per unit volume, from ~3 times less than diamond for cholesterol, to ~5 times less for
vegetable protein, to ~10-12 times less for amino acids and wood [6]. Since replibots must build energy-rich product structuresby
consuming relatively energy-poor feedstock structures (e.g., biomass), it may not be possible for biosphere conversion to proceed
entirely to completion (e.g., all carbon atoms incorporated into nanorobots) using chemical energy alone, even taking into account the
possible energy value of the decarbonified sludge byproduct, though such unused carbon may enter the atmosphere as CO2 and will
still be lost to the biosphere.
15
Blue goo will solve Grey goo

Arrius, 2003
(Quintus, Staff writer for Strategy Page, “Nanotechnology: Apocalyptic Development?,” November, Accessed 7/14/08,
www.strategypage.com) KMH
One suggested solution to the problem of "grey goo" is "blue goo" - special "policeman" nanotech devices designed specifically to
recognise and disassemble molecular machines which are out of control. The blue goo would be deliberately released into the
world, and allowed to replicate to a pre-determined level, there to wait and monitor the activity of other nanotech and act in case
of runaway self-replicators. It's a physically possible solution to the problem - but the human race has a long history of developing
technologies which destroy the environment well before they develop the technologies to control them. With nanotech, we will only get
one chance - the first accidental release could be the end of all life on earth.
Grey goo isn’t a possibility – even the founder of the theory said he was wrong
Radford, March 13, 2008
(Tim, Staff writer for The Guardian (London), “G2: Shortcuts: The Question: What is grey goo?,” March 13, 2008 Thursday, Accessed
7/14/08, lexis) KMH
Grey goo is journalistic shorthand for the hazards of nanotechnology: engineering at the scale of a billionth of a metre. Researchers have
begun to exploit the unique properties of matter at the finest detail, fashioning tools a few molecules at a time, to produce objects so small
you could line up half a million on a millimetre. According to Friends of the Earth, more than 100 products available in the UK -
antibacterials, agricultural chemicals, baby food - contain nanoparticles, and no one knows how toxic they might prove. Chemists and
pharmacologists will argue that they have always used nanotechnology - all chemical reactions happen at the scale of atoms - but they just
didn't have the word for it. And, they add, think about the benefits that might follow: little bits of molecular machinery designed to repair
heart lesions, destroy cancer cells, detect and kill pathogens, and so on.This is where the grey goo scenario begins. Twenty years ago, in
his book Engines of Creation, scientist Eric Drexler hypothesised that in the future, nanotechnological engines might be designed to
replicate themselves, perhaps to clean up oil spills or toxic landfill by making baby nanobots that remove the nasty stuff. But what if these
got out of control, and started consuming everything? If they multiplied exponentially, they could, he thought, turn the planet into grey
goo in two days. In fact, no one knows how to make this kind of artificial life, and Drexler later disowned the term. Prince Charles claims
never to have used it, but he certainly inspired "grey goo" headlines back in 2003, when he asked the Royal Society to examine the
potential hazards of nanotechnology. Alas, nobody can ever claim that a technology is absolutely safe: grey goo will remain the stuff of
campaigner nightmares.
16
Solvency- EXT: AT: Grey Goo

Replicating nanobots are impossible
Smalley, 2003
(Rick, University Professor, Gene and Norman Hackerman Professor of Chemistry and Professor of Physics & Astronomy, 1996 Nobel
Prize Winner – Chemistry and Engineering News, “Nanotechnology: Drexler and Smalley Make the Case for and Against “Molecular
Assemblers’”, December 1, lexis) KMH
But where does the enzyme or ribosome entity come from in your vision of a self-replicating nanobot? Is there a living cell
somewhere inside the nanobot that churns these out? There then must be liquid water present somewhere inside, and all the
nutrients necessary for life. And now that we're thinking about it, how is it that the nanobot picks just the enzyme molecule it needs
out of this cell, and how does it know just how to hold it and make sure it joins with the local region where the assembly is being
done, in just the right fashion? How does the nanobot know when the enzyme is damaged and needs to be replaced? How does the
nanobot do error detection and error correction? And what kind of chemistry can it do? Enzymes and ribosomes can only work in
water, and therefore cannot build anything that is chemically unstable in water. Biology is wonderous in the vast diversity of what it
can build, but it can't make a crystal of silicon, or steel, or copper, or aluminum, or titanium, or virtually any of the key materials
on which modern technology is built. Without such materials, how is this self-replicating nanobot ever going to make a radio, or a
laser, or an ultrafast memory, or virtually any other key component of modern technological society that isn't made of rock, wood,
flesh, and bone? I can only guess that you imagine it is possible to make a molecular entity that has the superb, selective chemical-
construction ability of an enzyme without the necessity of liquid water. If so, it would be helpful to all of us who take the nanobot
assembler idea of "Engines of Creation" seriously if you would tell us more about this nonaqueous enzymelike chemistry. What liquid
medium will you use? How are you going to replace the loss of the hydrophobic/hydrophilic, ion-solvating, hydrogen-bonding genius of
water in orchestrating precise three-dimensional structures and membranes? Or do you really think it is possible to do enzymelike
chemistry of arbitrary complexity with only dry surfaces and a vacuum? The central problem I see with the nanobot self-assembler
then is primarily chemistry. If the nanobot is restricted to be a water-based life-form, since this is the only way its molecular
assembly tools will work, then there is a long list of vulnerabilities and limitations to what it can do. If it is a non-water-based life-
form, then there is a vast area of chemistry that has eluded us for centuries.
Nobody will be able to produce self-replicating nanobots

Freitas, 2000
However, biovorous nanorobots capable of comprehensive ecophagy will not be easy to build and their design will require
exquisite attention to numerous complex specifications and operational challenges. Such biovores can emerge only after a lengthy
period of purposeful focused effort, or as a result of deliberate experiments aimed at creating general-purpose artificial life,
perhaps by employing genetic algorithms, and are highly unlikely to arise solely by accident.
17
Good kinds of nanobots will be able to defeat self-replicating bots

Freitas, 2000
8.4 Malicious Ecophagy. More difficult scenarios involve ecophagic attacks that are launched not to convert biomass to nanomass, but
rather primarily to destroy biomass. The optimal malicious ecophagic attack strategy appears to involve a two-phase process. In the first
phase, initial seed replibots are widely distributed in the vicinity of the target biomass, replicating with maximum stealth up to some
critical population size by consuming local environmental substrate to build nanomass. In the second phase, the now-large replibot
population ceases replication and exclusively undertakes its primary destructive purpose. More generally, this strategy may be described
as Build/Destroy. During the Build phase of the malicious "badbots," and assuming technological equivalence, defensive
"goodbots" enjoy at least three important tactical advantages over their adversaries: Preparation -- defensive agencies can
manufacture and position in advance overwhelming quantities of (ideally, non-self-replicating) defensive instrumentalities, e.g.,
goodbots, which can immediately be deployed at the first sign of trouble, with minimal additional risk to the environment; Efficiency
-- while badbots must simultaneously replicate and defend themselves against attack (either actively or by maintaining stealth),
goodbots may concentrate exclusively on attacking badbots (e.g., because of their large numerical superiority in an early
deployment) and thus enjoy lower operational overhead and higher efficiency in achieving their purpose, all else equal; and
Leverage -- in terms of materials, energy, time and sophistication, fewer resources are generally required to confine, disable, or
destroy a complex machine than are required to build or replicate the same complex machine from scratch (e.g., one small bomb
can destroy a large bomb-making factory; one small missile can sink a large ship). >
Grey goo is impossible – history of life proves

Electronic News, 2006
(Steven Keeping, “Researchers Debate Nano Future”, February, Accessed 7/14/08, lexis) KMH
Quantum nanoscience researchers are having to refute nanotechnology's negative "grey goo" publicity before turning to the serious
business of progress towards a practical quantum computer. At an international conference held in Noosa, Qld. at the end of January,
scientists were at pains to dispel the myths while getting to grips with more serious issues such as who will control the technology, and
how to protect publicly-funded Australian intellectual property (IP). Grey goo is a hypothetical scenario in which self-replicating
nanobots devour everything else, leaving just detritus behind."It's complete and utter nonsense," says Professor Gerard Milburn,
convener of the Sir Mark Oliphant Conference on Frontiers of Quantum Nanoscience. "It's not science. It's not even remotely feasible."
He pointed out that life itself has been replicating uncontrolled for the past 2-3 billion years, without any individual lifeform
consuming all others.
18
Nanoassemblers causing grey goo pose very little risk

Ralph Merkle, Ph.D from Stanford University in electrical engineering. Nanotechnology; Research and Perspectives, edited by BC
Crandall and James Lewis. 1989 p. 290-291
Let us contrast biological systems and artificial systems, first consid¬ering energy usage. Biological systems use a variety of energy
sources. A horse, for example, can munch on a variety of vegetables in nature. Bacteria can use many different sugars. By contrast, the
artificial systems that we have built to date use fairly specialized energy sources. A car uses gasoline. The image of a car foraging for
grass or munching on bushes is somewhat unlikely. There is reason to believe that artificially designed systems, unless they are
deliberately designed so that they can forage in the wild, will have a hard go of it in a natural environment. In particular, if your artificial
system is confined to utilizing a single source of energy, and if that single source of energy is presented to it in a relatively refined fashion
(which appears to be an economically attrac¬tive alternative), cutting off that form of energy stops the system from functioning. Cars can't
run without gasoline. Second, there is a requirement for raw materials. Again, biological systems are quite capable of using a wide range
of raw materials. Bacteria can utilize any of several different sugars combined with a few inorganic ions. Artificial systems today have
many complex components. An au¬tomobile has lots of parts, and the economic way to build a car is to build some of the parts in the auto
plant and some of the parts some where else. If you translate this principle to the design of an artificial self-replicating system, you can
see that it is likely to be cheaper to have a system that gets at least some of its components handed to it on a silver platter. Unlike
biological systems, which evolved in nature to survive in a harsh world, an artificial self-replicating system will be in a hothouse
environment where it's fed particular resources designed for its specific needs. In particular, you can give your artificial self-replicating
system compounds that are simply not found in nature but are relatively cheap and easy to produce. Not only does this make good
economic sense, it's also a pretty good design requirement. I recommend against designing artificial self-replicating systems that are so
robust that you could toss one into a fish pond and watch it swim away, thrive, and reproduce. This situation can and should be avoided in
practice.
19
Solar Nanotech- More efficient

Solar Nanotech will be fives times more efficient than current solar energy
Lovgren, 2005
(Stefan, Senior Staff Writer for National Geographic News, “Spray-On Solar-Power Cells Are True Breakthrough”, September 17, 2005,
Accessed 7/13/08, Accessed Online, http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/01/0114_050114_solarplastic.html) KMH
Scientists have invented a plastic solar cell that can turn the sun's power into electrical energy, even on a cloudy day.
The plastic material uses nanotechnology and contains the first solar cells able to harness the sun's invisible, infrared rays. The
breakthrough has led theorists to predict that plastic solar cells could one day become five times more efficient than current solar
cell technology. Like paint, the composite can be sprayed onto other materials and used as portable electricity. A sweater coated in the
material could power a cell phone or other wireless devices. A hydrogen-powered car painted with the film could potentially convert
enough energy into electricity to continually recharge the car's battery. The researchers envision that one day "solar farms" consisting of
the plastic material could be rolled across deserts to generate enough clean energy to supply the entire planet's power needs. "The sun that
reaches the Earth's surface delivers 10,000 times more energy than we consume," said Ted Sargent, an electrical and computer
engineering professor at the University of Toronto. Sargent is one of the inventors of the new plastic material. "If we could cover 0.1
percent of the Earth's surface with [very efficient] large-area solar cells," he said, "we could in principle replace all of our energy
habits with a source of power which is clean and renewable."
Solar Nanotechnology can provide electricity from almost anything, including sweaters
Lovgren, writer for National Geographic News, January 2005
National Geographic News, Spray-On Solar-Power Cells Are True Breakthrough, accessed 7/13/08,
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/01/0114_050114_solarplastic.html
He said the plastic coating (nanotechnological plastic solar cells) could be woven into a shirt or sweater and used to charge an item like a
cell phone. "A sweater is already absorbing all sorts of light both in the infrared and the visible," said Sargent. "Instead of just turning that
into heat, as it currently does, imagine if it were to turn that into electricity." Other possibilities include energy-saving plastic sheeting
that could be unfurled onto a rooftop to supply heating needs, or solar cell window coating that could let in enough infrared light to power
home appliances.
20
Solar Nanotech- provides energy independence

Nanotech is will allow give us energy independence
Nanotech Wire, 2005
(“Nanotechnology solar breakthrough will help spur viability of alternative energy”, 10/8/2005, Accessed 7/13/08,
http://nanotechwire.com/news.asp?nid=2411) KMH
Imagine being able to “paint” your roof with enough alternative energy to heat and cool your home. What if soldiers in the field could
carry an energy source in a roll of plastic wrap in their backpacks? Those ideas sound like science fiction ? particularly in the wake of the
rising costs of fossil fuel. But both are on the way to becoming reality because of a breakthrough in solar research by a team of scientists
from New Mexico State University and Wake Forest University. While traditional solar panels are made of silicon, which is expensive,
brittle and shatters like glass, organic solar cells being developed by this team are made of plastic that is relatively inexpensive, flexible,
can be wrapped around structures or even applied like paint, said physicist Seamus Curran, head of the nanotechnology laboratory at
NMSU. Nanotechnology, or molecular manufacturing, refers to the ability to build things one atom at a time. The relatively low energy
efficiency levels produced by organic solar cells have been a drawback. To be effective producers of energy, they must be able to convert
10 percent of the energy in sunlight to electricity. Typical silicon panels are about 12 percent energy conversion efficient. That level of
energy conversion has been a difficult reach for researchers on organic solar technology, with many of them hitting about 3 to 4 percent.
But the NMSU/Wake Forest team has achieved a solar energy efficiency level of 5.2 percent. The announcement was made at the Santa
Fe Workshop on Nanoengineered Materials and Macro-Molecular Technologies, which opened Sunday and continues through Friday.
“This means we are closer to making organic solar cells that are available on the market,” Curran said. Conventional thinking has been
that that landmark was at least a decade away. With this group’s research, it may be only four or five years before plastic solar cells are a
reality for consumers, Curran added. The importance of the breakthrough cannot be underestimated, Curran said. “We need to look into
alternative energy sources if the United States is to reduce its dependence on foreign sources,” the NMSU physics professor said. New
Mexico Economic Development Department Secretary Rick Homans added, “This breakthrough pushes the state of New Mexico further
ahead in the development of usable solar energy, a vital national resource. It combines two of the important clusters on which the state is
focused: renewable energy and micro nano systems, and underlines the strong research base of our state universities.” A cheap, flexible
plastic made of a polymer blend would revolutionize the solar market, Curran said. “Our expectation is to get beyond 10 percent in the
next five years,” Curran said. “Our current mix is using polymer and carbon buckyballs (fullerenes) and good engineering from Wake
Forest and unique NSOM imaging from NMSU to get to that point.” NSOM or near-field scanning optical microscopy allows them to
scan objects too small for regular microscopes. The development is an outgrowth of the collaborative’s work developing high-tech
coatings for military aircraft, a program supported by Sens. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., and Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., Curran said. The
nanotechnologies workshop, being held at the Loretto Inn and Spa in Santa Fe, is co-sponsored by the Economic Development
Department. Researchers from around the world are attending sessions that will examine novel and exotic approaches to nano-scale
technologies.
21
Solar Nanotech- effective, reliable, provides world

electricity
Nano Solar Power Cells can be 5 times more effective than current solar cell technology and could provide
the entire worlds electricity in a clean and reliable way
Scientists have invented a plastic solar cell that can turn the sun's power into electrical energy, even on a cloudy day. The plastic material
uses nanotechnology and contains the first solar cells able to harness the sun's invisible, infrared rays. The breakthrough has led theorists
to predict that plastic solar cells could one day become five times more efficient than current solar cell technology. Like paint, the
composite can be sprayed onto other materials and used as portable electricity. A sweater coated in the material could power a cell phone
or other wireless devices. A hydrogen-powered car painted with the film could potentially convert enough energy into electricity to
continually recharge the car's battery. The researchers envision that one day "solar farms" consisting of the plastic material could be
rolled across deserts to generate enough clean energy to supply the entire planet's power needs. "The sun that reaches the Earth's surface
delivers 10,000 times more energy than we consume," said Ted Sargent, an electrical and computer engineering professor at the
University of Toronto. Sargent is one of the inventors of the new plastic material. "If we could cover 0.1 percent of the Earth's surface
with [very efficient] large-area solar cells," he said, "we could in principle replace all of our energy habits with a source of power which is
clean and renewable."
100% of our energy needs can be met in 20 years with Nano Solar Power
Kurzweil, recipient of the $500,000 Lemelson-MIT prize, February 2005
Live Science, Ray Kurzweil aims to live forever, accessed 7/13/08, http://www.livescience.com/health/ap_Kurzweil_050213.html
He predicted the fall of the Soviet Union. He predicted the explosive spread of the Internet and wireless access. Now futurist and inventor
Ray Kurzweil is part of distinguished panel of engineers that says solar power will scale up to produce all the energy needs of Earth's
people in 20 years. There is 10,000 times more sunlight than we need to meet 100 percent of our energy needs, he says, and the
technology needed for collecting and storing it is about to emerge as the field of solar energy is going to advance exponentially in
accordance with Kurzweil's Law of Accelerating Returns. That law yields a doubling of price performance in information technologies
every year. Advances in technology are about to expand with the introduction of nano-engineered materials for solar panels, making them
far more efficient, lighter and easier to install. The reason why solar energy technologies will advance exponentially, Kurzweil said, is
because it is an "information technology" (one for which we can measure the information content), and thereby subject to the Law of
Accelerating Returns. "We also see an exponential progression in the use of solar energy," he said. "It is doubling now every two years.
Doubling every two years means multiplying by 1,000 in 20 years. At that rate we'll meet 100 percent of our energy needs in 20 years."
Solar energy powered by nanotech can produce all our energy needs
Scheer, writer for Emagazine, July 2005
The Enviromental Magazine, Solar Nanotech coming of age, accessed 7/14/08, http://www.emagazine.com/view/?2689
The leading lights of the so-called "solar nanotechnology" revolution are companies like Nanosys and Nanosolar, both of Palo Alto,
California, and Konarka of Lowell, Massachusetts. Engineers at these companies have created prototypes of thin rolls of highly efficient
light-collecting plastics for spreading across rooftops or embedding in building materials in order to power heating, cooling and other
electrical needs within. Company executives claim that once they can mass-produce these products, consumers will be able to generate all
their power from the sun while only spending about as much as they do today for non-renewable energy.
22
Solar Nanotech- AT: not reliable, no production at

night
Nano Solar Cells guarantee power even at night
Plastic solar cells are not new. But existing materials are only able to harness the sun's visible light. While half of the sun's power lies in
the visible spectrum, the other half lies in the infrared spectrum. The new material is the first plastic composite that is able to harness the
infrared portion. "Everything that's warm gives off some heat. Even people and animals give off heat," Sargent said. "So there actually is
some power remaining in the infrared [spectrum], even when it appears to us to be dark outside." The researchers combined specially
designed nano particles called quantum dots with a polymer to make the plastic that can detect energy in the infrared. With further
advances, the new plastic "could allow up to 30 percent of the sun's radiant energy to be harnessed, compared to 6 percent in today's best
plastic solar cells," said Peter Peumans, a Stanford University electrical engineering professor, who studied the work.
Solar Power, using nanotech, can receive energy at night

Stricker, researcher at the Idaho National Library, December 2007
Idaho National Library, Harvesting the Sun’s energy with antennas, accessed 7/14/08,
https://inlportal.inl.gov/portal/server.pt?open=514&objID=1269&mode=2&featurestory=DA_101047
Researchers at Idaho National Laboratory, along with partners at Microcontinuum Inc. (Cambridge, MA) and Patrick Pinhero of the
University of Missouri, are developing a novel way to collect energy from the sun with a technology that could potentially cost pennies a
yard, be imprinted on flexible materials and still draw energy after the sun has set. The new approach, which garnered two 2007 Nano50
awards, uses a special manufacturing process to stamp tiny square spirals of conducting metal onto a sheet of plastic. Each interlocking
spiral "nanoantenna" is as wide as 1/25 the diameter of a human hair. Because of their size, the nanoantennas absorb energy in the
infrared part of the spectrum, just outside the range of what is visible to the eye. The sun radiates a lot of infrared energy, some of which
is soaked up by the earth and later released as radiation for hours after sunset. Nanoantennas can take in energy from both sunlight and the
earth's heat, with higher efficiency than conventional solar cells. "I think these antennas really have the potential to replace traditional
solar panels," says physicist Steven Novack, who spoke about the technology in November at the National Nano Engineering Conference
in Boston.
23
Solar Nanotech- AT: no mass production

Nanosolar will quickly overtake current means of solar production
Hunt, writer for Celsias, November 2007
Celsias, Nanosolar’s breakthrough – solar now cheaper than coal, accessed 7/14/08, http://www.celsias.com/article/nanosolars-
breakthrough-technology-solar-now-cheap
These coatings are as thin as a layer of paint and can transfer sunlight to power at amazing efficiency. Although the underlying technology
has been around for years, Nanosolar has created the actual technology to manufacture and mass produce the solar sheets. The Nanosolar
plant in San Jose, once in full production in 2008, will be capable of producing 430 megawatts per year. This is more than the combined
total of every other solar manufacturer in the U.S.
24
Solar Nanotech- AT: Costs too much

Approaches to low cost solar cells will occur because of nanotechnology
“Nanotechnology: Basic Science and Emerging Technologies” pages 182-183. KMH
New approaches to low cost solar cells will almost certainly emerge with the help of nanotechnology. There has been little work to date,
but this should change as nanoparticles of the various necessary constituentsbecome available. New solar cells could be based on
nanoparticles of semiconductors or coated or filled nanotubes, individually or as films, maybe cross-linked with conducting electrode
nanowires, or specially doped titanium oxide in solid or liquid electrolyte. They may stand alone or be coated onto or doped into
nanopolymers or metal nanos¬tructures; or they may be embedded in a charge transfer medium. Nanosystems could lower costs and give
better efficiencies by enabling more efficient use of the solar spectrum. Most current tech¬nologies sample only a part of the incident solar
energy and use it with reduced efficiency because they employ just one material that has poor absorption coefficients across some parts of
the solar spectrum. Geometric compromises are made to get the best optics while min¬imising recombination (electrical) losses. It is no
use if most photons go right through the device or are absorbed well away from the inter¬nal junctions that collect them; or if the photo
generated electrical car¬riers produced can't get to the outside world because they have to traverse too large a distance in the junction
itself. Some thin film solar cell systems overcome the spectral problem to some extent by putting stacks of different types of
semiconductor junctions on top of each other [11]. With nanotechnology, the use of mixed materials should be easier in principle. To date
some of the best cells utilise half buried lay¬ers where metal fills laser-cut grooves. Nano-techniques could go fur¬ther, but an integrated
approach to production of the whole cell would need to be used, including the incorporation of arrays of internal nanowires, which might
be conducting carbon nanotubes, for instance.
25
Global Warming – Nanotubes/NanoBatteries

NanoBatteries and Nanotubes would drastically reduce carbon emissions with efficiency and effectiveness
Millennium Project of the American Council for the United Nations University, Global Energy Scenarios Scenario 2. Environmental
Backlash. August 08, 2007 http://www.millennium-project.org/millennium/energy-env-backlash.html accessed July 12, 2008
Government incentives helped stimulate retrofits in such green technologies as photovoltaic roofing tiles and walls for buildings, better
use of natural light for heating as well as saving electricity, more efficient windows, and liquid crystal display lighting (solid state lighting
that puts the right photon, at the right place, at the right time, in the right color, with the desired intensity) that is ten times more efficient
than conventional lighting. Even shading over parking garages in India and China is being replaced by photovoltaic nanotech sheeting to
produce extra income for parking lot owners. Cars and trucks have been retrofitted for different fuels. Rooftops from Egypt to Ecuador
are getting solar panels. However, one of the biggest retrofits that helped alter the energy situation was Wherever feasible, nanotubes have
replaced transmission wire in much of the world to conduct electricity more efficiently. This has had the same effect as producing a new
source of energy without greenhouse gasses or nuclear waste. Many cars built since 2015 remove CO2 from exhaust gases by chemical
absorption with solvents, and thriving businesses retrofit previously built cars with this carbon capture equipment. Energy storage was
dramatically improved by replacing old batteries with those using a range of nanotube applications.[4] These new "nanobatteries" plus the
three-dimensional computer chips with nanotubes have drastically cut the computer drain on the electric grids that just 15 years ago
accounted for nearly 20% of electric usage in high tech areas of the world.
26
Global Warming- Sequestering

Nanotech solves CO2 emissions by sequestering the CO2
Millennium Project of the American Council for the United Nations University, Global Energy Scenarios Scenario 2. Environmental
Backlash. August 08, 2007 http://www.millennium-project.org/millennium/energy-env-backlash.html accessed July 12, 2008
Although this prevents further damage, it does not solve the problem of global warming. Additional ways had to be found to sequester the
excessive global warming gases. Green Smart engineers have been testing nanotechnology applications to exhaust systems to reduce CO2
emissions. The use of nanotech on the surface of buildings to strip carbon from the air is a source for future molecular manufacturing
applications. The massive tree plantings have helped, but they have only reduced the growth rate of carbon in the atmosphere without
turning it around. However, the uses of advanced composites, ceramics, nanotubes, plastics, and lightweight-steel have more than doubled
the efficiency of cars and trucks, which has reduced emissions proportionally.
27
Global Warming- Renewables Solve

Renewable energy would significantly prevent global warming
Union of Concerned Scientists, Clean Energy. September 7th, 2005. http://www.ucsusa.org/clean_energy/fossil_fuels/ accessed
07/08/2008
Fossil fuels—coal, oil, and natural gas—are America's primary source of energy, accounting for more than 70 percent of current U.S.
electricity generation. However, the extraction and burning of these fuels contributes to global warming, causes cancer and other chronic
health problems, and degrades valuable land and water resources. In fact, fossil fuel-fired electricity generation is the single greatest
source of air pollution in the United States, and power plants are the leading U.S. source of carbon dioxide emissions—a primary
contributor to global warming. Fossil fuels also produce nitrogen oxides, sulfur oxides, hydrocarbons, dust, soot, smoke, and other
suspended matter. To decrease our dependence on fossil fuels while improving human health and environmental sustainability, UCS
engages in analysis and advocacy that encourages the implementation of energy efficiency measures and increased use of renewable
energy technologies.
28
Sun Death-2AC Add On

The sun is going to run out of hydrogen and this will cause earth to get engulfed by the sun and cause us to
all but go extinct in 2 billion years because of lack of heat
Exit Mundi, collector of apocalyptic scenarios. AAAAARGH!; Here Comes the Sun. August 08, 2007
http://www.exitmundi.nl/Sunburn.htm accessed July 13, 2008
In case you didn't know, the Sun is in fact a huge nuclear power plant. It runs on hydrogen. The Sun transfers hydrogen atoms into helium
by nuclear fusion. It's nothing like the puny hydrogen bombs humanity finds so impressive. Each second, no less than 400 million tons of
hydrogen goes boom. Unfortunately, the amount of fuel inside the Sun is limited. You can't see it, but in fact, that huge light bulb in the
sky we call `Sun' shrinks and cools down a tiny little bit every second. The Sun is `middle aged'. In another 5,000 million years, it will
run out of hydrogen. Long before, we will notice the consequences. On the one hand, the Sun will get brighter and warmer. On the other
hand, as the Sun shrinks and becomes less heavy, its gravitational pull on the Earth will loosen. Consequently, the orbit of our planet and
all other planets in the solar system will widen. Okay, so an earthly year will be several weeks longer. But don't mistake, there's a
downside here. It will get colder. And not just a little bit. Within ònly' several billions of years, Earth will become an icy, permafrost
planet, where it will be hard to survive. Well, we're still lucky, really. When the Sun eventually runs out of hydrogen, the nuclear
reactions inside the Sun's core will stop. There will be no explosive force pushing outwards from the heart of the Sun anymore. The Sun
will collapse, pressed together by its own gravity. Subsequently, temperatures inside the Sun will rise even more. And, lucky we, there
will be another nuclear reaction sparking off. The Sun will start fusing helium into carbon and hydrogen this time. KABOOM! This will
prevent the Sun from collapsing any further. Finally, we will have warmth again. But wait, we're in trouble. A nuclear power plant that
runs on helium gives off a hell of a lot more energy and heat than one run on hydrogen. The new, immense power of the Sun's core will
literally blow up the Sun. The Sun will grow, eating up several planets: first Mercury, then Venus. And next on the menu, yes, Earth.
Nanotechnologies ability to engineer things will prevent multiple scenarios for extinction—including the sun
running out of hydrogen
Seth Shostak, SETI Institute. Saving the Planet (Or, how science education is good for everyone's future), Space.com. November 10,
2005. http://www.space.com/searchforlife/seti_savetheplanet_051110.html accessed July 13, 2008
Many of the dangers that will confront your extremely great grandchildren involve changes in the Sun. The gradual brightening of Sol's
ignescent face will begin to interfere with plant life in 100 million years or so, but this problem, too, could be engineered away. By that
distant date, it should be a fairly simple matter to erect orbiting barriers to reduce the solar flux, or possibly re-formulate our atmosphere
to act as a natural screen. In a few billion years, the Sun will begin to die, swelling up like a puffer fish. An obvious counter-move by our
descendants would be to simply decamp to a cooler neighborhood, either farther out in the solar system (think: engineered habitats), or to
another star system altogether. Either would be a grandiose engineering project, but this event is in a future so remote that it would be silly
to assume that neither could be done. And in any case, migration would probably be simpler than trying to "rejuvenate" the Sun by
changing the conditions in its dying core (a fix occasionally suggested by those who consider the possibility that someday we will not
only go to the stars, but interfere with their personal lives).
29
Sun Death- Sun Death Soon

Only five billion years till the sun stops functioning—something must be done
Karen Masters, studies the distribution and motions of galaxies in the local universe. She got her PhD from Cornell in August 2005 and is
now a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. Is the Sun expanding? Will it ever explode?, Curious
About Astronomy? Ask An Astrononmer. September 2002 http://curious.astro.cornell.edu/question.php?number=232 accessed July 13,
2008
When the Sun runs out of hydrogen in its core completely (which won't be for another 5 billion years or so) nuclear reactions will stop
there, but they will continue in a shell around the core. The core will contract (since it is not generating energy) and as it contracts it will
heat up. Eventually it will get hot enough to start burning helium into carbon (a different nuclear reaction). While the core is contracting
the hydrogen burning around it heats will heat up the outer layers which will expand, and while they do that they will cool. The Sun will
then become what is called a Red Giant and its radius will be large enough to envelop the Earth!
30
Space- Teleportation
Nanotech allows for teleportation
Leonard David, Senior Space Writer. Teleportation: Express Lane Space Travel, Space.com July 08, 2005
http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/050708_teleportation.html accessed July 13, 2008
Over the last few years, however, researchers have successfully teleported beams of light across a laboratory bench. Also, the quantum
state of a trapped calcium ion to another calcium ion has been teleported in a controlled way. These and other experiments all make for
heady and heavy reading in scientific journals. The reports would have surely found a spot on Einstein's night table. For the most part, it's
an exotic amalgam of things like quantum this and quantum that, wave function, qubits and polarization, as well as uncertainty principle,
excited states and entanglement. Seemingly, milking all this highbrow physics to flesh out point-to-point human teleportation is a long,
long way off. Well, maybe...maybe not. A trillion trillion atoms In his new book, Teleportation - The Impossible Leap, published by
John Wiley & Sons, Inc., writer David Darling contends that ""One way or another, teleportation is going to play a major role in all our
futures. It will be a fundamental process at the heart of quantum computers, which will themselves radically change the world." Darling
suggests that some form of classical teleportation and replication for inanimate objects also seems inevitable. But whether humans can
make the leap, well, that remains to be seen. Teleporting a person would require a machine that isolates, appraises, and keeps track of
over a trillion trillion atoms that constitute the human body, then sends that data to another locale for reassembly--and hopefully without
mussing up your physical and mental makeup. "One thing is certain: if that impossible leap turns out to be merely difficult--a question of
simply overcoming technical challenges--it will someday be accomplished," Darling predicts. In this regard, Darling writes that the
quantum computer "is the joker in the deck, the factor that changes the rules of what is and isn't possible." Just last month, in fact,
scientists at Hewlett Packard announced that they've hammered out a new tactic for a creating a quantum computer--using switches of
light beams rather than today's run of the mill, transistor-laden devices. What's in the offing is hardware capable of making calculations
billions of times faster than any silicon-based computer. Given quantum computers and the networking of these devices, Darling senses
the day may not be far off for routine teleportation of individual atoms and molecules. That would lead to teleportation of macromolecules
and microbes...with, perhaps, human teleportation to follow. Space teleportation What could teleportation do for future space endeavors?
"We can see the first glimmerings of teleportation in space exploration today," said Darling, responding to questions sent via e-mail by
SPACE.com to his home office near Dundee, Scotland. "Strictly speaking, teleportation is about getting from A to B without passing
through the points between A and B. In other words, something dematerializes in one place, then simply rematerializes somewhere else,"
Darling said. Darling pointed out that the Spirit and Opportunity rovers had to get to Mars by conventional means. However, their mission
and actions are controlled by commands sent from Earth. "So by beaming up instructions, we effectively complete the configuration of the
spacecraft. Also, the camera eyes and other equipment of the rovers serve as vicarious extensions of our own senses. So you might say the
effect is as if we had personally teleported to the Martian surface," Darling said. Spooky action at a distance In the future it might be
possible to assemble spacecraft "on-the-spot" using local materials. "That would be a further step along the road to true teleportation,"
Darling added. To take this idea to its logical endpoint, Darling continued, that's when nanotechnology enters the scene. When
nanotechnology is mature, an automated assembly unit could be sent to a destination. On arrival, it would build the required robot
explorer from the molecular level up. "Bona fide quantum teleportation, as applied to space travel, would mean sending a supply of
entangled particles to the target world then use what Einstein called 'spooky action at a distance' to make these particles assume the exact
state of another collection of entangled particles back on Earth," Darling speculated. Doing so opens the prospect for genuinely
teleporting a robot vehicle--or even an entire human crew--across interplanetary or, in the long run, across interstellar distances, Darling
said. "Certainly, if it becomes possible to teleport humans," Darling said, "you can envisage people hopping to the Moon or to other parts
of the solar system, as quickly and as easily as we move data around the Internet today."
31
Space- Space Elevator

Nanotech is critical to a space elevator to move satellites and people into space
Leonard David, Senior Space Writer. Space Elevator Concept Undergoes "Reel" World Testing , Space.com. September 23, 2005
http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/050923_spaceelevator_test.html accessed July 14, 2008
A private group has taken one small step toward the prospect of building a futuristic space elevator. LiftPort Group Inc., of Bremerton,
Washington, has successfully tested a robot climber - a novel piece of hardware that reeled itself up and down a lengthy ribbon dangling
from a high-altitude balloon. The test run, conducted earlier this week, is seen as a precursor experiment intended to flight validate
equipment and methods to construct a space elevator. This visionary concept would make use of an ultra-strong carbon nanotube
composite ribbon stretching some 62,000 miles (100,000 kilometers) from Earth into space. The space elevator would be anchored to an
offshore sea platform near the equator in the Pacific Ocean. At the other end in space, the ribbon would be attached to a small
counterweight. Mechanical "lifters" -- robotic elevator cars -- would move up and down the ribbon, carrying such items as satellites, solar
power systems, and eventually people into space.
Development of nanotech leads to space elevators

“Nanotechnology: Basic Science and Emerging Technologies” pages 108-109. KMH
The overriding factor in the design of aircraft or spacecraft that need to enter the planet's atmosphere is the weight to power ratio. Smaller,
lighter craft are cheaper to make air- or space-borne. Carbon nanotube structural materials can radically reduce structural mass,
miniaturise electronics, and reduce power consumption. The use of atomically pre¬cise materials and components should shrink most
other components (Chapter 3.9). Thermal protection of spacecraft is crucial for atmos¬pheric re-entry and for other tasks involving high
temperatures. Carbon nanotubes, like graphite, should withstand high temperatures. As noted above, carbon nanotubes have a Young's
modulus of at least one terapascal (pascals x 1012), which is also of benefit in withstanding aeronautical strains, including the strains of
atmospheric re-entry. Some researchers have investigated the possibility of constructing a space elevator [38, 39]. This would consist of a
cable extending from the Earth's surface into space with a centre of mass at a geosynchro¬nous altitude so that it does not drag behind.
The cable would be attached to a satellite. Goods and people could ascend and descend along the cable. Gravity would bring them down
but other energy sources will be needed to send them up. But what happens if the cable breaks? Thousands of kilometres of cable will
drop to Earth, causing serious damage. The point of maximum stress occurs at an altitude where the angu¬lar velocity of the cable and
satellite is greater than at the Earth, so the cable must be thickest there and taper as it approaches Earth. These taper factors have actually
been measured, and for steel the pinnacle in space must be over 10 000 times wider than the base. Given that the base must be strong
enough to support the structure, it is clear that steel is useless for such an application. For diamond, the taper factor is 21.9 [39]. However,
diamond is brittle. Carbon nanotubes have a ten¬sile strength similar to diamond, but bundles of these nanometre-scale radius tubes
shouldn't propagate cracks nearly as well as the diamond tetrahedral lattice. Thus, if we can overcome the difficult problem of developing
a molecular nanotechnology capable of making nearly per¬fect carbon nanotube systems approximately 70 000 kilometres long, the first
serious problem of a transportation system capable of truly large-scale transfers of mass to orbit can be solved. To say this is a long way
off is an understatement.
32
Space- Better Ships

Nanotech is key to lighter better space ships- no mission is possible without it
Glen Golightly, Houston Bureau Chief. Nanotechnology: Rebuilding All the Sciences, Space.com. January 28, 2000
http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/technology/nano_last_000128.html accessed July 14, 2008
Smalley, a Nobel Prize winner, heads up the Center Nano-scale Science and Technology at Rice University and works with NASA to
develop lighter and stronger materials for spaceflight and terrestrial applications. The conference’s closing panel focused on where
nanotechnology is likely to head -- including issues with commercialization and workforce training. Nanotechnology has come to the
forefront following President Clinton’s call last week to double the fiscal year 2001 scientific research funds to almost $500 million. Dr.
Carlo Montemagno of Cornell University said he already sees scientific disciplines blurring as technology advances. "In my own group,
mathematicians, engineers and molecular biologists work with one another," he said. "They all have a stake in the core project and must
know the capabilities and limitations of other areas." Smalley added that nanotechnology is critical to the space agency’s future missions.
"I believe that NASA and 'nano' potentially have a vital, special relationship between one another," he said. "I can’t imagine ever
accomplishing a portion of that mission without 'nano' becoming a reality." Smalley’s research concentrates on development for carbon
nano-tubes, which are lighter and stronger than steel and could be used to produce super-light spacecraft or a space elevator on the Earth.
Nanotech provides the ability to make ultra strong and ultra light space ships
LEONARD DAVID, Special to Space News. Nanotechnology Holds Promise for Space — But When?, Space.com August 19, 2002
http://google.space.com/search?q=cache:NI5Qvg-
L_uIJ:www.space.com/spacenews/archive02/nanoarch_081302.html+nanotechnology&access=p&output=xml_no_dtd&ie=UTF-
8&client=default_frontend&site=default_collection&proxystylesheet=default_frontend&oe=ISO-8859-1 accessed July 14, 2008
Nanotechnology researchers also are delving into the world of carbon nanotubes. Materials woven from carbon nanotubes are considered
to have the highest strength-to-weight ratio known — some 50 to 100 times stronger than steel. One potential early use of carbon
nanotubes is reinforcing spacecraft structures, said Haym Benaroya, professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at Rutgers
University, New Brunswick, N.J. "I don’t see it as ripe for the picking right now. But spacecraft designers are going to benefit primarily
when some of these carbon nanotube kinds of materials start being made in large sizes and large quantities," Benaroya said."Carbon
nanotubes used as reinforcing material may happen within a few years, at most. Building a whole spacecraft purely from carbon nanotube
sheets — that’s further down the road."
33
Space- Astronaut Health

Nanotechnology ensures that astronauts can stay healthy in space
LEONARD DAVID, Space News Correspondent. Nanotechnology: Scientists Pin Big Hopes on a Small Scale, Space.com. January 10,
2005 http://www.space.com/spacenews/archive05/nanoarch_010305.html accessed July 14, 2008
The agency should keep a long-range eye on nanotechnology capabilities that might prove helpful for the Moon, Mars and Beyond
agenda 10-15 years form now, Meyyappan said. "There are a couple of areas I'd zoom in on right away," he said, emphasizing advanced
life-support equipment and radiation-shielding technology for crews outward bound from Earth. Meyyappan led the National
Nanotechnology Initiative Grand Challenge Workshop in Palo Alto, Calif., last summer. The NASA-sponsored meeting brought together
experts to examine six areas in which nanotechnology is likely to affect space endeavors: n Nanomaterials: Carbon nanotube reinforced,
lightweight materials could revolutionize vehicle design with their superior tensile strength and their ability to conduct heat and
electricity. n Nanorobotics: The next stage in miniaturization may lead to molecule-sized actuators and motors, or microscopic robots to
aid in studying cells and biological systems, as well as nanoparticles and fibers. n Microcraft: Tiny and highly capable vehicles could be
developed for deep space probes, orbiters, planetary atmospheric entry probes or mobile surface explorers. n Nanosensors and
Instrumentation: Tiny, wireless, fast, super sensitive and non-invasive sensors and instruments could be fitted with chemical, electronic or
optical detectors for science missions, particularly for use in on-the-spot analysis and robotic operations. n Nano-micro-macro
Integration: Nanotechnologies could be incorporated into systems useful on a more human scale, such as life support equipment and
environmental monitoring systems. n Astronaut health management: Space travelers on lengthy voyages could use nanotechnology to
combat high-radiation environments, to fabricate medical monitors and healing devices, and to help reduce or overcome the stresses and
strains stemming from long-term space treks. The astronaut health management can come in a couple forms. One is to create the
nanomaterials that are specifically tailored to thwart radiation penetration of the spacecraft. Then there is the nanotechnology sensors to
better characterize the radiation levels. In addition, certain nanodrugs might be feasible to help counter radiation impacts on the
physiology of the astronaut.
34
Space – Terraforming
Nanotech can ensure a quick terraforming of Mars so that it will become a second earth
Mike Treder, your friendly weblog author, is co-founder and Executive Director of the Center for Responsible Nanotechnology.
Terraforming, Anyone?, Responsible Nanotechnology. July 04, 2007 http://crnano.typepad.com/crnblog/2007/07/terraforming-an.html
accessed July 14, 2008
How best to carry out a fast-paced, decade by decade planetary facelift of Mars -- a technique called "terraforming" -- has been outlined
by Lowell Wood, a noted physicist and recent retiree of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory...
"I suggest that the near-term outlook is that Mars will be terraformed," Wood said, and seriously underway by the middle of this century
and essentially complete by the end of the 21st century.
Wood defined terraforming as "the purposeful alteration of the physical environment to increase its habitability for humans." He noted
that we homo sapiens are a terraforming species, pointing to our own planet's alteration over time.
It's exciting to think that such a transformation might occur in a relatively short timespan, as opposed to the centuries or even millennia
that other scientists have estimated it would take to terraform Mars.
Wood said that Mars currently is "stuck" in a semi-permanent "thermal depression." But there is a multiplicity of design solutions, he
foresees, such as engineering an artificial greenhouse effect at the planet that warms the world and makes it "a more preferred planet."
Overall, Wood said that a workable plan can be scripted to raise the average temperature of Mars, rid the world of excess carbon dioxide,
as well as generate soil to support agriculture.
After roughly one to three decades of such warming, Wood continued, the "Great Spring" literally erupts all over Mars. It's all a matter of
trimming-and-tailoring a thawed Mars to the "biospheric optimum," he concluded...
"I believe it's roughly a 50/50 chance that young children now alive will walk on Martian meadows...will swim in Martian lakes," Wood
said. It is not technology, nor money, he said, the pacing ingredient is marshaled will.
Of course, if molecular manufacturing can be developed and can be applied to a project of this magnitude, changes might happen much
more quickly than even Wood has imagined.
35
Nanotechnology allows terraforming of mars

Robert J. Coppinger, studying Manufacturing management at Middlesex University in England. Terraforming Mars using self replicating
molecular machines, sci.nanotech. May 23, 1994 http://www.aleph.se/Trans/Tech/Space/terra.txt accessed July 15, 2008
The initial problem cited for living on Mars is the atmosphere. Mar's atmosphere is presently 6-7 millibar's, less than one tenth of ours.
Approximately, 3-400,000 billion tons. To have an atmosphere of one bar the mass of gas needed would be four million billion tons.
(4000 billion tons = 1 mbar). For plant life on Mars pressures as low as 10mbar would be adequate, but we want humans to be able to
live there, at least in the near future wearing just 'scuba diving' like pressure suits. Other factors, such as rate of rotation and gravity are
not a problem. Mars' surface gravity is 0.38 g and this is adequate for terraforming. There is no deficiency in the amount of sunlight that
reaches Mars, it may be only 43% of Earth's total but this is sufficient for photosynthesis, for the plants we do want to send to Mars. For
human habitation, the minimum partial pressure of oxygen must be about 130mbar. If the entire atmosphere was to be only oxygen it is
known that long term exposure to pure oxygen at 345 mbar (a more comfortable pressure) can be tolerated but oxygen is flammable, a
major problem. With oxygen toxicity a possible problem, 300mbar is a better alternative, with a buffer gas, for example nitrogen can be
used as there are possible nitrate reservoirs on mars in the soil/regolith. It is believed that problems of cosmic radiation can be overcome
with a gas column mass of 390mbar and above. So we could have partial pressures of oxygen and nitrogen at 195 for each gas, giving us
more oxygen than the absolute minimum, giving us a buffer gas and of course aiding the blockage of cosmic radiation. So 390mbar (or
1.56 million billion tons of atmospheric gas) could be a target value. Of course we need Mars to be habitable for humans and this
atmosphere will also balance the energy budget of the planet. As on the Earth the planet absorbs and radiates energy from the sun. The
atmosphere therefore must aid warming by trapping this warmth so there is a net gain from sun warming against the radiating of energy.
This is known as the greenhouse affect and the temperature increase due to this is about 6kelvin. Adding O2 and N2 will increase this
effect. Another way of increasing the temperature would be to add CFC's, as we have found on Earth. The CFC's, CF6, CF3CL, CF2CL2
and CF3Br can all be manufactured on Mars from elements found there. These CFC's also have long lifetimes against UV radiation
damage, from the sun. One part per billion of CFC's will increase the temperature by about 0.1 kelvin. For a real temperature increase,
CFC levels really need to be at parts per million, and this is not toxic and this would result in 0.01 mbar's of the atmosphere being CFC's
and this requires 40 billion tons of gas. Due to UV damage there would have to be continuous production of CFC's to the sum of 100
million tons per year. UV destroyed CFC's could be reconstituted from their parts that would then be floating in the stratosphere.
Unfortunately any ozone layer would be destroyed, yet much of the radiation would be deflected with the column gas of 390 mbar plus.
Sources of CO2 can be found in the regolith/soil of Mars. It is estimated that the regolith contains 300 mbars of CO2. Another source is
the south pole where a 350 km diameter CO2 'cap' which may be 1km thick will provide 100mbar of atmospheric pressure. One Hundred
milibars will activate global sublimation, certainly in the regolith and this will in turn create a run away greenhouse effect. A necessity
for terraforming is water, and this is believed to exist on Mars at levels of about 500 metres below the surface as permafrost and it is
known that the polar cap is 5000 cubic kilometres of ice. The estimated amount of water that Mars has lost through atmospheric
outgassing is estimated at 0.5-1 km worth of water - this is based on such water created geophysical landmarks such as the Valles
Marineris. Other chemicals which are factors in creating life are sulphur and phosphorous and both exist on Mars. In order to create this
terraforming process, to get it going and to see the process continue to create a habitat for humans, Mars would have to receive in a short
time frame, the equivalent of ten years worth of sunlight, or 1 million joules cm-2. To convert the materials we know we can find on
Mars into the gases we need to create life we would need a highly efficient conversion organism. Molecular mechanosynthesis using
molecular devices is one possible answer to the huge quantities, the billions of tons that have to be produced to create the 390 milibars or
even to create the 2.2 bar atmosphere that some scientists believe is necessary for Earth like conditions. Nanotechnology will give us
these devices. In a recent paper given at a USA/Japan symposium on nanotechnoogy and it's affect on manufacturing the time line given
for the development of nanotechnological manufacturing systems gave us, in 2010, systems that could synthesise substrate. This would
appear to be a complex task, with atom deposition rates far higher than we have today. If we can produce machines with those capabilities
how hard will it be to create molecular machines whose job, in reality, will be purely the disassembling of carbonate and nitrate in martian
regolith and the sublimation of polar caps. In Eric Drexlers book, 'Nanosystems: Molecular machinery, manufacturing and computation',
he details the design of mechanochemical machines that could do all this. Breaking apart materials at the molecular level will probably
take less energy than Chris McKay's (whose last paper on terraforming Mars was in Nature in 1991) estimate of 1 million joules for the
terraforming process, due to the nature of the mechanosynthesis process. Drexler, on page 63 of 'Engines of Creation' says that the
dissembling machines could break down rock, thus the carbonates in the regolith could be obtained. An enzyme molecule can break down
40 million hydrogen peroxide molecules per second, therefore, under thermal agitation at 'normal', Earth temperatures the molecule
'break down' speed can be 100 molecules per trillionth of a second (mps).
36
Space- Time Travel

Nanotechnology is key to harness wormholes and time travel.
Dick Pelletier, (futurist science and technology columnist), 2008, April 14, PositiveFuturist.com,
“Time travel will become reality in future, physicists say,” Accessed 7/15/08, http://positivefuturist.com/archive/145.html, jo
Although black holes and cosmic strings offer hope of traveling through time, most physicists believe that wormholes represent our best
shot. Wormholes are theoretical shortcuts through space and time that connect two distant points, like a worm tunnel in an apple. Cal
Tech’s Kip Thorne showed that we could control wormholes if we used an exotic form of matter, which experts believe might come from
‘phantom energy’, a mysterious dark matter that comprises up to seventy percent of the universe. Lisbon University’s Francisco Lobo
believes “An advanced civilization could mine the phantom energy necessary to construct and sustain a traversable wormhole”, making
time travel possible. How would civilization benefit from this wild technology? We could retrieve scanned minds from lost loved ones the
night before they died; upload them into new bodies allowing their lives to continue. We could also search the future for dangers that
might befall humanity, and then develop defenses. When might time travel become reality? Forward-thinkers believe that advanced
nanotech, quantum computing, and artificial intelligence will enable technologies necessary to harness wormholes within 200 to 500
years; so if life extension enthusiasts are correct, many people alive today will experience time travel in their lifetime. And if someone
should knock on your door one day and claim to be your great-great-great-great granddaughter from the future don’t slam the door – she
could be a time traveler.
37
Space- AT: Radiation

Nanotech is key to allow detection of heavy ion radiation so it can be treated to allow for long term space
exploration
Heather Sparks, SPACE.com Staff Writer. How Miniature Radiation Detectors Will Keep Astronauts Safe in Deep Space, Space.com July
17, 2002. http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/technology/radiation_nanobots_020717.html accessed July 14, 2008
There's no doubt that space travel is a risky business. Even in low Earth orbit, today's astronauts face potential mechanical failure and the
mental strain of isolation. However, the future of space exploration lies beyond Earth's protective magnetosphere, where an even bigger
threat lurks in the form of heavy ion radiation. In just one day of interstellar space travel, for example, an astronaut will face radiation
levels equal to a year's worth of incidental radiation on Earth. This radiation can cause DNA to mutate and cells to die. To battle this
invisible threat, NASA and the National Cancer Institute (NCI) awarded $11 million to seven United States' universities this winter for the
development of nano-scale biomedical technologies that detect, diagnose, and battle radiation exposure, cancer, and other diseases at the
cellular level. "You can view this as a whole new realm of diagnostic agents that you have inside, reporting on you. It's a lot like Star
Trek," said James Baker, the lead researcher at the University of Michigan, whose team was awarded nearly a quarter of the funding from
NASA and the NCI. Baker is building a device so small that it fits inside white blood cells and reports cellular damage caused by
radiation. The technology will be applied to cancer patients and astronauts. A spacecraft and the astronauts inside it make for little more
than a speed bump to heavy ion radiation in interstellar space. In fact, heavy ion radiation passes through the body like tiny bullets and
leaves a microscopic trail of destruction behind them. The destruction often takes the form as distinct breaks in the DNA of white blood
cells. The damage is so bad that the cells hit by the radiation often carry out what is called apoptosis, or programmed cell death. A variety
of enzymes are quickly made and released during this cellular suicide, one of the first is Caspase 3. "Caspase 3 chews up cells from the
inside," Baker said. It also chews through a loose bond on Baker's nano device that allows it to give off a detectable fluorescent glow.
Like all good design, Baker's synthetic spherical macromolecule does a lot with very little. Called a dendrimer, it is made from just two
types of molecules often found in plastics, which means it doesn't disintegrate easily. The core is a simple diamine molecule, usually
ammonia, bound on all sides with acrylic acid, a simple building block of plastic. Then ammonia is layered on top of the acids, and so on.
Thus, the dendrimer is built, layer by layer, like a microscopic jawbreaker. The use of a diamine and an acid layer allows for a variety of
possibilities, Baker said. Depending whether the last layer is a diamine or an acid, different kinds of chemical components can be bound
to the outside, and the dendrimer's function is easily changed. To make a Caspase-detecting dendrimer, Baker adds two components. One
fools the white blood cells into identifying the dendrimer as a blood sugar. Thus the cell absorbs it readily. The other addition is a two-
pronged molecular system that uses a technique called fluorescence resonance energy transfer, or FRET. The system is made of two
closely bound molecules; one gives off fluorescent energy and the other absorbs it. Before the cell undergoes apoptosis, (whether induced
by radiation or by the cell's own biological clock) the FRET system stays bound together, the fluorescence stays absorbed within the
dendrimer, and the white blood cell is dark inside. But once apoptosis begins and Caspase-3 is released, the FRET bond is quickly broken.
Suddenly, the white blood cell is awash in fluorescent light. Baker's team is concurrently devising a retinal scanning device that measures
the amount of fluorescence inside an astronaut's body. If the level is above baseline, then counteracting drugs could be taken, such as
those being developed by Marcelo Vazquez and his space medicine team at Brookhaven National Lab on Long Island. "This system will
allow us to measure how much radiation your cells receive because white blood cells are the most sensitive in the body," Vazquez said. "If
they achieve this, it will be a good step forward in long term space exploration."
38
Space- Impact- Prevent Extinction-Disease

Diseases will wipe out humanity – space colonization is the only alternative for survival
Professor Hawking, Cambridge University Mathematician, 2001
“colonies in space may be the only hope” Roger Highfield, Science Editor
http://news.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=%2Fnews%2F2001%2F10%2F16%2Fnhawk16.xml
THE human race is likely to be wiped out by a doomsday virus before the Millennium is out, unless we set up colonies in space, Prof
Stephen Hawking warns today. In an interview with The Telegraph, Prof Hawking, the world's best known cosmologist, says that biology,
rather than physics, presents the biggest challenge to human survival. "Although September 11 was horrible, it didn't threaten the survival
of the human race, like nuclear weapons do," said the Cambridge University scientist. "In the long term, I am more worried about biology.
Nuclear weapons need large facilities, but genetic engineering can be done in a small lab. You can't regulate every lab in the world. The
danger is that either by accident or design, we create a virus that destroys us. "I don't think the human race will survive the next thousand
years, unless we spread into space. There are too many accidents that can befall life on a single planet. But I'm an optimist. We will reach
out to the stars." Current theories suggest that space travel will be tedious, using spaceships travelling slower than light. But Prof
Hawking, Lucasian professor of mathematics at Cambridge, says that a warp drive, of the kind seen in Star Trek, cannot be ruled out.
39
Space- Impact- Prevent Extinction-Militarism

Militarism - Failure to move towards space colonization will cause more money to be placed into
warfighting causing inevitable extinction
Sylvia Engdahl, 2001
http://www.sylviaengdahl.com/space.htm “Space and Human Survival: My Views”
People have frequently asked me why I believe expansion into space is essential to human survival. Here's why. Space and Human
Survival, Part I
Until recently, the reason most commonly offered for believing our survival depends on space travel was that our species will need to
move elsewhere in order to survive the ultimate death of our sun, or the possibility of our sun turning into a nova. (Scientists now believe
that these specific scenarios won't happen; but the sun will eventually become a red giant, which as far as Earth is concerned, is an equally
disastrous one.) This is not of such remote concern as it may seem, as I'll explain below. However, it surely is a remote event--billions of
years in the future--and I don't blame anyone for not giving it very high priority at present. It is far from being my main reason. A more
urgent cause for concern is the need not to "put all our eggs in one basket," in case the worst happens and we blow up our own planet, or
make it uninhabitable by means of nuclear disaster or perhaps biological warfare. We would all like to believe this won't happen, yet some
people are seriously afraid that it will--it's hardly an irrational fear. Peace with Russia may have drawn attention from it, yet there are
other potential troublemakers, even terrorists; the nuclear peril is not mere history. Furthermore, there is the small but all-too-real
possibility that Earth might be struck by an asteroid. We all hope and believe our homes won't burn down, and yet we buy fire insurance.
Does not our species as a whole need an insurance policy? (Even Carl Sagan, a long-time opponent of using manned spacecraft where
robots can serve, came out in support of space colonization near the end of his life, for this reason; see his book Pale Blue Dot.) New --
October 15, 2001: In an interview with Britain's newspaper Daily Telegraph, eminent cosmologist Stephen Hawking said, "I don't think
that the human race will survive the next thousand years unless we spread into space. There are too many accidents that can befall life on
a single planet." Hawking is more worried about the possibility of our creating a virus that destroys us than about nuclear disaster.
However, he said, "I'm an optimist. We will reach out to the stars." (For the full article, see the link section below.) My 1971 novel The
Far Side of Evil (of which an updated edition is scheduled for publication in 2002) is based on the concept of a "Critical Stage" during
which a species has the technology to expand into space, but hasn't yet implemented it, and in which that same level of technology
enables it to wipe itself out. The premise of the book is that each world will do one or the other, but not both. I have believed this since the
early 50s, when there was real danger of nuclear war but no sign of space travel. When the Russians launched Sputnik in 1957, my
reaction was overwhelming joy and relief, because I thought that at last our energies were going to be turned toward space exploration. I
felt that way through the era of Apollo. Since Apollo, as public support of the space program has waned, my fears have grown again;
because I don't believe that a world turned in on itself can remain peaceful. A progressive species like ours has a built-in drive to move
forward, and that energy has to go somewhere. Historically, when it was not going into mere survival or into the exploration and
settlement of new lands--which is the adaptive reason for such a drive--it has gone into war. This is the price we pay for our innate
progressiveness. I know that it is now fashionable to deride the concept of progress, and certainly we cannot say that progress is
inevitable. It surely doesn't characterize all change in all areas of human endeavor. Nevertheless, overall, the human race as a whole
advances; if it did not we would still be cavemen. This is what distinguishes our species from all others. And like it or not, this drive is
inseparable from the drive toward growth and expansion. Many successful species colonize new ecological niches; this is one of the
fundamental features of evolution. When a species can't find a new niche, and the resources of the old one are no longer sufficient, it dies
out. If the resources do remain sufficient, it lives, but is unchanging from era to era. There are no cases in biology of progressive evolution
unaccompanied by expansion.
40
Space- Impact- Prevent Extinction-Overpopulation

Population growth ensures extinction unless we establish space colonization
The question of resources raises an even more crucial reason for expansion into space than the danger of Earth's destruction. It's obvious
that this planet cannot support an expanding population forever. Most people who recognize this fact advocate population control to the
extent of "zero population growth." I do not; I believe it would be fatal not only for the reason explained above, but because if it could be
achieved it would result in stagnation. I do not want a world in which there can be no growth; growth leads to intellectual and artistic
progress as well as to material survival. Furthermore, I do not believe it could be achieved. The built-in desire for personal descendants is
too strong; that's why our species has survived this long, why it has spread throughout the entire world. Moreover, the biological response
to threatened survival is to speed up reproduction, as we can see by the number of starving children in the world. If we tried to suppress
population growth completely, we would have either immediate violent upheaval or a period of dictatorship followed by bloody
revolution. Ultimately, we'd reduce the population all right; we'd decimate it. That may be "survival" but it's surely not the future we want.
We do not want even the present restriction on resources. Currently, some nations live well while others are deprived, and it's asserted that
even those with the best access to resources should stop using them up--the underdeveloped nations, under this philosophy, are not given
the hope of a standard of living commensurate with the level our species has achieved. Will the Third World tolerate such a situation
forever? I surely wouldn't blame them for not wanting to. And neither do I want the rest of the world reduced to a lower level of
technology. Even if I had no other objection to such a trend, the plain fact is that a low level of technology cannot support the same size
population as a high level; so if you want to cut back on technology, you have to either kill people outright or let them starve. And you
certainly can't do anything toward extending the length of the human lifespan. This is the inevitable result of planning based on a single-
planet environment. If there is pessimism in Earthbound science fiction (which its most outstanding characteristic), these truths are the
source of it. I have not seen any that denies any of them; pop-culture SF reveals that what people grasp mythopoeically about such a
future involves catastrophic war, cut-throat human relationships in overcrowded cities, and a general trend toward dehumanization. Apart
from the major films with which my course dealt (e.g. Bladerunner), Soylent Green postulates cannibalism and Logan's Run is based on
the premise that everybody is required to die at the age of 30. The destruction of the world's ecology is a basic assumption--which is
natural, since in a contest between a stable biosphere and personal survival, humans will either prevail or they will die. Myths showing
these things are indeed part of the response to a new perception of our environment: the perception that as far as Earth is concerned, it is
limited. [A basic premise of my course was that all myth is a response of a culture to the environment in which it perceives itself to exist.]
But at the rational level, people do not want to face them. They tell themselves that if we do our best to conserve resources and give up a
lot of the modern conveniences that enable us to spend time expanding our minds, we can avoid such a fate--as indeed we can, for a
while. But not forever. And most significantly, not for long enough to establish space settlements, if we don't start soon enough. Space
humanization is not something that can be achieved overnight.
Overpopulation guarantees extinction unless we act to move to space now – we cannot delay
Jon M Wiley 1995
http://www.anatomy.usyd.edu.au/danny/usenet/sci.anthropology/archive/january-1995/0387.html
“Humanity as a Tool: An Expansion of the Gaia Hypothesis”
One hundred fifty million years is a long time, many wonder what the rush is? The facts are that *humans* do not have 150 million
years for the very reasons outlined above. But even so, why not wait fifty or one hundred years? It is important that once a species has
the technological capability to travel in space, they should exploit it as quickly as possible to release the pressure on their species. The
pressure comes from the biosphere's self regulating mechanisms which manifest as human overpopulation. Venturing into space is much
like going to the dentist. If you never go, your teeth will likely fall out. The longer you prolong it, the more difficult the eventual visit
will be due to built up problems which need to be fixed. But if you go early, or on time, it isn't too bad an experience after all and you are
much better off because of it, no matter how much it hurt your pocketbook. Indeed, we are venturing into space now, but not at a rate or
a manner which parallels our exponentially inflating knowledge base or population. We went to the Moon and now we can't get past Low
Earth Orbit. The biosphere "frowns" upon taking a step back for every two forward. Policy makers need to realize that space is not
merely a playland for scientists or a place to dump communications sattelites, it is crucial to our survival and to the survival of all Life
on Earth.
41
Space- Impact- Prevent Extinction-Meteor

Even if the big asteroid doesn’t wipe us out – some meteors will come with the effect of 100 times that of a
nuclear bomb
P Creola, Swiss Department of Foreign Affairs, 1994
http://esapub.esrin.esa.it/bulletin/bullet82/creola82.htm “Has Space a Future?”
(*) Address to the Annual Meeting of the Swiss Academy of Technical Sciences, Bern, 22/23
Thirdly, and lastly, a few thoughts about long-term survival on this planet. We recently witnessed the spectacular collision of Comet
Shoemaker-Levy with Jupiter. The probability of a similar collision with the Earth over the next 150 years is estimated at 1 in 10 000. Do
you find this probability too small to worry about? Enormous sums of money are spent on technical measures and insurance against lesser
risks originating on Earth. Nor does it have to be a whole comet. Every ten years, statistically speaking, as in 1908 in the Siberian taiga
and in February 1994 in the western Pacific, the Earth is struck by a meteorite with a force equivalent to 10 to 100 times that of the atomic
bomb dropped on Hiroshima, easily capable of flattening one of the world's largest cities. Only space technology could give us the
possibility of diverting such dangerous debris from its trajectory.
42
Space- Impact- Solves Environment

Environmental Destruction – space exploration allows us to see the importance of the Earth as a home –
unless we explore we will all die
Joseph Teller 1989
http://www.omphalos.net/files/pagan/MYCEN5.TXT
MYCENEAEN MYSTERIES : TECHNOLOGY PAST & PRESENT
Space Technologies, such as the shuttle project, probes, all the communications satellites and the proposed Space Platform/Station in
Earth orbit are all vital advances for mankind and for the survival of the Earth. It is not for us to take our agressions and wars into space,
but to take our curiosity and trying to work with nature is definately of our interest. WIthout the space program, Solar based energy
sources will never be properly explored or utilized to their best advantage. Until we can look upon the dead worlds of the system we
cannot begin to conceive the importance of the Earth as home. Until we have found and seen how worlds are formed and grow, we will
not fully understand how we can repair all the mistakes we've made on our own world and its ecology. If we can mine the dead worlds
and asteroids, we will not need to mine the Earth and rape it of its own riches. If we find another world that is habitable, we might find for
ourselevs a chance to start again and not make the same mistakes that brought our environment to its present sorry state. Much of our real
future lies in this technology, and there is nothing wrong with the oppotunities or being involved.
43
Space- AT: Colonization = Imperialism

It is not imperialism – Space exploration requires us to place ourselves in the role of the alien and non-
human – it forces us to confront imperialism
Richard L Poss, Professor of Humanities at University of Arizona, 2001
http://www.newmars.com/archives/000021.shtml
"We should not presume to conquer other worlds. It is not for us to disturb the pristine state of other planets." This argument invokes guilt
over past genocides, over manifest destiny, over pollution, and ridicules the effort to explore space as a vain attempt to reclaim past
imperialist glory. This is essentially a cultural argument, and can only be met on cultural terms. If we rip off the mask of piety, we expose
this argument for what it is, fear and cowardice. It accuses space exploration of being a flight from responsibility when in fact it is the
opposite. A commitment to space exploration involves nothing less than taking responsibility for the solar system the way we now take
responsibility for the Earth. Space exploration is dangerous, expensive, and not for the weak of heart. It will eventually entail
"environmental management" not just of one forest or of the entire Earth, but of the entire solar system. As such, it involves a profound
turn outward, into territories some feel are "alien" and "inhuman." It will always be a threat to those who fear the wide vistas revealed by
modern science, who prefer to huddle here in endless contemplation of the past, in comfortable ignorance of the reality of other
landscapes than our own. This argument has curious blind-spots. It has no problem with the current state of high technology, for example.
It is presumably not "hubristic" to hop around on a commercial jet from New York to Paris to Tokyo, to lecture audiences on the evils of
science and technology, but it is only the gravity well of Earth which is a sacred taboo.
Space colonization stops colonialism – people will take a new perspective in creating their homes
Richard L Poss, Professor of Humanities at University of Arizona, 2001
http://www.newmars.com/archives/000021.shtml
If space exploration is more than doing science and making better machines for a more convenient life on Earth, then what is its real
essence? For the answer we must refer to the first and greatest of explorers, Odysseus, whose voyage through great pains and marvelous
wonders, recounted in Homer's Odyssey, was all in search of his home, the isle of Ithaca. The ultimate goal in his wanderings was to get
back home where he belonged, as king of the island, husband to his wife, son to his elderly father, and father to his own son. Later, when
Virgil writes the Aeneid under the patronage of the Emperor Augustus, he rewrites Odysseus' voyage, transforming it into a different kind
of journey. Aeneas' world, Troy, is destroyed, and the gods coerce him into leading his people to a new land. He encounters the same
dangers and marvels as Odysseus, but for a different kind of overriding purpose, which is to create a new home and a new civilization. He
wages war on the Italian mainland, then marries the Princess Lavinia. "Lavinia" is a woman but is also the name of the land near Rome.
His followers intermarry with Italians and settle on Italian soil, which becomes their home. Thus the goal of his adventures is to join with
the new land and plant the seeds of what will become the civilization we know as Rome. This narrative has a long and problematic
history. It is the essential myth of colonialism, but it is also the essential trajectory of space exploration. We will go into space, not to
bring back things which will make us richer or more comfortable here on Earth. We will go there to live and make it our home. This is the
"New World" argument, and just as few Americans today want to return permanently to their country of origin, in two hundred years few
residents of Mars or the space stations will want to move back to Earth. This argument raises the hopes for a new start, for a new
landscape where new kinds of cities, universities, arts and letters will arise. This kind of exploration is the precursor to migration, and it is
backed by a biological imperative which is more basic and more powerful than the languages or ideologies we generate to describe it.
44
Space- Impact- Solves Everything

All of the world’s problems are compounded by failure of space humanization – only going to space can help us

I realize that what I've been saying here doesn't sound like my usual optimism. But the reason it doesn't, I think, is that most people don't
understand what's meant by "space humanization". Some of you are probably thinking that space travel isn't going to be a big help with
these problems, as indeed, the form of it shown in today's mythology would not. Almost certainly, you're thinking that it won't solve the
other problems of Earth, and I fear you may be thinking that the other problems should be solved first.
One big reason why they should not is the "narrow window" concept. The other is that they could not. I have explained why I believe the
problem of war can't be solved without expansion. The problem of hunger is, or ultimately will be, the direct result of our planet's limited
resources; though it could be solved for the near-term by political reforms, we are not likely to see such reforms while nations are playing
a "zero-sum game" with what resources Earth still has. Widespread poverty, when not politically based, is caused by insufficient access to
high technology and by the fact that there aren't enough resources to go around (if you doubt this, compare the amount of poverty here
with the amount in the Third World, and the amount on the Western frontier with the amount in our modern cities). Non-contagious
disease, such as cancer, is at least partially the result of stress; and while expansion won't eliminate stress, overcrowding certainly
increases it. The problem of atmospheric pollution is the result of trying to contain the industry necessary to maintain our technology
within the biosphere instead of moving it into orbit where it belongs. In short, all the worldwide problems we want to solve, and feel we
should have solved, are related to the fact that we've outgrown the ecological niche we presently occupy. I view them not as pathologies,
but as natural indicators of our evolutionary stage. I would like to believe that they'll prove spurs to expansion. If they don't, we'll be one
of evolution's failures. If I have frightened any readers here, I'm not sorry! But cheer up; in Part II I'll explain how humanizing space can
not only save our species, but give all cultures equal access to resources that are virtually unlimited.
45
Aliens- 2AC Add On

There are other Aliens in our Solar System
Than, Live Science Writer 2007
<Live Science, Ker Than, 7-15-08, http://www.livescience.com/strangenews/070806_GM_life_universe.html>
But today's scientists hope to get beyond mere statistics to find something more substantial, and more edifying. Perhaps more than at any
other time in history, scientists are optimistic that extraterrestrial life does exist, and that a firm confirmation can be had. Their hope is
buoyed by recent discoveries of worlds beyond our solar system and new revelations recently learned about the hardiness of life here on
our own planet. "As we learn more about the diversity of life, particularly microbial life, we expand our definition of what life is and how
life can exist in some very hostile (to humans) environments," said biologist Diana Northup of the University of New Mexico. Scientists
have discovered microbes that are resilient to levels of heat, cold, salt, acidity, and radiation that would kill humans. Some of these so-
called "extremophiles" have been found thriving in complete darkness, in parched deserts and even miles below ground. All of this is
good news for astrobiologists who dream of finding life beyond Earth's confines, as many of the extreme environments on our planet are
thought to be the norm for other worlds. Earth's deserts, for example, have analogues on dry, dusty Mars. Saturn's moon Titan is a world
of meandering rivers and lakes, and beneath the icy crust of another Saturn moon, Enceladus, might lie environments resembling the
frigid ocean depths of Earth.
Aliens would want to destroy us

Armageddon Online No Date Given
<Armageddon Online, 7-15-08, http://armageddononline.tripod.com/aliens.htm>
Since on Earth society has become more peaceful as it developed, it is easy to assume that alien civilisations that have developed for
thousands of years would not be inclined to go to war. However this easily could not have happened elsewhere, and it is only chance that
it did on Earth. Suppose the Nazis had achieved world domination in World War 2, as they easily could have done. If they discovered
another civilisation they would not hesitate to destroy it - if they thought other humans had 'impure' blood then what would they think of
aliens? So aliens discovering us might simply want to destroy us to racially purify the universe. A second idea would be that they needed
Earth for something, such as resources or living space. There may be very few planet's in the universe that are capable of supporting life,
so aliens from an overpopulated, over-polluted world might seize any opportunity to ensure the survival of their species. It may be that
their planet was destroyed, or made inhospitable; perhaps in one of the ways suggested on this site. Similarly, if aliens lacked resources
essential to them, if they were available on Earth they might see no option other than to invade.
We can use Nanotechnology to create Drinkable force-fields

Radiation Health Foundation April 28, 2008
<Radiation Health Foundation, 7-15-08, http://www.rhfweb.com/ssw.html>
With present technologies, we can engineer a biochemical and genetically nano engineered force field producing drinkable liquid- by
programming nano biochemical particles which use environmental free energy power sources and which use biochemical nano
computers and chips and memory device, we can place a biochemical nano liquid substance into the blood stream and into all cells of the
body to project a healing, life extending, and powerful force field that stabilizes the bodies form in an ideal form and jams all harmful
energies. We can also reprogram the genes and spiritual memories of the body by means of electron lazers, and scalar waves to contain
our ideal body form and memories and to naturally produce natural biochemical substances that project the ideal body form in and around
our body to jam out harmful energies, to stabilize the body, to heal the body, and to extend life.
46
A molecular nano weapon can gives us super weapons

Mavrozov, writer for News Analysis, August 2007
News Analysis, China developing the Ultimate Superweapon, accessed 7/15/08,
http://www.newsmax.com/navrozov/china_superweapon/2007/08/31/28884.html
Speaking of the United States, let me take molecular nano super weapons as an example of a scientific vision. Eric Drexler wrote his
volume on nanotechnology in 1986, and in 2007 I received on the Internet its “20th anniversary edition updated and expanded” (630
pages). If successfully developed, this scientific vision could be the ultimate super weapon of today. The molecular nano weapon — a
growing cloud advancing to its target and consisting of molecules acting as artificial microbes or viruses, capable of multiplying and
destroying everything in their path, including their targets. On Page 355 of the 2007 edition of his study, Drexler states, "A [nuclear] bomb
can only blast things, but nanomachines and AI [artificial intelligence], can be used to infiltrate, seize, change, and govern a territory of a
world." Quite apart from my reading of Drexler, I wrote a column about Lt. Col. Thomas E. Bearden (U.S. Army, retired) describing
super weapons. By way of gratitude, his Chenier Press has sent me his latest study of super weapons, entitled “Oblivion: America at the
Brink.” Bearden concludes his study as follows: "If we are to survive, we shall need the most strenuous and rapid effort in our history,
now. In time of grave peril, Americans have always rallied to rational liberty and survival. We must do so again. God bless and keep
America! We pray for its survival."
47
Aliens- Aliens Exist

There are Aliens inside of Roswell
Fox News 2007
<Fox News, 7-15-8, http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,287643,00.html>
But last week came an astonishing new twist to the Roswell mystery.Lt. Walter Haut was the public-relations officer at the base in 1947
and was the man who issued the original and subsequent press releases after the crash on the orders of the base commander, Col. William
Blanchard.Haut died in December 2005, but left a sworn affidavit to be opened only after his death.Last week, the text was released. It
asserts that the weather-balloon claim was a cover story and that the real object had been recovered by the military and stored in a
hangar.He described seeing not just the craft, but alien bodies.He wasn't the first Roswell witness to talk about alien bodies.Local
undertaker Glenn Dennis had long claimed that he was contacted by authorities at Roswell shortly after the crash and asked to provide a
number of child-sized coffins.When he arrived at the base, he was apparently told by a nurse (who later disappeared) that a UFO had
crashed and that small humanoid extraterrestrials had been recovered.But Haut is the only one of the original participants to claim to have
seen alien bodies.
There are other “Earths” out there

Than, Live Science Writer 2007
Astrobiologists are also heartened by the recent explosion of new planets discovered outside our solar system. Since 1995, when
astronomers spotted the first planet in orbit around another normal star, the number of extrasolar planets, or "exoplanets," has swelled to
over 200. Scientists now know of more than 20 times more planets outside our solar system than in it. The majority of exoplanets
discovered so far are bloated, fast-spinning gas giants, known as "hot Jupiters," that orbit extremely close to their stars and are thus
probably unsuitable for life. But some exoplanets are wondrously Earth-like. Scientists recently spotted one world only 20.5 light-years
away that lies within the habitable zone of its star—the region around a star where liquid water, and thus life, might exist. (It was later
discovered the planet might be too hot for life, but another potentially habitable world in the same system was quickly found to take its
place.) With the ongoing refinement of current planet-finding techniques and the launch of new satellites, scientists expect not only to find
a truly Earth-like world, but to also be able to probe it for life's spectral fingerprints carried by a planet's reflected light. "Depending on
what level of seeking and finding we are prepared to do, we could make discoveries in the next two decades that entirely change the way
we understand the universe and life," said Margaret Turnbull, an astrobiologist at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore,
Maryland.
48
Aliens- Will be more advanced

Aliens will be more Advanced than us
Than Live Science Writer 2007
Of course, there is always the chance that extraterrestrial life will find us first. Perhaps not in the form of a visiting UFO, but a radio
transmission from an advanced alien civilization is still considered within the realm of possibility. "Mankind has achieved scientific-
technological civilization only in the last 200 years or so, out of about 4.5 billion years of life on Earth," said Frank Wilczek, a Nobel-
Prize winning physicist at MIT. "So it seems we ought to expect there to be many scientific-technological civilizations that have had many
millions, or even billions, of years to develop." But even the discovery of one single-celled microbe on a distant world would be enough
—enough to finally answer that age old question of "Are we alone in the universe?" and enough to change how humanity views
itself. "The discovery of life forms inhabiting the unexplored extremities of our own planet, and eventually, the discovery of life on other
planets, will bring into greater awareness the magnificence of a living universe," Turnball told LiveScience, "and, hopefully, a better
understanding of ourselves."
49
Aliens- Want to kill us

Aliens will kill us,
Armageddon Online No Date Given
<Armageddon Online, 7-15-08, http://armageddononline.tripod.com/aliens.htm>
Despite numerous science-fiction film plots, it is most unlikely that humans could defeat an alien race so advanced that it had faster than
light technology. Film plots range from human viruses killing aliens, unlikely since alien invaders could surely think of some sort of
protective suit, to humans getting nuclear warheads inside their ship, unlikely since aliens could surely detect us trying. If aliens simply
wanted to eradicate humanity, then they could use nuclear weapons or some other technology to kill us without even entering our
atmosphere. Nuclear weapons could not be used if they wanted to preserve Earth for themselves, but aliens capable of getting to Earth
must surely have some suitable weapon.
50
Aliens- Nano provides invisibility

Nanotech allows us to become Invisible
Johnson, March 3, 2008
(R. Colin, “ELECTRONIC ENGINEERING TIMES”, March 3, 2008, Accessed 7/13/08, lexis) KMH
Since President Bush signed the National Nanotech Initiative into law in 2003, the United States has been concentrating its efforts on
staying ahead in nanomaterial development. In the meantime, both Asia and Europe have launched aggressive nanomaterial
development cooperatives of their own. Nanoscale materials, it seems, are poised to enhance almost every sector of the electronic-
materials industry. Nanoscale materials use ultraprecise fabrication techniques to harness effects impossible to craft in normal
bulk materials-from invisibility cloaks, on-chip energy harvesters and superhigh-speed transistors to carbon-impregnated plastic
that's as strong as steel. Despite the calls to slow nanoscale-material development for fear of health hazards, there is no letup in sight. In
fact, the medical community has embraced nanomaterials for everything from ultralow-cost medical tests to targeting diseased cells for
pinpoint drug delivery and even eliminating the need for pharmaceuticals altogether with nanoparticle magnets. It would seem that there's
nowhere nanomaterials won't go-and nothing they won't change-in the years to come.
51
Utopia – Nanotech provides

Nanotechnology means that people don’t have to work, be able to access free food along with any other
material they would want as nanotech would ensure everything would either be very cheap or free,
including planets—this world would allow persons to do whatever they want to occupy their time
Ed Regis, Science technology author. Nano; the emerging science of nanotechnology: remaking the world- molecule by molecule. 1995 p.
176-178
Superficially, anyway, the major social boon brought to us by nanotechnology would be freedom from physical labor, this as a result of
the world's work being turned over to the assemblers. No longer would humanity have to toil for its daily bread. No more getting up in the
morning, going in to the office, having to be friendly with people. No more time clocks. Clearly, the promised land had been sighted, and
it lay not all that far ahead. Or at least that was the first-glance view of the situation. But, of course, there being a cloud for every silver
lining, deeper analysis led to some darker suspicions. Supposing for the sake of argument that assemblers could in fact, with trivial
exceptions, do the work of the world, what then was going to be left for people to do? How would they fill their endless days, especially
across thousands of years? When it was nine o'clock on Monday morning and you didn't have to be at the office, what then did you
actually do? And particularly what did you do for money? No more time clocks, after all, also meant no more paychecks. What would
hap-pen, after the revolution, to those great and valued social institutions known as the market system, the gross national product, the
world economy? Indeed, the more you thought about it the more it appeared that nanotechnology was a two-edged sword not only in
terms of its gray-goo physical risks, but also because of the dangers it posed to the social and economic order. Under the worst-case
interpretation, nanotechnology was the ultimate Luddite nightmare: people would be displaced by machines once and for all — machines,
further-more, that were much too small to wreck. How could you smash the machines (as the Luddites always wanted to do) when you
couldn't even see the damn things? Such questions turned up, naturally enough, as rather amusing discussion items at more than one
meeting of the MIT Nanotechnology Study Group. Whatever else could be said of the NSG membership, one complaint you couldn't
make was that they ducked the hard issues. Just the reverse: if there was a potential problem with nanotechnology, the NSG wanted to
know about it. They wanted to solve it, if possible, or least get it discussed. That was their oath from the weekend retreat, and it was one
that they were duty-bound to honor. The NSG had started a "Nanotechnology Notebook," a collection of articles on various nano topics,
and some of the pieces in it addressed the unemployment issue. Obviously, Drexler's invention was not the first one to threaten mass
unemployment: the Luddites themselves went back to the early 1800s, and in more recent times the prospect of automation, robotics, and
artificial intelligence revived the old controversy. But if the papers in the Nanotechnology Notebook were any indication, there was no
agreement on the subject even among the experts. Basically there were two view-points: one was that automation did not mean job loss;
the other was that it did. James Albus, a robotics researcher, took the first view. "There is not a fixed amount of work," he said. "More
work can always be created. Work is easy to create. There is always more work to be done than people to do it." Artificial intelligence
would itself create jobs. "Building the automatic factories is a Herculean task that will provide employment to millions of workers for
several generations." And so on. Nils Nilsson, an artificial-intelligence researcher, took the precise opposite position. "Even if AI does
create more work," he said, "this work can also be performed by AI devices without necessarily implying more jobs for humans." People
will in fact become unemployed, Nilsson predicted, but "by ùnemployed' I do not mean unoccupied. Nor do I mean to imply that people
will regard their unemployment as in any way undesirable. I merely mean that people's time will not be spent predominantly working for
an income." As to how people's time would be spent, Nilsson was not full of ideas, and the few notions he did have ranged from the
dreadful ("volunteer or public-service activities") to the unrealistic ("artistic and creative pursuits") to the monotonous (the rise of "a
`Polynesian-type' culture"). Was that the final payoff of nanotechnology — mangoes and ennui? To get a better grip on the matter, the
NSG invited David Friedman, economist at the University of Chicago (and the son of Milton Friedman, the Nobel Prize winner), to give a
talk on the subject at the January 1987 nano conference they were sponsoring. But even Friedman was of two minds on the issue. The
lesson from history, he said, was that technology did not mean massive unemployment. "In this country, for example, since independence,
roughly speaking, our population has gone up by almost two orders of magnitude. Throughout that time, aside from a couple of rather un
usual years, the number of jobs and the number of workers never differed by more than ten percent. And I would think that just sort of
with no theory at all, it seems very peculiar that you would have two independent numbers, each of which went up about a hundredfold
during a period of two hundred years and that were virtually never more than ten percent apart." What technology really did, said
Friedman, was to increase productivity and create wealth. It gave people more free time. "What happens," he said, "is that as technology
improves, output per hour goes up. In a market economy people have the option of taking that improved output per hour in the form of
more income — more real income — or in the form of more leisure. And of course over the last two hundred years people have done both
on a large scale." Nanotechnology would merely push this to extremes ... and then some. "No one will bother to charge for food," he said.
"Food machines would be provided as a free amenity. They will be set up on street corners to commemorate dead spouses, just as water
fountains are now. Raw materials, except for very large objects like planets, will cost almost zero." A new car might cost something, but
not much. "With Eric's technology we can make and market a new car for three seventy-five. That's three dollars and seventy-five cents."
This was pretty much the standard view, nanotechnology as the molecular cornucopia, and all was well and good. Still, when it came time
to say exactly what would fill a per-son's time in the nano age, when food machines were on street corners, when new cars went for $3.75,
52
when only the larger planets were even remotely pricey, well, even Dave Friedman was slightly at a loss. What would these people
actually do? "If it's important to human beings to feel that they're doing important, produ tive things, and if it turns out that in the world of
a hundred tears from now the important, productive thing you're doing is giving your wife a back rub, and you're both living off this
phenomenal flow of income from your very small amount of property in a very, very productive world, you may feel useless. "I can offer
you no guarantees from economic theory against that."
53
Utopia – Solves Capitalism  Nirvana

Nanotechnology breaks down greed and capitalism allowing everyone to live in nirvana
183-184
Money, too, would no longer be worshiped the way it always had been; it would no longer be a badge of status. How could it be in an age
when, one, everybody had tons of it, and, two, you didn't even need it, or very much of it, to acquire things? Essentially, the only material
entities that would retain value in the nano age were land, which even nanotechnology could make no more of, and "special items of
artistic merit," which was to say, artworks. Since the work of the world would be done by machines — by the assemblers — there would
be large amounts of unemployment. Nevertheless, there wouldn't be an unemployment "problem." Al-though you could certainly work if
you wanted to, you wouldn't have to work for a living — that was the whole point. Unemployment would simply be a neutral and natural
condition, the normal state of affairs, like the sky's being blue. As for the four-billion-dollar question — What would people be doing
when they didn't have to work? — MacGillivray's answer was utterly simple: they'd be off enjoying themselves. "We will have an
entertainment society, not an information society," he said. "Self-directed people will pursue knowledge and entertainment for its own
sake. Some will accumulate knowledge for the joy, satisfaction, and challenge of the pursuit. Others will take up artistic activities. Some
will preserve and continue traditional and creative means of construction and production." Art, performance, creation — these became the
big themes of the future among the nano clan. Nanotechnology, apparently, was greater nirvana. It meant instant and effortless satisfaction
of every material want or need. It gave you everything, all on a platter. Matter had been overpowered; reality itself took on a new cast: it
was controllable, plastic, malleable. It presented no further hindrance, no resistance to human will. The assemblers would provide.
54
Utopia- Nanotech gives us everything we need and

provides freedom
Nanotech would give people freedom and all the necessities imaginable
Drexler, 86
(Eric, Nanotechnologist, “Engines of Creation,” Accessed 7/13/08, http://www.e-drexler.com/d/06/00/EOC/EOC_Chapter_15.html) KMH
Nanotechnology will open new choices. Self-replicating systems will be able to provide food, health care, shelter, and other
necessities. They will accomplish this without bureaucracies or large factories. Small, self-sufficient communities can reap the
benefits. One test of the freedom a technology offers is whether it frees people to return to primitive ways of life. Modern
technology fails this test; molecular technology succeeds. As a test case, imagine returning to a stone-age style of life - not by
simply ignoring molecular technology, but while using it.
55
Utopia – Aging
Nanotechnology prevent aging
Gregory M. Farhy, B.S. in biology from U Cal Irvine, and Ph.D. in pharmacology and cryobiology from Medical College of Georgia.
Nanotechnology; Research and Perspectives, edited by BC Crandall and James Lewis. 1989 p. 255-256
The remainder of this chapter deals with the problems of aging (level 2 in table 12.1). The aging process has been postulated to arise in
either of two ways. The first is through random damage, such as free radical damage or nonenzymatic glucosylation of sensitive sites on
proteins. However, rather than random damage, physiological changes are usually found such as changes in neurotransmitter and
hormonal receptor pop¬ulation sizes. Much that resembles random damage occurs as a conse¬quence of these physiological changes.
Therefore the lion's share of aging seems to be due to the second postulated process: genetically "pro¬grammed" senescence. In all
likelihood, both processes play at least some role. Nevertheless, as the following discussion will suggest, "phys¬iological" and relatively
ordinary intervention strategies should be equal to the task of dealing with either type of problem. Nanotechnological computer-effector
systems would certainly provide effective ways for dealing with random damage. But other techniques—based on the ob¬servation that
cells are actually very good at repairing themselves—may provide satisfactory solutions. Incorporating a few additional repair systems
may be all that is needed to handle any damage that results in aging. Are there any precedents that would make us believe that it is
possible to eliminate aging? The answer is affirmative. There are living trees that are several thousand years old that are perfectly healthy
and show no signs of aging.3 There appear to be nonaging animals as well, particularly sea anemones,4 hydras, certain lobsters, and
possibly certain fish. (Data are somewhat limited; it is hard for short-lived creatures such as humans to monitor individual free-living
ocean-dwelling animals for several decades.)
56
Utopia- AT: People will be bored

People who are compelled to work can do so—there will still be jobs available
303-304
Plausible as all of that was, there were yet a few problems with it. For one thing, the idea that people would be suicidal over no longer
having to work for a living, well, that was a bit strained on the face of it. Wouldn't they be at least slightly relieved? After all, if they
wanted to keep on working for a living, there was nothing in nanotechnology to stop them. People could do all the work they wanted to,
they just wouldn't be compelled to — not by external reality at any rate. The fact was that plenty of "ordinary" jobs would still be around
for people to do, even in the nano age: there'd be cops, reporters, lawyers, restaurant chefs, waiters, judges, senators, writers, marriage
counselors, mathematicians. Nanomachines, talented as they were, weren't going to be masters of every specialty. Then, too, the notion of
what counted as "work" would be redefined in the nano age, as it often had been in the past. "When housework was mechanized,
standards rose," said Mary Bateson. "Our ancestors didn't change the sheets twice a week, more like twice a year, probably. Back in the
days when women wove their own fabric — and maybe even spun the yarn and made their own candles — the standards for what a house
should look like were one heck of a lot lower than they are now. In that area, what has happened might be regarded as the creation of
`
busywork,' by changing the standards. "The identical activity can be turned into work or into leisure by being packaged differently," she
added. Gardening, for ex-ample, was essentially the same activity as farming — but in one case it was "recreation," and in the other,
"work." Nanotechnology would allow you to choose what was work, instead of having brute nature foist that work upon you. Beyond that
was the fact that even after nanotechnology was perfected, even after it had become widespread and freely avail-able, not everyone would
take equal advantage of it. Some would use it only selectively and in rare cases. Whereas few might decline nanotechnology's anti-aging
benefits or its capacity for curing disease, not everyone was going to want to get their food from a "meat machine" or to live in a mock-
wood, nanomachined house. Why not live in a real house, made out of real wood, built by carpenters, instead of one formed in ten
minutes out of some nameless and faceless Utility Fog?
57
58
Health Add On
Nanotech solves for all death and illnesses
Zey , 1994
(Michael, Ph.D in sociology, executive director of the Expansionary Institute, “Seizing the Future,” lexis) KMH
Nanotechnology will also play a major role in postoperative healing. Quite simply, repair machines will help the heart grow fresh
muscle by resetting cellular control mechanisms. Stroke victims will be helped to regenerate fresh brain tissue even where there has
been significant damage. The ultimate goal here is not merely to cure disease, but rather to establish lifetime health, perhaps even
immortality. This will transpire when we have achieved a complete understanding of the molecular structure of healthy tissue.
Then we will have the knowledge to diagram, as if were, the structure of a healthy heart cell or a healthy liver and transfer to tiny
machines the accurate information about that organ’s molecules, cells, and tissues.
EMERGING INFECTIOUS DISEASES THREATEN PLANETARY EXTINCTION

The Toronto Sun, October 16, 1994, Pg. M6
Nor did the media go beyond Surat and explain how this largely inconsequential epidemic, a kind of false alarm in a much larger
microbial saga, was another sharp warning of our species' growing vulnerability to infectious disease. Imagine, for a moment, if Surat had
aroused a different airborne microbe, a so-called "emerging virus," beyond the waning reach of antibiotics. Suppose that the headliner
germ had been a new strain of Ebola that dissolves internal organs into a bloody tar or the mysterious "X" virus that killed thousands in
the Sudan last year. Had such a microbe been unleashed, the final death toll might have been millions, and the world might now be
mourning a "new Black Death." The planet, in fact, might be an entirely different and emptier place altogether.
59
Health- restores body

Nanotech solves blindness and can restore motor function to stroke patients
Ker Than, LiveScience Staff Writer. Nanotech Restores Vision in Hamsters, livescience.com. March 13, 2006
http://www.livescience.com/health/060313_neuro_mend.html accessed July 14, 2008
Scientists partially restored the vision in blinded hamsters by plugging gaps in their injured brains with a synthetic substance that allowed
brain cells to reconnect with one another, a new study reports. If it can be applied to humans, the microscopic material could one day help
restore sensory and motor function to patients suffering from strokes and injuries of the brain or spinal cord. It could also help mend cuts
made in the brain during surgery. "If we can reconnect parts of the brain that were disconnected by a stroke, then we may be able to
restore speech to an individual who is able to understand what is said but has lost the ability to speak," said study team member Rutledge
Ellis-Behnke from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The substance contains nano-sized particles that self-assemble into a fibrous
mesh that mimics the body's natural connective tissue when placed in contact with living cells. The mesh allows existing neurons whose
axons have been severed by injury or stroke to reconnect. Axons are branch-like projections that link neurons to one other, allowing them
to communicate. When many axons are bundled together, they form a nerve.
Nanotechnology allows the fabrication of tissue to become a reality

Nanotechnology; Research and Perspectives, edited by BC Crandall and James Lewis. 1989 p. 253
Beyond this, the psychological side of medical goals begins to become important. After you become a permanently healthy immortal,
what other medical goals can you have? Well, people will still have their vanity to satisfy. They may wish to change their adult body size,
to lengthen just their legs, to remodel the shape of their skulls, and so on. Beyond this, accident victims may require regeneration of
crushed, burned, or severed body parts, and people disfigured by birth defects—before disease reversal precludes such defects—or people
who are oth¬erwise damaged, will require help. These goals represent major depar¬tures from what I would call a mature "entry-level"
genetic engineering; they cannot be achieved by turning on or turning off a few existing genes or by synthesizing and inserting a few
additional genes that simply lead to the production of ordinary types of catalytic proteins. Instead, actualizing goals of this nature will
require both an understanding of how to program living tissue to create desired macroscopic structures (something the body already
knows how to do) and a means of assuring that the process of overriding previous, natural, morphogenetic pro-grams goes smoothly. This
is hardly a trivial undertaking but one that can still rely on relatively ordinary biological mechanisms. Nanotech¬nology would likely be
helpful for these tasks, but goals at this level can probably be achieved, although with some difficulty, without a mature nanotechnology.
Nanotech can fix irreversible cell damage

Nanotechnology; Research and Perspectives, edited by BC Crandall and James Lewis. 1989 p. 253 -254
What else might be medically relevant beyond this? "Fatal" traumatic accidents, attempted homicides, massive exposure to radiation,
prolonged accidental systemic poisoning, and so on, could all lead to prolonged cardiac arrest and/or "irreversible" cellular damage, with
or without a variety of other systemic traumas superimposed. This prob-lem is qualitatively different from any considered so far due to
our inability to rely on cellular homeostatic mechanisms to maintain "house-keeping" while structural repairs are carried out.
Deterioration prior to treatment presents additional problems. No technology short of nano-technology would seem to have any hope of
successfully addressing these difficulties, and we must expect that even nanotechnology will fail in many cases.
60
Health- Solves Disease

Nanotech solves for pain and diseases
Spence, 1999
Bill, Alcor Life Extension Foundation, December 1999, http://www.stii.dost.gov.ph/infoscience/jun2001/jun01_6.htm) KMH
Supermedicine Nanotechnology can have innumerable applications in various fields including industry, agriculture, energy, ecology, and
health, among others. Supermedicine, including cryonics (roughly, freezing the terminally with the intention of reviving it in the future
when nanotechnology already has the cure for the illness) excites more people now than anything else. Building on the atomic scale,
mechanical computers with the power of a mainframe can be manufactured so small, that several hundred will fit inside the space
of a biological cell. If one combines microscopic motors, gears, bearings, plates, sensors, power and communication cables, etc.
with powerful microscopic computers, one has the makings of a new class of materials, programmable microscopic smart materials
that can be used in medicine. Medical nanite can patrol the body, armed with a complete knowledge of a person's DNA, and dispatch
any foreign invaders. Such cell sentinels will form an artificial immune system and immunity to not only the common cold, but also
AIDS and any future viral or bacterial mutations. The nanites can do what the plastic surgeon does, only better. No pain, no
bruising, and results overnight. People can sculpt their own bodies. People who feel they were born with the wrong gender can really
make the change, taking on the full attribute of the opposite sex. Men can bear children. Imagine having one's body and bones woven
with invisible diamond fabric. Simple calculations show, a properly engineered body reinforcement net (possibly bio-diamond
composite) woven with nanites smaller than a human cell can increase tolerance to "G" forces to the point that one can fall out of a
building and walk away unhurt and alive. In the event of a fire or a chemical spill, should the air become toxic, microscopic diamond
vessels just ten billionths of a meter wide, pressurized with 1,000 atmospheres of pure oxygen could sense oxygen levels in the blood and
provide respiration requirements of the body for hours. Fatal accidents can be walked away from, thanks to a range of safety devices
possible only with nanotechnology. Even more astounding, nano computers ad manipulators will be small enough to insert into cells,
without compromising cellular function ad perform a myriad novel functions. One particularly interesting function is to take an inventory
of the host cell's structures using the cell's DNA as a blueprint. Should a foreign nasty element arrive, something outside the inventory as
stated by the cell's DNA, the cell sentinel will destroy the invader before it has time to cause damage. The nano computer will not need to
know what disease the invader represents, it will not matter. If it is not included in the DNA code, it is destroyed. Viruses, prions
(microscopic protein particle similar to a virus but lacking in nucleic acid), parasites and bacteria continue to mutate ad produce new
diseases which man's immune system may or may not handle. In theory, a nano cell sentinel can make the body immune to any
present or future infectious diseases. Imagine a child growing up disease-free. There will be no more painful childbirth. With
mature nanotechnology capable of cellular manipulation, there is no reason a woman should experience agonizing hours of labor at the
miraculous moment of birth. Dilation can be controlled by the mother without pain. Birth will no longer be traumatic with
nanotechnology. There will be nanites for cellular structural repairs (radiation damage, etc.) ad genetic modifications, like disabling
biological death gene clocks. >
Nanotechnology can solve the problems of disease and cancer

K. Eric Drexler, visiting scholar at Stanford University’s Department of Computer Science. Nanotechnology; Research and Perspectives,
edited by BC Crandall and James Lewis. 1989 p. 345
Potential medical applications also show that small systems can have big effects. Cells and tissues in the human body are built and
maintained by molecular machinery, but sometimes that machinery proves inadequate: viruses multiply, cancer cells spread, or systems
age and deteriorate. As one might expect, new molecular machines and computers of subcellular size could support the body's own
mechanisms. Devices containing nanocomputers interfaced to molecular sensors and effectors could serve as an augmented immune
system, searching out and destroying viruses and cancer cells. Similar devices, programmed as repair ma-chines, could enter living cells
to edit out viral DNA sequences and repair molecular damage. Such machines would bring surgical control to the molecular level,
opening broad new horizons in medicine.
61
Health- Solves Cancer

Health experts predict nanotechnology can help solve cancer by 2015
Keim, July 8, 2008
(Brandon, Freelance and science writer, “Cancer Nanotech: Government Spending Done Right,” Accessed 7/14/08,
http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2008/07/cancer-nanotech.html) KMH
The promising field of cancer nanotherapies provide a perfect example of why government spending on science is good for business --
and, ultimately, for people. Several years ago, the National Cancer Institute made nanotechnology a centerpiece of its promise to
eliminate suffering and death from cancer by 2015. Though the timetable may seem just a little out of reach, the promise of cancer
nanotech -- molecules designed to detect and destroy cancerous cells -- was real. The NCI poured money into cancer nanotech training
and research. At the time, experiments were largely restricted to animals; as of today, at least 48 clinical trials are ongoing, many already
in Phase II.
62
Health- diagnosis
Nanotech ensures quality medical diagnosis
Medicine is concerned with diagnosis and cure. A cure may only need to be short term, such as during the process of an operation or until
nat¬ural healing can take place. Nanomedicine may have some potential in each of these areas, but in the short term it may be used
primarily for diagnosis. This will be done using nanoreceptors such as those discussed in Chapter 6. Instruments that are used in
nanomedicine could well be biological material because of the obvious congruency. Nanoreceptors will need to identify trace amounts of
biological material that are spe¬cific to the presence of a particular virus or bacterium, or which detect a particular body malfunction, such
as brain abnormality or organ stress. These could be based on electrical devices built by tethering a molecu¬lar detector to a membrane so
that a change in ion concentration cre¬ates a detectable electrical current, as described in Chapter 6. Hundreds of thousands of these
devices could be present in a single probe, each with a specific electrical signature so that a read-out of pathogen versus concentration
could be determined. Any particular body fluid could be studied. In the doctor's surgery or a forensic laboratory it would be sali¬va, sweat,
urine, blood, sperm or vaginal fluid.
63
Water Wars Add On

Nanotech will solve water shortages
Another area where nanotechnology excels is its ability to discrim¬inate between species of molecules or dissolved solids and hence help
deal with select species. For instance, nanotechnology is used in special activated filters based on a capacitor with aligned carbon
nanotubes that act as electrodes and hang densely into the channels through which the water flows. This can remove salt or other
contaminants from water to produce clean water quite cheaply. The main competi¬tion for desalination, based on cost, will be solar
thermal energy for distillation. However, in many locations burning liquid fuels and gas for distillation is still cheaper at present.
Lack of water and the related problem of massive land degradation is one of the world's major environmental issues. Opening up other
cost-effective water sources will also be of inestimable benefit, whether sea water or groundwater. With nanotechnology we will be able
to fil¬ter ions easily and cheaply to purify and more easily recycle the water we use. Recycling is going to become essential in many world
loca¬tions. We will need to start using sea water on a grand scale.
DEMANDS ARE GOING TO INCREASE FOR WATER AND WILL CAUSE CONFLICT
Ed Brown August 23, 2005 Renewable Energy Brings Water to the World,
http://www.renewableenergyaccess.com/rea/news/story?id=35664 Accessed 7/23/07
Water demand is expected to continue to increase at twice the rate of population growth. A big part of this increase is being created by the
demand for water to cool more power plants. In the next seven years India, China and the U.S. plan to build 750 new coal-fired power
plants. Another 340 coal plants are also planned throughout the world in the same timeframe. And with the Federal Energy Bill now
passed, new power plants, including the possibility of a new generation of nuclear plants, are expected to be built. The generation of
electricity using nuclear energy consumes the most water - 0.62 gallons per kWh. Coal power plants use 0.49 gallons per kWh and a
combined cycle natural gas power plant uses 0.25 gallons per kWh. Thermoelectric power plants withdraw 39 billion gallons of clean
drinking water from our aquifers every day (20% of total water withdrawals). This is the equivalent to the daily drinking water
requirements of 62 billion people, about 10 times the Earth's population. As the demand for water increases, competition for water
resource will continue to escalate and it will most likely result in local and regional conflicts. Communities downstream from many of
these power plants will have less water available for their crops and for drinking. More conflicts will arise within communities to
determine water use priorities.
These regional instabilities would ensure an escalated war with the likely use of nuclear weapons
Dr. Jeffrey Deutsch, earned a BA in Government from Cornell University, in Ithaca, NY, and an MA and PhD in Economics from George
Mason University, in Fairfax, VA. The Rabid Tiger Newsletter, Vol. II, No. 9. November 18, 2002. http://www.rabidtigers.com/
accesssed 07/11/2007
The Rabid Tiger Project believes that a nuclear war is most likely to start in Africa. Civil wars in the Congo (the country formerly known
as Zaire), Rwanda, Somalia and Sierra Leone, and domestic instability in Zimbabwe, Sudan and other countries, as well as occasional
brushfire and other wars (thanks in part to "national" borders that cut across tribal ones) turn into a really nasty stew. We've got all too
many rabid tigers and potential rabid tigers, who are willing to push the button rather than risk being seen as wishy-washy in the face of a
mortal threat and overthrown. Geopolitically speaking, Africa is open range. Very few countries in Africa are beholden to any particular
power. South Africa is a major exception in this respect - not to mention in that she also probably already has the Bomb. Thus, outside
powers can more easily find client states there than, say, in Europe where the political lines have long since been drawn, or Asia where
many of the countries (China, India, Japan) are powers unto themselves and don't need any "help," thank you. Thus, an African war can
attract outside involvement very quickly. Of course, a proxy war alone may not induce the Great Powers to fight each other. But an
African nuclear strike can ignite a much broader conflagration, if the other powers are interested in a fight. Certainly, such a strike would
in the first place have been facilitated by outside help - financial, scientific, engineering, etc. Africa is an ocean of troubled waters, and
some people love to go fishing.
64
Hydrogen – Nanotech key to hydrogen economy

Nanotech can store elements like hydrogen efficiently
Michael, Kamali, Michelle, Burkhard, Professors at the College of Science, Technology and Environment in Sydney, Australia,
Nanotubes may have a role in hydrogen storage [21]. Whilst its ener¬gy content on a mass-for-mass basis is better than petrol, hydrogen
has difficulty competing with fossil fuel because it is a gas. The target for hydrogen capacity that would interest car manufacturers is
about 6.5 percent by weight, regardless of storage medium. Nanotubes can also store helium. Nanotubes can also be used to store other
materials like oxides or metals such as copper. Hence they can be used as nano- test tubes, or the carbon can be removed to produce nano-
copper wires for nano-electrical circuits. Nanotubes may also have a use in batteries. Graphite can store lithium ions, the charge carriers
for some batteries, but six carbon atoms are needed for every lithium ion. The geometry inherent in bundles of nanotubes may allow them
to accommodate more than one lithium ion for every six carbons.
65
Environment – Nano Solves it

Nanotech will clean the environment in multiple ways
Louis Theodore, professor in the Chemical Engineering Department of Manhattan College and Robert G. Kunz, environmental
consultant with three decades of experience in the petroleum and chemical industries. Nanotechnology; Environmental implications and
solutions. 2005 p. 15-16
Returning to the positive features of this new activity, nanotechnology will be one of the key technologies used in the quest to improve
the global environment in the 21st century. While there will be some direct effects, much of the technology's influence on the environment
will be through indirect applications of nanotechnology. Although any technology, whether nanotechnology or a box of matches, can
always be put to both positive and negative uses, there are many areas in which the positive aspects of nanotechnology look promising.
These extend from pollution reduction through environmental remediation to sustainable development. There has already been a
considerable shift in both public and corporate attitudes to the environment. Major scandals such as Enron and WorldCom have led not
only to tighter corporate governance but also to calls for greater corporate responsibility. The end result of this shift will be to make
companies focus on the environment, and look to leveraging nanotechnology as a way of not only improving efficiency and lowering
costs, but doing this by reducing energy consumption and minimizing waste. A typical example would be in the use of nanoparticle
catalysts that are not only more efficient, owing to more of the active catalyst being exposed, but also require less precious metal (thus
reducing cost), are more tightly bound to the support (increasing the lifetime of the catalyst) and may also increase selectivity, that is,
produce more of the desired reaction product, rather than by-products. Though nanotechnology could have some significant effects on
environmental technologies, environmental considerations have not historically been given any-where near the priority in new
developments that commercial considerations are given, and this balance, though swinging gradually more toward environmental con-
siderations, still largely dominates. Many of the direct applications of nanotechnology relate to the removal of some element or compound
from the environment, through, for example, the use of nanofiltration, nanoporous sorbents (absorbents and adsorbents), catalysts in
cleanup operations, and filtering, separating, and destroying environmental contaminants in processing waste products. Most effects, as
with other technologies, are likely to be indirect. The application of nanotechnology to the environment is already being hailed by some as
the "killer application," offering companies a chance to enhance their green credentials without hurting their balance sheets and also
creating some huge new markets. Improved efficiency of energy production and supply has both commercial and environmental
advantages. One is likely to see the biggest impacts in this area, in savings through lighter composite materials, growth of the use of
alternative energy (e.g., through improved economic viability of solar and wind energy generation), and the advent of commercially
viable fuel cells in a number of applications. Such technologies certainly have the ability to help considerably in the reduction of global
carbon emissions, and other emissions, but probably the most dramatic effects, from the point of view of the daily lives of many
individuals in both developed and developing countries, will come with clean water and a reduction in health costs. Further, air in cities
around the world could become as unpolluted as the air in the country. Some, including the authors of this work, have concluded that the
major environmental nanotechnology breakthroughs will occur naturally through pollution Intervention principles_10 .
66
Environment – Oil Spills Add On

Nanotech makes hella legit Paper towels—it can even soak up tons of oil
MIT News May 30, 2008

<MIT News, 7-15-08, http://apatheticlemming.blogspot.com/2008/07/slick-idea-from-mit-nanotech-oil-spill.html>
"A mat of nanowires with the touch and feel of paper could be an important new tool in the cleanup of oil and other organic pollutants,
MIT researchers and colleagues report in the May 30 online issue of Nature Nanotechnology.
"The scientists say they have created a membrane that can absorb up to 20 times its weight in oil, and can be recycled many times for
future use. The oil itself can also be recovered. Some 200,000 tons of oil have already been spilled at sea since the start of the decade.
oil spills in oceans devestate marine wildlife

Paul Goff, Architect in Manhattan who is concerned about issues of public space and ecology. Car Culture’s War on the Environment Part
IV: The loss of farmland, forests, and wildlife, SATYA. September 1995 http://www.satyamag.com/sept95/goff.html
The profligate use of oil, in many ways, may contain the most ecological destructive component of all: the ubiquitous oil spill —
ubiquitous in a sense that the Exxon Valdez disaster was not an anomaly; spills of that magnitude occur quite often and have disastrous
implications on the ecology of the world’s oceans. Greenpeace estimates that one billion gallons of oil are directly spilled into the oceans
every year. Valdez was only the 14th largest spill in history, but, because most others occurred off shore and did not directly reach a
populated land mass, there was a dearth of media coverage. Accidental spills only represent 17% of the total oil which enters the marine
environment. The rest, according to the National Research Council in 1985, enters the oceans via the routine flushing of carrier tanks, and
the daily byproducts of the petroleum industry. Another 50 million gallons of petroleum seep into the world’s fresh water supply through
the daily run-off from roads and do-it-yourself mechanics. Although the estimation of the total death of sea creatures and birds due to oil
spillage is incalculable, the toll from the Alaska Valdez incident, according to Greenpeace, led to the deaths of 5000 otters, 200 harbor
seals, and perhaps half a million birds.
Marine Biodiversity critical to all human life

MARINE BIODIVERSITY CRITICAL TO HUMAN LIFE
Greenpeace Statement, 1996 (STATEMENT OF RECOGNITION OF THE INTERNATIONAL YEAR OF THE OCEAN,
http://archive.greenpeace.org/~comms/98/yoo/docs/statement.html) (PDOCSS1009)
Marine and coastal biodiversity serves as the foundation of the natural ecosystems that produce and maintain fisheries and other marine
life. As addressed elsewhere in this statement, marine biodiversity is increasingly under threat as a result of human activities causing
harmful and sometimes irreversible damage.
67
AT: Topicality- Alternative energy

Solar Nanotech is an alternative energy
Scheer, writer for Emagazine, July 2005
The Enviromental Magazine, Solar Nanotech coming of age, accessed 7/14/08, http://www.emagazine.com/view/?2689
"The market is obviously huge, demand is huge. Besides, [alternative energy] is imperative in the world we live in," said Bill Gurley of
Benchmark Capital, a Silicon Valley venture firm whose partners got rich on investments like AOL, Ebay and Palm Computing. As the
casualties mount in Iraq and oil companies get ready to dig into the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, more and more forward thinking
investors are hitching their wagons to the dream of solar nanotech.
68
AT: Deep Eco- Need Tech funding

Environmentalism won’t work, we need new technology—nanotech funding allows us to speed up nanotech
development of efficient motors and batteries
Glenn Harlan Reynolds is Beauchamp Brogan Distinguished Professor of Law at the University of Tennessee. GREEN & SMART
EARTH-SAVING DONE RIGHT, New York Post. April 22, 2008
http://www.nypost.com/seven/04222008/postopinion/opedcolumnists/green__smart_107556.htm accessed July 12, 2008
* Reducing carbon emissions by making people poorer will never happen. Just ask people in China - now the world's No. 1 carbon emitter
- how interested they are in returning to the economic conditions they suffered a few decades ago when their carbon emissions were
lower. * Burning fossil fuels is a lousy idea for reasons that have nothing to do with global warming. These hydrocarbons offer important
applications as fertilizers and chemical feedstocks, making it foolish to burn them for fuel. * New technologies are generally cleaner,
safer and more efficient than old ones. All this aims us toward a solution that doesn't involve impossible sacrifice. Even many scientific
champions of global-warming theory are admitting the first point, by shifting their focus from cutting emissions to "geoengineering" - by
which they mean responding to global warming by doing things like injecting particulates into the stratosphere to block sunlight, or
fertilizing carbon-absorbing algae blooms in the tropical oceans. These are drastic steps, worth researching in case the worst happens, but
nothing we should rush into. But then, impoverishing the world would be a drastic step, too, and it's one that's not likely to sell. But what
if we could reduce greenhouse gases without impoverishing the world? That would be worth doing anyway, because along with those
greenhouse gases come all sorts of other nasty substances we're better off without. That point is catching on, too. Even some
environmentalists are already looking to nuclear power as, ironically enough, more environmentally friendly than coal, oil, or natural gas,
and we'll likely see more such sentiment in the future. But nuclear power is just a stopgap - as more advanced technologies like
nanotechnology offer much greater prospects via solar energy and reduced energy consumption. MIT's Vladimir Bulovic calls nanotech a
potentially "disruptive technology" in the solar-energy field, offering a complete shift from today's fossil-fuel environment. And famed
inventor and futurist Ray Kurzweil projects the current rate of progress in solar power forward and argues, "The power we are generating
from solar is doubling every two years; at that rate, it will be able to meet all our energy needs within 20 years." Solar research is
progressing rapidly, and recent research suggests that "quantum nanodots" may offer dramatic improvements, perhaps on the order that
Kurzweil predicts. Nanotech offers dramatic improvements on the side of energy consumption, too: As computing and other devices
become smaller, they become more efficient - and nanotech will allow drastic improvements in both size and efficiency. Nanotech is
starting to yield super-strong, super-light materials, too. Imagine how much more efficient a family car could be if you cut the weight in
half, even if you kept burning gas. But nanotech is also likely to produce better batteries and better motors, meaning that your lighter car
may also be electric, powered ultimately by those nanodot solar panels. All of these things are in the works now to greater and lesser
degrees, but they could happen faster if there were more research and development support. Ultimately, we're probably better off putting
our energies into promoting cleaner, more advanced technologies like these than in trying to get people to reduce the scope of their lives
through "hair-shirt environmentalism." Hair-shirts have always had their fans, but have seldom been widely adopted. On the other hand,
most people would like to lead cleaner, better, more efficient lives. Why not give 'em what they want, and help the planet at the same
time? A focus on cutting energy consumption with today's technology isn't going to make much of a difference. Let's work on replacing
current tech with something better, instead.
69
Federalism 2AC block

1) Patent Laws
A) Federalism causes disunity in patent laws—this causes weak patent laws
Banks, Professor of Political Science @ Univ of Akron, 2003
36 Akron L. Rev. 425, The Constitutional Politics of Interpreting Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment, accessed 7/15/08,
A judiciary committed to preserving its own power at the expense [*470] of all others in a political system emphasizing a dual
government of shared powers n262 wreaks havoc with the rule of law. Understanding the limits of Congress' Section 5 power is
notoriously difficult because the doctrinal position a Justice stakes out is fact-sensitive and always affected by a variety of legal and
political factors. n263 Thus, the Court's decision to wield its power and directly tip the balance of federalism towards the states is
significant, for it pragmatically influences how citizens, and litigants, order their legal expectations in their dealings with the legal
process. Court watchers and Supreme Court Justices have expressed concern that the Rehnquist Court's firm commitment of
respecting, say, a state's "dignity" n264 threatens long-standing doctrinal interpretations of pre-emption, Commerce Clause
jurisprudence and administrative law. n265 As Justice Stevens argued in Florida Prepaid, the Court's new federalism has great potential
to disrupt the national uniformity of patent laws; and significantly, puts too much faith in state judiciaries to understand technical
legal rules they have little familiarity with, while ironically, removing the federal bench who has the requisite expertise from their
adjudication. n266 The creation and ambiguity of the Court's innovative legal standards, like the plain statement rule and the
reformulated congruence and proportionality test in Boerne will only exacerbate the confusion in the lower courts, who are trying to
make sense of them, especially in light of past precedent that the Court is systematically overturning in its frenzy to uphold state
sovereignty. n267 In short, the threat of having "shifting legislative majorities" n268 disrupt the [*471] balance of federalism has been
inexplicably and illegitimately been replaced by the shifting coalitions of a divided (often five-to-four)
B) Strong Patent laws key to the success of nanotechnology.

David S. Almeling, (J.D., 2004, Duke University School of Law; B.A., 2001, University of Florida.), 2004,
STAN. TECH. L. REV. N1, “Patenting Nanotechnology: Problems with the Utility Requirement,” Accessed 7/15/08,
http://stlr.stanford.edu/STLR/Articles/04_STLR_N1, jo
Second, the industry requires patents for commercial success.218 Most obviously, companies argue that without patents, they would be
less willing to engage in fundamental research.219 And because nanotechnology is an emerging industry, most projects are at the
fundamental-research stage.220 Patents encourage this research by giving companies the confidence that they will have some return on
their investment through the competitive advantage of patent protection.221 Without this confidence, companies would hesitate to invest
in costly research. Applied Nanotechnology is one company that relies in part on its patents.222 In 2003, it had 68 patents (with 86 more
pending) that it licensed to create cash flow to fuel further research.223 Another small company that relies in part on its patents is C Sixty,
a company that uses nanotechnology in drug design.224 C Sixty recently signed an exclusive license with Merck, a large company that
will develop drugs based on C Sixty’s patented technology.225 One commentator has suggested that C Sixty is a "platform company" that
uses its patents to "derive most of its future revenues from licensing and partnering."226 57 Another reason that the nanotechnology
industry needs strong patent protection is that much of the innovation surrounds small companies,227 and patents are critical to these
companies. Without patents, small companies have few defenses against larger companies that are better equipped to take inventions to
market.228 This would be unfortunate because small companies are critical in creating new markets, 229 and small companies often have
greater flexibility in emerging markets than large companies.230 The Federal Government has recognized the importance of small
nanotechnology companies by directing funding to these companies.231 Thus, because patents are a vital incentive for the entire industry
to fund research, and because patents are particularly vital to small companies, adopting a heightened utility standard would harm
innovation.
70
2 ) Science Education
A) State control of education stops reforms necessary for scientific education
Alan Dove, American Society for Clinical Investigation 2002
http://www.jci.org/cgi/content/full/110/8/1057 J. Clin. Invest. 110:1057-1060 (2002). doi:10.1172/JCI200216959
Science education in the US represents the melding of two of the most complex systems ever devised by humans: the body of scientific
knowledge and the institution of American public education. There is general agreement that this Byzantine enterprise is in need of major
reform, but the factors that drove its deterioration are difficult to pinpoint. Following a longstanding national tradition, fingers of blame
have been pointed in virtually every direction. Even a cursory study reveals a plethora of possible causes. A post-Sputnik wave of science
teachers, drawn by patriotism and relatively high salaries, has mostly retired. Many school districts are going broke. More students now
come from unstable households, many below the poverty line. Celebrities and political leaders increasingly embrace pseudoscientific or
antiscientific beliefs. With the advancement of knowledge, science itself has become more complex. While many of these trends are not
unique to the US, efforts at reforming science education here face the added obstacle of federalism. More than almost any other area of
public policy, education in the US is controlled at the state level, so current reform strategies call for changing 50 autonomous systems. "I
would say that if we were going to have a big reform of K–12 science education in this country, it would have to come from the federal
level," says Beth Montelone, a biologist at Kansas State University (Manhattan, Kansas, USA), who is involved in school reform. State
control of education, however, is a sacred cow in US politics. Asked if federal control would make curriculum changes easier, the NSF’s
Brown responds with a chuckle, "That’s a question that is hypothetical. As a federal bureaucrat, I’m not even going to go down that road."
Brown explains that the NSF and other federal agencies have to help shape states’ agendas indirectly: "We don’t say to them that you must
do this particular curriculum or you must do that, but we say whatever you’re doing has to have a logic and has to get more kids involved
in science and math." The agency, which currently has a budget of more than $350 million dedicated to improving science education, can
also assist grass-roots reform efforts once they have begun at the state or local level.
B) We need to educate the people in the United States so they don’t reject nanotech
Gross, April 16, 2008

(Grant, IDG News Service, “Lawmakers Look to Increase Nanotech Safety Research,” Accessed 7/15/08,
http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/144708/lawmakers_look_to_increase_nanotech_safety_research.html) KMH
The U.S. government "desperately" needs to educate consumers about nanotech to avoid horror stories in the media, added Representative
Vernon Ehlers, a Michigan Republican. Nanotech "has such an enormous potential to change our lives in ways we can't imagine," he said.
"Yet, I don't think we quite have a handle on how we're going to use it ... and what the dangers are."In addition to health and safety
research, more consumer education and teaching about nanotech in colleges and high schools is needed, added Joseph Krajcik, a professor
of education at the University of Michigan. "Most of our children, most of our adult population doesn't even understand the scale we're
talking about," he said. "I think we have a lot of work we have to do to educate our country so that we are informed citizens."
C) Space exploration depends on science education

Tarig Malik, Staff Writer. Space Commission Gets Advice on Sustaining Public Interest in Bush Vision, Space.com. April 16, 2004.
http://www.space.com/news/commission_sustainability_040416.html
If NASA plans to sustain its mission of sending humans to other worlds in the next few decades, it must encourage schoolteachers to fold
space into lesson plans that inspire students to pursue careers in science, education professionals told a presidential commission Thursday.
A robust education effort would also reinforce the workforce that will eventually build the spaceships of tomorrow, further sustaining the
space, according to aerospace experts who spoke before the Presidential Commission on the Implementation on United States Space
Exploration Policy.
71
Federalism – Innovations key to nanotech

Technological Innovation is synonymous with Nanotechnology Innovation
Adelaide.edu University Paper 2002
<Adelaide, 7-15-08, http://www.adelaide.edu.au/news/news429.html>
He says the opportunities for students wanting to study nanotechnology at the University of Adelaide were excellent. "My own
department is revising its courses to accommodate more of the chemical aspects of nanotechnology as part of a continual review of course
content. Excellent opportunities exist in physics also. Thus a student can select modules for their BSc (Bachelor of Science) program that
will equip them as nanotechnologists." Professor Lincoln says it's important not to give the impression that there is "nanotechnology"
and "other technology". "Nanotechnology, exciting as it is, is simply a reflection of human curiosity discovering more about existence
and applying these discoveries in practical applications, which in this case, because it is at molecular scale, has become nanotechnology.
"Thus, it is a continuation of the miniaturisation of technology that pervades everyday life. It represents the parallel progress of science
and technological innovation," he says.
72
Federalism Crushes Science Education

State control causes incoherent science standards – this decreases decreases scientific literacy
US National Research Center for International Mathemativs 2004
“A Splintered Vision: An Investigation of US Science and Math Education” http://hub.mspnet.org/index.cfm/9109
There is no one at the helm of mathematics and science education in the U.S.; in truth, there is no identifiable helm. No single coherent
vision of how to educate today's children dominates U.S. educational practice in either subject, nor is there a single, commonly accepted
place to turn to for such visions. Our visions to the extent that they exist at all are multiple. These splintered visions produce unfocused
curricula and textbooks that fail to define clearly what is intended to be taught. They influence teachers to implement diffuse learning
goals intheir classrooms. They emphasize familiarity with many topics rather than concentrated attention to a few. And they likely lower
the academic performance of students who spend years in such a learning environment. Our curricula, textbooks, and teaching all are "a
mile wide and an inch deep."
Emperically centrally driven scientific standards are more successful than local decentralized efforts
US National Research Center for International Mathemativs 2004
“A Splintered Vision: An Investigation of US Science and Math Education” http://hub.mspnet.org/index.cfm/9109
The U.S. vision of mathematics and science is splintered. We are not where we want to be. We must change. But the required change is
fundamental and deeply structural. There are no single answers or instant solutions. Most nations do not share similarly splintered visions
in mathematics and science education. Theirs are more coherent. While central guiding visions do not alone guarantee student
achievement, they contribute to optimal attainments. These shared visions are insufficient to ensure desired achievements, but they seem
necessary starting points. The U.S. has a decentralized educational system in which the component organizations do not always work
towards common goals, nor do they always aim at producing important combined results.
73
Kritik-AT: Consumption K-
We need to encourage consumption- saying we shouldn’t is doing so at the expense of the life expectancy of
people around the world in underdeveloped countries
Gordon Tullock, Karl Eller Professor of Economics and Political Science at University of Arizona. Nanotechnology; Research and
Perspectives, edited by BC Crandall and James Lewis. 1989 p. 282-283
Most people can easily think of ways to increase their standard of living by 25 percent. If you ask them to consider a larger increase, they
are at first a bit dubious, but if you point out the lifestyle of some of their neighbors, they quickly realize that they could increase their
standard of living even further. If we increased world income ten times while keeping population constant, the average per capita income
in the world would probably be slightly less than the average per capita income of those with advanced academic degrees. If we increased
world income by a factor of 100—a large amount—it is likely that the average world per capita income would still be less than that of the
average Ford dealer's. There is no reason that we cannot simply increase our consumption indefinitely. Some people seem to think that we
now have all we need, and we should not want anything more. But this is essentially a moral position and often implies that other people
should not increase their consumption, but not the moralist. Those who take this position rarely reduce their own consumption. It is hard
to say anything scientific about a view that morally people should reduce consumption—or at least not increase it—but it seems to me
extraordinarily hard-hearted. With the exception of Africa, life expectancy in the so-called underdeveloped world has increased very
sharply over the last few years. This is largely a result of increasing consumption.
74
Neg- AT: Solvency

Won’t be able to reach full potential until experts provide a way to distribute the material
Carlstrom, 2005
(Paul, Special to the Chronicle, “As solar gets smaller, its future gets brighter. Nanotechnology could turn rooftops into a sea of power-
generating stations”, July 11, 2005, Accessed 7/13/08, http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-
bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2005/07/11/BUG7IDL1AF1.DTL&type=tech) KMH
Distribution an obstacle: "The problem is distribution. Nanomaterials could provide a way to transmit energy as well as capture it."
Until the distribution issue is solved, Nordan says, solar energy will not be able to meet its potential of supplying vast amounts of
power. Analysts like Nordan and Mints say that while rooftops are the most attractive areas for investors, nanomaterial solar energy may
first be implemented on mobile devices like cell phones and laptop computers.
Nanobots can penetrate the human body from the air, skin, or digestion they are toxic
Royal Academy of Engineering 2004,
(“Nanoscience and Nanotechnologies: Opportunities and Uncertainties,” July 2004, lexis) KMH
To understand the potential risks to humans from nanoparticles, it is necessary first to consider briefly the body’s defences against
particles in general and the properties that particles require to overcome these defences. Throughout much of their evolutionary history,
humans have been exposed to small particles, often in very high concentration, and the mechanisms evolved for defence against micro-
organisms are also used to defend the body against such particles. Access to the human body can occur through the lungs, the skin or
the intestinal tract. Each organ presents a barrier to penetration by micro-organisms or other particles. Nevertheless, despite the
defence mechanisms outlined in Box 5.2, certain particles have proved to have toxic effects on humans, just as have certain
microorganisms. In general this is a consequence of properties that either allow them to evade or cause damage to defensive
mechanisms. An understanding of these mechanisms is of importance to estimate the possible toxic effects of nanoparticles or nanotubes.
Three types of particle in particular have provided relevant information: the minerals quartz and asbestos, and the particles associated with
air pollution.
Nanoparticles make the air explosive and are extremely difficult to detect. The smaller the particles, the
more severe the explosion
Royal Academy of Engineering 2004
The explosion of dust clouds is a potential hazard in industries such as food production (sugar, flour, custard powder), animal feed
production and places handling sawdust, many organic chemicals, plastics, metal powders and coal. The increased production of
nanopowders such as metals has led to questions about whether there is a greater risk of explosion in the clouds of these
nanopowders that might form during their production, transport or storage. Any dry, fine and combustible powder poses an
explosion or fire risk, either through spontaneous combustion or ignition. The increased surface area of nanoparticles might mean
that they would be more likely to become self-charged, and be more easily ignited. In addition, because of their small size,
nanoparticles may persist for longer in the air, may be harder to detect and may be invisible to the naked eye, making crude
detection difficult. 47 The UK Health and Safety Laboratory (HSL) has recently reviewed research in this area and found that although
there is a body of literature about the explosion risk of micrometre-scale powders, no information exists on nanopowders (HSL 2004).
Research on micrometre-scale powders reveals that explosion severity tends to increase with decreasing particle size, although for
some substances this effect levels off. The report recognises that the changes in the physical and chemical properties of particles below
100nm mean that results from tests at the micrometrescale cannot be extrapolated to the nanoscale, where the risk of explosion could be
either greater or smaller. The HSL has identified the need for research to determine the explosion characteristics of a representative range
of nanopowders; they believe that this research can be undertaken using standard apparatus and procedures already employed for
assessing dust explosion hazards.
75
People will react violently to nanotechnology because it crosses the line into divine territory
Louis Laurent, head of the Matter and Information Department at the French National Agency for Research. and Jean- Claude Petit, head
of Molecular Chemistry Service Unit in the Department of Condensed Matter, Atoms and Molecules of the French Commissariat a
l’Energie Atomique. Nanotechnology Challenges; Implications for Philosophy, Ethics, and Society edited by Joachim Schummer, and
Davis Baird. 2006 p. 272-273
Developments in science and technology may also provoke reactions such as ìt's going too far' or `somebody is trying to play God'.
Every-one has their own, personal definition of the limits that humans should not exceed, whether or not this is based on a sacred view of
the world. This definition draws on a mixed set of elements in which everyone finds their own meaning: scientific knowledge, precedents,
cultural myths, and personal religious beliefs. These reactions, if it is felt that a transgression has taken place, may be violent even if there
is no immediate danger. If these acts show a degree of uncertainty with regard to their consequences, the perception of risk may be
boosted by the only partly conscious idea of `divine punishment'. A typical example is an experiment that allows doing what has never
been done before, which in some way is a transgression in itself. There are numerous precedents, and few directors of new experimental
installations could do without refuting apocalyptic scenarios. For instance, the Tokamak TFR was built at the beginning of the 70s at the
French Atomic Energy Commission (CEA) in Fontenay-aux-Roses, France, to study thermonuclear fusion, a machine that was then the
most powerful in the world. Some opponents of the project were afraid that the hot plasma from this machine might be the source of
intense electric fields that would cause a catastrophe. One of the most recent cases is the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider at Brookhaven in
the USA. The purpose of this collider is to study frontal collisions at very high energy between heavy ions, heating them up to
temperatures close to those that existed a few fractions of a second after the big bang. Two scenarios went around the world. The first
predicted the appearance of a black hole in the interaction zone that would swallow up the entire planet. The other scenario was the
appearance of `strange' particles (with reference to strangeness, a property of certain quarks) that would swallow the earth atom by atom.
A scientific panel was set up to try to provide rational responses to such concerns.16 However, the cases that seem to have the most
resonance, both on the emotional level and in terms of the ethical debate they trigger, relate to progress in biotechnology. This technology
does in fact pose a potential challenge to the fundamental conception of life, the human being, and even the anthropological structure of
society, like parental relationships. Cloning and experiments on stem cells have been sufficiently discussed in recent time. Even when the
potential danger is not clearly identified and it is not clear that a project will be successful, the very idea of transgressing the boundaries of
forbidden knowledge seems to generate fear. The archetype of the Tree of Knowledge illustrates the religious ban on acquiring knowledge
and, more importantly, releasing the `hidden forces' of Nature. This ban is common to a number of cultural eras: the Greek myth of
Prometheus, condemned to have his liver torn to shreds by the eagle of Zeus for having stolen the sacred fire of knowledge from the gods,
is also linked to it. However, the Christian West has remained particularly marked by the Biblical story of the fall of Adam, the ancestor
and symbol of all humanity. This fall is held to be the result of `sin', the transgression of a major taboo: man attempted to become the rival
of his Creator by gaining access to forbidden knowledge. This knowledge bears a curse, and seeking to understand the hidden forces of
Nature is sacrilegious — the vain and curious desire of research, called knowledge and science, as denounced by Saint Augustine. The
discovery of `formidable hidden energies' in matter, asking only to be released in order to return the world to chaos, simply strengthened
in parts of the population, often unconsciously, the feeling that in the 20th
76
Neg- Grey goo 1nc

Nanotechnology will lead to grey goo
Bart Mongoven, Stratfor.com. Nanotechnology policy, Reading the world.com. October 23, 2005
http://www.readingtheworld.com/index.php?p=353
The term “nanotechnology” refers to any number of products that depend on the precise formation of extremely small components – 1 to
100 nanometers. Dozens of nanotechnology products are already on the market, in products including such things as antibacterial wound
dressings, dental adhesives, and even in fashion, but these represent a minute fraction of the commercial applications nanotech will find in
the coming decade. Leading the parade of promising new nanotechnologies are carbon nanotubes, which allow for the formation of
small, strong devices that can be used for countless applications. Somewhere in the future lies the development of self-assembling or self-
replicating nanotechnologies. These conceivably could have such wonderful applications as being inserted as agents into the human
bloodstream to help combat the effects of disease and aging. On the other hand, nightmare scenarios about self-replicating machinery
have been the stuff of science fiction for decades, and the fear of a world consumed by uncontrollable self-replicating nanites has an
understood name: “gray goo.” Acknowledging the fears of the “gray goo” and other more realistic potential problems, the
nanotechnology industry is working with government to find a satisfactory regulatory regime. Business wants some form of regulation
because, as the “gray goo” scenario suggests, the most provocative rationale for regulating nanotechnology is direct safety risk, and the
industry knows that significant allegations of harm from nanotech products could stifle the future of the industry as a whole. What
industry and the government are trying to develop is a regime that will prevent the “gray goo” while allowing for nanotechnology to
flourish under the eye of a watchful, though non-intrusive, government.
Gray goo leads to extinction

Bill Joy, cofounder and Chief Scientist of Sun Microsystems, was cochair of the presidential commission on the future of IT research.
Why the future doesn't need us, Wired News. April 2000 http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/8.04/joy_pr.html
"Plants" with "leaves" no more efficient than today's solar cells could out-compete real plants, crowding the biosphere with an inedible
foliage. Tough omnivorous "bacteria" could out-compete real bacteria: They could spread like blowing pollen, replicate swiftly, and
reduce the biosphere to dust in a matter of days. Dangerous replicators could easily be too tough, small, and rapidly spreading to stop - at
least if we make no preparation. We have trouble enough controlling viruses and fruit flies. Among the cognoscenti of nanotechnology,
this threat has become known as the "gray goo problem." Though masses of uncontrolled replicators need not be gray or gooey, the term
"gray goo" emphasizes that replicators able to obliterate life might be less inspiring than a single species of crabgrass. They might be
superior in an evolutionary sense, but this need not make them valuable. The gray goo threat makes one thing perfectly clear: We cannot
afford certain kinds of accidents with replicating assemblers. Gray goo would surely be a depressing ending to our human adventure on
Earth, far worse than mere fire or ice, and one that could stem from a simple laboratory accident.6 Oops.
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Neg- Grey Goo Impact- 72 hours extinction

Grey goo would destroy the entire world in 72 hours
Exit Mundi, collector of apocalyptic scenarios. Scrunch, Scrunch. Grey Goo Is Coming to Get You! August 08, 2007
http://www.exitmundi.nl/graygoo.htm accessed July 14, 2008
Nano philosophers foresee that one day (some estimate around 2010) it will be possible to create a nano assembler: a man made
molecule, that is `programmed' to create certain things out of raw materials. A nano assembler would for instance pick up plain carbon
atoms and rearrange them into the molecular structure of a diamond. Or it would make water out of the atomic parts of plain air. Or a
cheese sandwich out of dust. Or water into wine, you name it. This notion is not as weird as it sounds. Our DNA- and RNA-molecules do
it all the time! They pick up the raw materials from our food, and turn them into complex molecules. DNA and RNA are nano assemblers
that manufacture whole organisms, with arms and legs, and fingers that can type the word `nanotechnology'. So, if a nano factory can be
programmed to create a cheese sandwich out of atoms, why wouldn't it be able to create new nano factories? This in fact is exactly the
way it will be, at least according to nanopioneers like K. Eric Drexler. Let's face it: it's a hell of a job to build a nano machine by hand. It
would be much easier to make nano machines that are capable of copying themselves, much in the way DNA-molecules replicate
themselves. Nano scientists claim it is even essential for a nano machine to be self-replicating. Since they are so tiny, we would need
millions of them to be of any use. It would take a lifetime to make them all by hand. Nano factories are thus by definition Von Neumann
machines: devices capable of creating new copies of themselves. But there's a nasty downside. What will such a self-replicating nano
machine do if you carelessly tossed it away? You guessed it: it would go on grabbing all atoms within reach, rearranging them into copies
of itself. And the copies would make more copies of themselves. And those copies would make even more copies of the copies of the
copies. And so on. No, you just DON'T want to know what this means. Within only 72 hours after the release of the first molecular nano
machine, every single atom on earth would be ùsed' to create new nano machines. In other words, all plants, animals, humans, cars,
buildings and even rocks would have been èaten up' by a vast, exponentially growing army of invisibly small nano devices.
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Neg- Nanotech kills the environment

Nanobots spreads pollutants to organisms and ecosystems
Perhaps the greatest potential source of concentrated environmental exposure in the near term comes from the application of nanoparticles
to soil or waters for remediation (and possibly for soil stabilization and to deliver fertilisers), as outlined in section 3.2. In some cases the
nanoparticles used for remediation are confined in a matrix but, in pilot studies, slurries of iron nanoparticles have been pumped into
contaminated groundwater in the USA (Zhang 2003). Given the many sites contaminated with chemicals and heavy metals, the potential
for nanotechnologies to contribute to effective remediation is large. But this potential use also implies a question about eco-toxicity: what
impact might the high surface reactivity of nanoparticles that are being exploited for remediation have on plants, animals, microorganisms
and ecosystem processes? It is of course possible that, in the concentrations used in remediation, any negative impacts on ecosystems will
be outweighed by the benefits of the clean up of contaminated land and waters, but this needs to be evaluated by appropriate research and
further pilot studies before deliberate release into the environment is allowed. In the UK, requests for use of nanoparticles in remediation
of groundwater and other contaminated media are likely to be made to the Environment Agency. We recommend that the use of free (that
is, not fixed in a matrix) manufactured nanoparticles in environmental applications such as remediation be prohibited until appropriate
research has been undertaken and it can be demonstrated that the potential benefits outweigh the potential risks. 45 It has also been
suggested to us that that nanoparticles might be used to increase the bioavailablity of pollutants, allowing them to be broken down by
bacteria, or that they might be used to disperse and dilute pollutants. As with the example above, the very properties that researchers hope
to exploit could potentially lead to unintended consequences for the environment, for example increased bioavailability of pollutants to
plants and animals, or the transport of pollutants to sensitive ecosystems. This is clearly another area where more research is required
alongside the development of these remediation systems.
79
Neg- AT: Sun Death

The sun will never explode
Karen Masters, studies the distribution and motions of galaxies in the local universe. She got her PhD from Cornell in August 2005 and is
now a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. Is the Sun expanding? Will it ever explode?, Curious
About Astronomy? Ask An Astrononmer. September 2002 http://curious.astro.cornell.edu/question.php?number=232 accessed July 13,
2008
So the Sun will never explode (even though more massive stars can and do). The difference is that the Sun isn't massive enough to ignite
anything past helium in its core. More massive stars continue nuclear burning until they start making iron. This creates an unstable core
which will then explode in a supernova explosion.
Even getting off the rock won’t solve the impacts of the sun—we will be fried from our space habitat
Exit Mundi, collector of apocalyptic scenarios. AAAAARGH!; Here Comes the Sun. August 08, 2007
http://www.exitmundi.nl/Sunburn.htm accessed July 13, 2008
Of course, we still have some 5,000 million years to come up with a solution for this nasty problem. For one thing, we might evacuate, or
even find a way to move our entire planet away from the Sun. But even then, it's highly unlikely we will enjoy the Sun as much as we
once did. Since the Sun has expanded so much, its outer parts will cool down. The Sun's surface will become cool, deep red. It will be a
Red Giant -- `giant' being just the right name for an object that just ate up our planet.
So there we are in our spaceship or wherever we are, glancing back at our red giant Sun. Will that be it? No, it won't. Even the helium-
into-carbon reaction doesn't last forever. Eventually, after another 100 million years or so, the Sun runs out of helium as well. The nuclear
reactions will stop again, and gravity will take over once more. The Sun's core will collapse further. But this time, a dramatic change will
occur. The Sun simply won't have enough gravitational strength to hold itself together anymore. The Sun's outer layers will be pushed off
into space. In other words: the Sun will explode. There will be a big nebula of super hot solar gas, flinging off in all directions. A beautiful
sight, but not for us poor things. For many millions of years in a row, it will be like we're on the grill of a barbecue once more -- spaceship
or no spaceship. And there will be radiation. Lots of it.
80
Neg- AT: Sun will explode in six years

AT: Sun will explode in six years
Lynn Carter, uses radar astronomy to study the planets, especially Venus. She got her PhD in Astronomy from Cornell in Summer 2004
and is now working at the Smithsonian in Washington D.C. on the Mars Express radar. Will the sun go supernova in six years and destroy
Earth (as seen on Yahoo)?, Curious About Astronomy?; Ask an Astronomer. October 2002
http://curious.astro.cornell.edu/question.php?number=285
I hadn't seen this article before, so thanks for bringing it to my attention. You're right to be skeptical, for several reasons! First, the sun is
too small to ever go supernova, so the basic premise of the article is incorrect. There just isn't enough mass in our sun to cause it to
explode and collapse to form a neutron star or black hole. Also, I haven't been able to find out any information on this guy "Dr. Piers Van
der Meer". There's an online database, called the Astrophysics Data System, that keeps records of Journal articles published in
astronomy/astrophysics/planetary science. Even beginning graduate students will show up in the records because they've usually been to
at least one conference, and as soon as you have a couple papers about your reaserch it's easy to find out what you're doing and where you
work. But this person doesn't show up in the system at all! I looked him up using a search engine and he doesn't seem to have a web page
affiliated with any organization. So if he's a serious astrophysicist, he hasn't published papers or appeared at conferences before, and isn't
part of a major organization. Also, the article claims he's associated with the European Space Agency (ESA) (which is a real, credible
organization), but when you look at their website there's no mention of this press release at all. So it's not endorsed by them, apparently.
The article was also written for "Weekly World News", which is one of those papers that tends to publish fictional stories and half-truths,
or distort the truth to get a sensationalistic story. And there are some truths to the story. For example, SOHO is a satellite that is run jointly
by ESA and NASA, and it does take images of giant flares and prominences, which are like giant explosions on the sun. Flares and
prominences happen all the time, and although they may cause aurorae or interfere with communications, they're really not a big deal.
SOHO has lots of cool images; you can check them out at the SOHO website. Notice they don't say anything about the sun exploding
either. A few people have requested more information about the temperature of the sun. The temperature at the center of the sun is about
16 million degrees Kelvin (27 million degrees Fahrenheit), as stated in the article. As the sun burns up its hydrogen, helium builds up in
the core, and the core contracts. This contraction causes heating, so the internal temperature of the sun is increasing over time. However,
this temperature change in the hydrogen burning sun is very slow! In the book "The New Solar System", Kenneth Lang states that as a
result of the core contraction and heating, the surface temperature has gone up 300 K over the past 4.5 billion years. When the sun
exhausts its hydrogen supply (in a few billion years) the sun will become a red giant star, which has a much hotter, helium-burning, core
but actually a lower surface temperature. (The Astro 201 website has a good webpage about the sun's evolution, if you want an
explanation of the transition to red giants.) The current surface temperture of the sun is about 5780 Kelvins. Since surface temperature
determines a star's color, the sun would actually appear blue if its surface temperature had doubled! Everyone would be able to notice
that. Also, the Weekly World News article claims that people measured temperature trends "in recent years", which (besides being vague)
is a very short time in the life of the sun. Temperature measurements over a few years really won't tell you anything about the long term
behavior of the sun. So, I think what happened is that Weekly World News pieced together some truths and found some person willing to
add a few extra things to make the story exciting. It's certainly not credible astrophysics!
81
Neg- AT: Utopia

Nanotech utopias are impossible, its too expensive and unrealistic
Michael Wong, Rationalist. The Nanotechnology Myth, Stardestroyer.net. 2004
http://www.stardestroyer.net/Empire/Tech/Myths/Nanotech.html accessed July 14, 2008
Nanotechnology disciples tend to talk about the wonders of building something "molecule by molecule", as if this would make all
manufacturing cheap and near-instantaneous. However, they never ask the looming question: what's so great about building something
molecule by molecule? Do they realize that such microscopically incremental manufacturing techniques already exist? Electroplate
growth manufacturing techniques are real. They build items atom by atom, and the result has exceptional chemical and microstructural
purity as well as the ability to produce highly accurate and complex shapes (on one side; the other side looks like hell). However, they are
ridiculously slow, which makes them ridiculously expensive (I still remember the first time I picked up a piece; it was smaller than a tape
measure and its price tag was in the tens of thousands of dollars). This is not a problem which will magically go away; many years of
development have not resulted in significant improvements in speed. Similarly, nickel-vapour deposition technology constructs a metallic
form atom by atom by depositing nickel carbonyl vapour onto heated tooling, and again, the principal drawback is low speed and lousy
accuracy on the side opposite the tooling (not to mention inapplicability to other base metals and some annoying geometric constraints
which I won't bore you with; just trust me when I say that from my experience, it can be a real pain in the ass). The same is true of laser-
based rapid-prototyping technologies, which are not only slow and expensive but also limited to weak plastic items. Nanobots would most
likely be even slower than the aforementioned technologies; electroplating and nickel vapour deposition pour on atoms as quickly as they
can bond to the underlying material, and nanobots would only add complexity to this process. Accuracy is also a serious problem. Let's
say you have a 100,000 nanobots, and you want to make a six-inch metallic ruler. Nothing complicated, right? A simple ruler, with the
usual hatch marks for length measurement. Obviously, you want it to be flat and square. Now, you turn your nanobots loose. Presto, they
whip up a perfect ruler for you, right? Because they grow it molecule by molecule, it's really slow but it's easy and it's dimensionally
perfect, right? Ummmm ... OK, let's look at this from the perspective of nanobot #1. Just to be generous, let's visualize the nanobot as a
tiny little worker spacecraft that you control, so it has your human intelligence (rather optimistic for a nanobot, but I am trying to be
generous). Your objective is to help the other 99,999 nanobots build a ruler, but from your perspective (inside a 10 micron wide nanobot,
so you've been shrunk to roughly 1/200000 your original size), this six inch ruler is more than thirty kilometres long! Worse yet, there are
some serious logistical problems to work out: How do you co-ordinate your activities with the pilots of the other nanobots? Is there a
commander nanobot? Are there middle manager nanobots? Who assigns nanobots to which part of the ruler? How do you know where to
start, ie- how do you decide where one end of the ruler is going to be, and where the other end is going to be? How do you communicate
with the other nanobots? Radio transmissions? How do you communicate clearly with tens of thousands of other nanobots
simultaneously? How do you align your movements with theirs? How do you plan? How much fuel do you carry? That little nanobot
vehicle of yours doesn't run on the power of positive thinking, so how much work can it do on a full tank? Where and how do you refuel?
How long does it take you to refuel? What is your propulsion system? You're not getting a free ride in someone's bloodstream like the sort
of nanobot which looks for cancerous cells (a more sensible application of nanotechnology), so how do you maneuver about on the
manufacturing table in order to help assemble this ruler? How do you jet up into the air to get on top of it if you need to? How much
power do you have to combat gravity and air currents? How do you deal with lost nanobots? In a normal manufacturing environment, air
currents, static discharge, and other environmental disturbances could easily blow a nanobot out of the group or seriously damage it. Does
the plan adjust automatically for worker turnover? Or must this ruler be manufactured in a vacuum-sealed clean-room environment? This
is rapidly shaping up to be a ridiculously expensive ruler! How much payload can you carry? If you're grabbing molecules or tiny
particles and attaching them to this ruler, where do you get them from? How many can you carry per trip? How much energy does it take
to weld each chunk of metal to the ruler? Do you realize that if you use larger particles per trip, the resulting ruler will have greater
porosity? What are you going to do, weld molten metal into the gaps? Consider the energy costs of doing that! How do you assure
dimensional accuracy of the overall ruler? The nanobot working on the other end of the ruler is (as far as you're concerned) more than 30
kilometres away, remember? How do you know he's not higher than you are? Do you set up a laser-based perimeter system in order to
confine your activities within simple geometric bounds? If so, how do you make more complex shapes than a flat ruler? Do you use
tooling in order to confine your activities? If so, what conceivable advantage does this process have over simple die-casting? Hmmm ... a
bit more complicated than we thought, eh? And this starts from the assumption that each nanobot is as intelligent as a human being, which
is ridiculously optimistic. Now let's compare this to the "primitive" conventional method of making a flat ruler. Pour some metal into a
die, wait for it to cool, and you're done. Alternatively, take a strip of metal, put into a stamping press, hit the green button and BANG!
One stamped-steel ruler. Do you still think all manufacturing will be replaced by nanotechnology once we work the bugs out? "But
humans are grown, and that works, so you're making it sound harder than it is!" some may protest. But they would be missing the point.
As mentioned previously, our manufacturing accuracy leaves something to be desired, and is well below the standards expected of
machined parts. A $1 compact disc is manufactured with tighter tolerances than the human body, which can't even make two arms, two
legs, two eyes, or two of anything which match to within what a typical manufacturer would consider tight tolerances. Moreover, initial
growth stages must take place in a special environment (the womb), so the process doesn't work on a table in the middle of a factory. A
82
constant stream of nutrients (ie- fuel) must be fed into the body so it can grow itself. And what about speed? It takes approximately 16-18
years to manufacture a mature human being, remember? If it took that long to make a car, would you wait? What about waste? A human
being will emit more than 1E10 joules of waste heat before it is mature, in addition to producing some 5,000 litres of urine and several
hundred kilograms of feces (dry weight), all while consuming enormous amounts of both solid and liquid nutrients and burning them at
25% efficiency. Is this really a manufacturing model that we want to emulate for industry? People who propose one-stop "cure-all"
solutions usually haven't thought clearly and thoroughly about them; in reality, there is no conceivable advantage in 99% of the
applications where nanotechnology disciples would have us use it. Small robots are good for doing small things (eg- killing a cancer cell),
but not for doing big things (eg- making an engine block). Moreover, accuracy is a serious problem with any atom-by-atom or molecule-
by-molecule manufacturing scheme; whereas an engine block can be easily finished to within close tolerances with large CNC grinding
tools, that same block would be nightmarishly difficult to manufacture to the same tolerance using nanobots (to say nothing of the
staggering difference in speed and efficiency between casting the block and building it atom by atom with nanobots).
83
Neg- AT: Health

Nanotech can cause CANCER!
Dr. Harry Kroto, leader in nanotech research, November 2007 Environmental Graffiti, And the New Potential Cancer Causing Agent Is…
…… Nanotechnology!, accessed 7/14/08, http://www.environmentalgraffiti.com/sciencetech/and-the-new-potential-cancer-causing-agent-
is-nanotechnology/472
Some scientists are just beginning to explore the possible health effects of exposure to nanoparticles. While there have been no long term
studies, there are some short-term studies with somewhat worrying results. Fish who ingest even a small number of carbon nanoparticles
were far more likely to develop brain cancer. Breathing in carbon nanotubes caused lung problems similar to asbestos exposure in rats.
Health scientist John Balbus, of the public policy group Environmental Defense, said: “There’s no reason to think that all of these things
are going to be harmful, but we should be prudent because of their ability to get into the body and access parts of it that normal chemicals
don’t.” Environmental groups want regulations to keep pace with nanotech research. Ian Illuminato, a campaigner with Friends of the
Earth, said: “We’re calling on government to invest more money in health, safety, and environmental research so that we can make sure
these products are safe.”
84
Neg- AT: anti ship weapons

Nanotech can’t create anti ship weapons
A common nanotechnology idea on the newsgroups is the nanobot as unstoppable attacker against spaceships. Some sci-fi fanboys like to
write scenarios in which a swarm of nanobots attacks a helpless starship, eats through its hull atom by atom, and then swarms through its
insides, killing its crew and devastating its equipment. Does that sound unstoppable to you? The Star Trek Voyager staff writers even put
this idea onscreen, in the form of modified Borg nanoprobes which were launched into space against seemingly unstoppable alien
warships from another dimension. Does that seem realistic? If you think so, then please consider these problems: Iron stays together
because its energy state is lower when bonded to other iron atoms. Therefore, even if we ignore the actual mechanism and assume perfect
efficiency, the work required to liberate a piece of iron from the surrounding matrix is non-trivial. This is a serious problem for nanobots
which have literally microscopic fuel reserves. And if we don't ignore the mechanism, we must also account for its inherent inefficiencies
and limitations. In the vacuum of space, there is no ambient chemical energy source for the nanobot. Even if the nanobot carried enough
fuel to liberate a microscopic chunk of metal from the target spacecraft's hull, it would run out of fuel and go dead immediately
afterwards. In other words, since each nanobot couldn't dislodge more than a microscopic piece of metal from the target hull, you would
have to hit the hull with such a large volume of nanobots that you'd be much better off simply hurling a macroscopic projectile at it (to say
nothing of the incredible cost of manufacturing all of those nanobots, as opposed to a single slug or shell). The small size of nanobots
obviously precludes thick electrical shielding. Therefore, a simple jolt of electrical current through the hull-plates would instantly destroy
any nanobots on its surface. In other words, countermeasures against nanobot attacks would be ridiculously easy to devise, even if we
disregard commonplace sci-fi contraptions such as particle shielding and forcefields. Moreover, intense magnetic fields and other
defensive systems might very well disable nanobots as a completely unintended side-effect of normal operation. Rates of heat transfer are
correlated to surface area, while heat content is correlated to volume. Obviously, the ratio of surface area to volume is much larger for a
microscopic object than it is for a macroscopic object, which means that microscopic objects are extremely vulnerable to heat. This is why
a piece of hull armour might survive an intense radiation bombardment while a thin antenna made of the same material might melt away
(it's also why a bunch of ice chips will melt faster than one big ice cube). In other words, the normal radiative heat flux on the tiny shell of
an exposed nanobot in space (depending on its proximity to the nearest star) might very well be enough to fry its innards (this is a
problem for the idea of solar-powered nanobots in space; their fuel source may destroy them). It goes without saying that the heat flux in
the vicinity of a pitched battle involving nuclear-yield weapons would certainly fry an exposed nanobot (unless you carefully manufacture
a thickly shielded casing for each nanobot, which would make it much larger, thus defeating the purpose and decreasing the ratio of useful
machinery to dead weight). On the upside, nanobots would probably be able to withstand much greater accelerations than macrosopic
machines without damage, because of the relationship of size to proportional strength (see the "Size Matters" page). However, this would
not suffice to make them an effective anti-ship weapon.
85
Neg- AT: Anti personnel weapons

Nanotech won’t provide the perfect anti personal weapons
The best weapons application for nanobots is obviously against ground personnel, rather than spaceships. But even in that role, they have
their own particular limitations, and can hardly be regarded as an omnipotent weapon. That's not to say they can't kill people, but
everything's relative, and the real question is: are they more effective than other forms of weaponry? Let's compare an enormous swarm of
nanobots to a nuclear weapon, judging by various criteria: Destructive impact: nukes win. A nuclear weapon causes devastation far in
excess of that which could be wrought by a swarm of nanobots. Cost: again, nukes win. A nuclear weapon is relatively inexpensive
compared to trillions of micro-miniaturized machines. Collateral damage: nanobots win. A nuclear weapon destroys and devastates cities
(and depending on its design and detonation altitude, it may also produce deadly long-lived radioactive fallout), but nanobots would
theoretically kill the humans while leaving the cities intact. If they have a built-in self-termination date (or they simply tend to wear out or
break down after a certain period of time), the planet could be safe for immediate occupation. Delivery: nukes win. A nuclear missile can
theoretically be shot down in flight despite its great speed, but it can also easily navigate to the target through all manner of upper-
atmospheric disturbances and electromagnetic fields, as well as inclement weather conditions on the way down such as high wind,
lightning storms, rain, etc. If it is not shot down, it will deliver 100% of its payload to the designated target, all concentrated in one place
with devastating effect. Nanobots, on the other hand, might not be detected on the way in, but they could also be blown hundreds of miles
off-course by high winds, or damaged (perhaps totally neutralized) by magnetic fields, cosmic rays, upper-atmosphere ionization, etc. In
fact, given the inevitability of dispersion on the way down, it is virtually impossible to concentrate a strike on a particular target from
orbit, and excessive dispersion might make them useless (no machine is perfect; how much damage could one nanobot possibly do before
it breaks down or wears out, even if we assume it can extract unlimited fuel from its environment?) Countermeasures: nukes win. The
only real countermeasure against a nuclear weapon is to try to shoot it down in flight. With only a few minutes of warning at most, there
won't be sufficient warning to evacuate citizens or move the bulk of the population into shelters, assuming enough shelters exist. A cloud
of nanobots, on the other hand, might not even be detected en route. However, if they are detected, they can be easily neutralized. A
nuclear airburst in the midst of a nanobot cloud would vapourize most of them and disable the rest, with minimal fallout and very
localized collateral damage. The electromagnetic pulse alone should neutralize them. This leads us to the second countermeasure, which
is reactive rather than proactive: nanobots, unlike nuclear weapons, can be stymied by countermeasures even after they reach the target.
Non-nuclear EMP weapons (yes, we're already developing them) could clear large areas of nanobots without killing anyone or destroying
cities, high-voltage ionizing field circuits in air vents could protect sealed shelters, armoured vehicles, etc., and electromagnetic pulses
could even be used to treat victims after infection. Some might argue that self-replication is the key to making nanobots more effective
despite these weaknesses. In theory, self-replicating nanobots could be deposited on a planet and it wouldn't matter if 99% of them are
destroyed or blown off course, because they would continue to replicate until they become an overwhelming "grey goo" all over the
planet. However, there are some rather glaring feasibility issues associated with this idea. How much energy (ie- fuel) does it take for a
nanobot to manufacture a duplicate of itself? What special tools would it require in order to do this, and how would the inclusion of those
tools increase its expense and size? How would they affect its ability to perform its primary function? Remember that unlike a bacterium,
it's not made from organic materials. It needs refined metals and other specialized raw materials, but where is it going to find them? How
much travelling would it have to do in search of those materials, and how much energy will this take? How is it going to fuel up the
nanobot that it just made, given that it probably used up its reserves in order to build it? Is it going to replenish from solar power? If so,
how will it work at night, indoors, on overcast days, or inside a human body? How long will it last under increased ultraviolet radiation
(which does more than merely cause skin cancer; it actually breaks up chemical bonds over time, which is why it bleaches paint and
destroys plastic) if it must remain exposed to direct sunlight in order to function? Do you remember the effect of microscopic size on
vulnerability to radiation? Moreover, the idea of nanobot self-replication also opens up a huge can of worms from a safety perspective,
and I think it highly unlikely that any reasonable person would take the risk. Anything less than 100% perfect replication opens up the
possibility of evolution over multiple generations, and I don't think I need to explain the dangers inherent in an evolving species of
nanobot, not only to its victims but also potentially to its inventors. And after all of this, it's still not a good weapon. Nanobots would still
be vulnerable to various countermeasures, it's difficult to tell whether an area is clean, and it would be difficult to regain control if they get
out of containment, thus forcing you to employ the same countermeasures yourself. Any weapon which poses as much risk to you as it
does to your enemy is not a particularly good weapon.
86
Neg- AT: Space

Nanotechs help to the space program are mostly just hype
LEONARD DAVID, Special to Space News. Nanotechnology Holds Promise for Space — But When?, Space.com August 19, 2002
http://google.space.com/search?q=cache:NI5Qvg-
L_uIJ:www.space.com/spacenews/archive02/nanoarch_081302.html+nanotechnology&access=p&output=xml_no_dtd&ie=UTF-
8&client=default_frontend&site=default_collection&proxystylesheet=default_frontend&oe=ISO-8859-1 accessed July 14, 2008
But Benaroya cautioned that there is a certain degree of hype associated with nanotechnology. "It’s true with any new field," he said.
"Some of it is hype, some of it is real." Nanotechnology today is frontier science, and is not likely to yield dramatic consequences in
spacecraft building or operations anytime soon, Benaroya said. Money is now being spent on very simple, one-of-a-kind components, he
said. "I don’t see any major cost-savings, but there is a lot of university activity across the spectrum of engineering and science in the
nano area, throughout all disciplines," Benaroya said.
2.
A) Colonizing Mars would ensure that new bacteria would be brought to earth
Vasyl Michael Harik, Ph.D., is a nanotechnology consultant. commentary, Space.com. January 31, 2005
http://www.space.com/spacenews/archive05/harikoparch_012405.html accessed July 14, 2008
The recent discovery of water on Mars is a stunning achievement of NASA's robotic missions. It also has opened up a possibility of past
life on Mars and potential colonies of bacteria, which might have survived the harsh Mars environment in more hospitable places. These
are truly remarkable new frontiers in space exploration and space science. One should not be blinded, however, by these new prospects of
martian microorganisms.
We have to be open to all possibilities associated with new scientific endeavors, whether it is a Mars mission or nanotechnology back here
on Earth.
Recently, Jeffrey Kargel, a geologist with the U.S.Geological Survey, warned in an article in Science magazinethat NASA Mars missions
might bring bacteria to Earth from the cold surface of Mars. The low temperatures, apparently, do not ensure sterility; as scientists have
actually "observed a panoply of bacteria and fungi that survived the frigid vacuum of space, including microbes which lived dormant for
six years aboard an orbiting satellite launched in 1984."
B) Bacteria causes disease

earthlife.net, Bacteria and Disease. May 2008. http://www.earthlife.net/prokaryotes/disease.html accessed July 15, 2008
Bacteria cause disease. Most of these bacteria, like those listed below make their presence felt immediatley and may or may not result in
death. Some people though, can be infected with a bacterium that normally causes a disease and not show any harmfull effects at all,
people like this are called carriers. A sad example of this was Typhoid Mary who was identified as a carrier for typhoid fever in 1906.
C) EMERGING INFECTIOUS DISEASES THREATEN PLANETARY EXTINCTION

The Toronto Sun, October 16, 1994, Pg. M6
Nor did the media go beyond Surat and explain how this largely inconsequential epidemic, a kind of false alarm in a much larger
microbial saga, was another sharp warning of our species' growing vulnerability to infectious disease. Imagine, for a moment, if Surat had
aroused a different airborne microbe, a so-called "emerging virus," beyond the waning reach of antibiotics. Suppose that the headliner
germ had been a new strain of Ebola that dissolves internal organs into a bloody tar or the mysterious "X" virus that killed thousands in
the Sudan last year. Had such a microbe been unleashed, the final death toll might have been millions, and the world might now be
mourning a "new Black Death." The planet, in fact, might be an entirely different and emptier place altogether.
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Humans can’t reproduce in space

O’Neill Solar Physics Doctor July 12, 2008
<Universe Today, 7-16-08, http://www.universetoday.com/2008/07/12/nasa-needs-to-take-space-sex-seriously/>
The fact remains however, that we are naive of the effects of sex in space, let alone if it is even a pleasurable experience. The mechanics
of "human docking procedures" (as described by tests carried out by the Russian space agency) are a lot more complicated when in zero
gravity. NASA researchers have pointed out that additional problems include motion sickness, increased sweating and a drop in blood
pressure - all of which are big problems for astronauts in space. There are also huge ethical questions hanging over possible pregnancies
in space. Zero-G tests on rat embryos produced decreased skeletal and brain development, the effects on a human embryo will remain a
mystery. Also, even if astronauts are having sex for purely recreational reasons, the effectiveness of oral contraception has been brought
into question, making the whole procedure highly problematic, risking accidental pregnancies (something no space agency is prepared for,
especially during missions to the Moon or Mars).
Space colonization ensures global conflict

Mikula, 2000
(Sean R., Lawyer and former Military Intelligence Officer, 2001, “Blue Helmets in the Next Frontier: The Future is Now,” The Georgia
Journal of International and Comparative Law, Accessed 7/15/08, lexis) KMH
ABOVE ALL, we must guard against the misuse of outer space. We recognized early on that a legal regime was needed to prevent it
[from] becoming another area of military confrontation. The international community has acted jointly, through the United Nations, to
ensure that outer space would be developed peacefully. But there is much more to be done. We must not allow this century, so plagued
with war and suffering, to pass on its legacy to the next, when the technology at our disposal will be even more awesome. We cannot view
the expanse of space as another battleground for our earthly conflicts. - Kofi Annan, 1 United Nations Secretary-General.
88
Neg- EXT: Space Bacteria bad

Space bacteria would be resistant to antibiotics
Ian O'Neill, riting for the Universe Today since December 2007 and a solar physics doctor. Germs Living in Space "Almost Three Times
as Likely to Cause Disease", Universe Today. March 11, 2008. http://www.universetoday.com/2008/03/11/germs-living-in-space-almost-
three-times-as-likely-to-cause-disease/ accessed July 15, 2008
So, as humans venture into space, it is inevitable that bacteria will come too - the whole symbiotic and parasitic jungle - exploring space
with us. Bacteria will mutate, often very quickly, adapting to the environment surrounding the little microbes. Mutation is the difference
between a bacteria being harmless to becoming deadly. Mutations help bacteria to survive and as an example, they can become antibiotic
resistant. This is a huge problem in places where antibiotics are used very regularly (such as hospitals); genetic information is passed
down the generations of bacteria (often doubling in population in a matter of minutes). If just one microbe has the genetic ability to
survive a type of antibiotic, its number will multiply, creating a strain of "superbug" that can avoid being killed by antibiotics - one of the
most basic examples of "natural selection". Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) is one particular nasty strain of the
otherwise benign Staphylococcus genus which has mutated to resist commonly used antibiotics.
89
Neg- AT: Space- Wars Prevent

War stops space exploration – it drains the resources necessary
I have called this stage in our evolution the "Critical Stage." Paul Levinson [the Director of Connected Education] uses different
terminology for the same concept. He says that we have only a narrow window to get into space, a relatively short time during which we
have the capability, but have not yet run out of the resources to do it. I agree with him completely about this. Expansion into space
demands high technology and full utilization of our world's material resources (although not destructive utilization). It also demands
financial resources that we will not have if we deplete the material resources of Earth. And it demands human resources, which we will
lose if we are reduced to global war or widespread starvation. Finally, it demands spiritual resources, which we are not likely to retain
under the sort of dictatorship that would be necessary to maintain a "sustainable" global civilization. Because the window is narrow, then,
we not only have to worry about immediate perils. The ultimate, unavoidable danger for our planet, the transformation of our sun, is
distant--but if we don't expand into space now, we can never do it. Even if I'm wrong and we survive stagnation, it will be too late to
escape from this solar system, much less to explore for the sake of exploring.
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Neg- AT: Space- Econ key to exploration

Economic growth is key to space
Robert Roy Britt. Top 3 Reasons to Colonize Space. October 2001 http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/colonize_why_011008-4.html
And the time is now: History instructs that technological hay should be made while the economic sun shines.
"There is a danger we will end the human space program at some point, leaving us stranded on the Earth," Gott warns. "History shows
that expensive technological projects are often abandoned after awhile. For example, the Ancient Egyptians quit building pyramids. So we
should be colonizing space now while we have the chance."
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Neg- AT: Aliens will attack

Aliens live in the center of the earth and don’t want anything to do with us
Pravda Russian News Source 2004
<Pravda, 7-15-08, http://english.pravda.ru/science/19/94/378/14269_aliens.html>
Geologists do not share the theory of the Earth's huge cavity, although they do not exclude a possibility of numerous large hollow spaces
in planet's depths. Human life is hardly possible in those cavities: the temperature is too high and there is very little oxygen there. Some
researchers believe that the underground civilization might be of an extraterrestrial origin. Aliens were probably tired of people's eternal
wars and atrocities, and moved under the ground, from where they comfortably observed the development of the mankind. What if UFOs
appear in the sky from under the ground, not from other galaxies? However, if planet Earth is hollow inside, someone should have found
the gateway to the underground world long ago. A group of American scientists believes that underground cities exist on Earth in the
fourth dimension. When the Earth's electromagnetic field changes from time to time, entrances to the tunnels open, and accidental
“visitors” may see the underground cities and their inhabitants. One of the theories says that many mysterious constructions, like the
English Stonehendge for example, were built to designate entrances to underground cities. If there is a reasonable race living under the
ground, it would be an explanation to a lot of inexplicable phenomena.
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Neg- Nano Tech inevitable

Nanotech inevitable
Alden, 2002
(Alden, May 20, “Nanotechnology -- Good or Evil?”, Accessed 7/13/08, http://www.r21online.com/archives/000007.html) KMH
Things are moving fast, however. Nearly 500 companies are researching and developing nanotechnology, including such behemoths
as IBM, Motorola, Hewlett Packard, Lucent, Hitachi, Mitsubishi, NEC, Corning, Dow Chemical, and 3M as well as scores of
start-ups, looking to raise money from nearly 75 different venture capital firms who have made bets on nanotech. A fine bubble,
while maybe in the immediate future, will come eventually.
93
Neg – Kritik Links- Capitalism

Capitalism link-Nanotechnology inevitably create divisions between the rich and the poor. The plan creates
a nano-divide which allows exploitation of the poor.
Much of the ‘visionary’ literature at the radical disjunction end of the continuum described in the ESRC report (Wood et al 2003) contains
repeated claims about the major long-term impacts of nanotechnologies upon global society: for example, that it will provide cheap
sustainable energy, environmental remediation, radical advances in medical diagnosis and treatment, more powerful IT capabilities, and
improved consumer products (see many of the contributions to two recent National Science Foundation (NSF) workshops (NSF 2001,
2003)). If even a few of these predictions prove true then the implications for global society and the economies of many nations are
profound indeed. However, it is equally legitimate to ask who will benefit and, more crucially, who might lose out? The application
of science, technology and engineering has undoubtedly improved life expectancy and quality of life for many in the long term. In
the short-term, however, technological developments have not necessarily benefited all of humankind, and some have generated
very definite ‘winners’ and ‘losers’. Concerns have been raised over the potential for nanotechnologies to intensify the gap
between rich and poor countries because of their different capacities to develop and exploit nanotechnologies, leading to a socalled
nanodivide’. If global economic progress in producing high-value products and services depends upon exploiting scientific
knowledge, the high entry price for new procedures and skills (for example, in the medical domain) is very likely to exacerbate
existing divisions between rich and poor, a parallel danger that could arise if the more radical ‘visions’ of the promise of
nanotechnologies were realised, is that enthusiasm for developing a ‘technical fix’ to a range of global. Nanoscience and
nanotechnologies The Royal Society & The Royal Academy of Engineering societal ills might obscure or divert investment from
cheaper, more sustainable, or low-technology solutions to health and environmental problems.
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Neg- Kritik Links- Biopower

Capitalism/State/Biopower Link-Nanotech opens up the space for the next generation of state control and
domination and development is for the sake of profit
Lundberg, No date
[Jan, “Resisting Nanotech, Violence, and the Corporate State,” Culture Change, No date, Accessed 7/14/08,
http://www.culturechange.org/e-letter-they'recoming.html) KMH
With nanotechnology, engineered machine-humans will conceivably be part of the arsenal of control against you and me.
Technological applications oftentimes have more than one purpose: peaceful profit and war profit. Besides the military, the
plainest extension of society's control and oppression of the masses is the security industry — police, prisons, self-defense — which
is a power unto itself. In the U.S. it already succeeds in incarcerating more people than anywhere in the world in history, on both a
numerical and per capita basis. The Land of the Free? With nanotechnology, society's control apparatus and its plans for the
population could eventually get set in concrete and living tissues before people know what hit them. Rather than solve society's
problems, our masters have locked people up. If you're not a master, you have to watch your step not to see your freedom taken
away from you. If you oppose the dominant system or are a leader for liberation, there are tried and true measures to be taken
against you by the secret government: slander, libel, prison, assassination. With drugs and other methods, mind control has also
been pursued. With nanotech, society could further conceal or add to the forementioned practices, such that prison and
concentration camps might become less essential. Nanotechnology refers to nanoscience's "manipulation of living and non-living
matter at the level of the nanometer, one billionth of a meter. It is at this scale that quantum physics takes over from classical
physics and the properties of elements change character in novel and unpredictable ways." (- ETC Group) A major question is
whether nanoscience theory for technologies can get beyond mechanical kinds of applications in the human molecular
environment, for example. However, billions of dollars of research and armies of scientists are working to rapidly change our
world for the sake of profit — called progress.
NEG – Another biopower link – Developing nanotechnology allows for more state control which will
inevitably result in a genocide
Drexler, 1986
(K. Eric, The dude that invented the grey goo theory, “Engines of Creation,” pages 176-177 KMH
The implications of this possibility depend on whether the state exists to serve the people, or the people exist to serve the state. In
the first case, we have a state shaped by human beings to serve general human purposes; democracies tend to be at least rough
approximations to this ideal. If a democratically controlled government loses its need for people, this will basically mean that it no longer
needs to use people as bureaucrats or taxpayers. This will open new possibilities, some of which may prove desirable. In the second case,
we have a state evolved to exploit human beings, perhaps along totalitarian lines. States have needed people as workers because
human labor has been the necessary foundation of power. What is more, genocide has been expensive and troublesome to organize
and execute. Yet, in this century totalitarian states have slaughtered their citizens by the millions. Advanced technology will make
workers unnecessary and genocide easy history suggests that totalitarian states may then eliminate people wholesale. There is some
consolation in this. It seems likely that a state willing and able to enslave us biologically would instead simply kill us. The threat of
advanced technology in the hands of governments makes one thing perfectly clear: we can’t afford to have an oppressive state
take the lead in the coming breakthroughs.
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Neg- Kritik- Deep Eco

Without living in harmony with the ecosphere it is impossible to implement technology in a way that will
work within the biological system—your aff is doomed to failure
Lester W. Milbrath, director of the Research Program in Environment and Society and professor emeritus of political science as well as
sociology at the State University of New York at Buffalo. Nanotechnology; Research and Perspectives, edited by BC Crandall and James
Lewis. 1989 p. 298-299
I derive two truths from this thought experiment. First, there is a special wisdom in nature's well-established cycles and patterns. Nature
as we see it today is what has been retained in good systemic working order after billions of failed experiments over billions of years. Our
knowledge cannot fathom that complexity and intricacy. Ironically, we have somehow gained the power to disastrously disrupt these
finely tuned systems, but we have not yet gained the social learning and wisdom to use our power in harmony with nature. Second, we
miss the point when we say that we have an environmental crisis. We have a crisis of the human species. Yet, humans lived in harmony
with nature on this planet for more than two million years. It seems that the problem is not necessarily our physical makeup or with
human culture. Rather, the problem is our specific civilization, our particular cultural variant. Our industrial civilization has taken a
trajectory that cannot be sustained. Either we transform our civilization so that it can be sustained or nature will transform it for us.
Nature's lessons are learned by pain and death—I fervently hope that this is not our destiny. Increasing environmental degradation is on
the verge of forcing the human species into massive social relearning. Such learning will be key to bringing about a societal
transformation that could enable humans to live in a long-term, sustainable relationship with nature. As part of this social relearning we
urgently need to learn such lessons as the following: (1) this would be a better world if there were fewer, not more, humans; (2) it is folly
to speedily consume nonrenewable resources; (3) economic growth cannot be an enduring value; (4) a simple life can be rich and
fulfilling even though we consume little; (5) compassion for other people, future generations, and other species is a vital life force; (6)
partnership is better than domination; (7) cooperation is more successful than competition, (8) holistic, systemic, integrative thinking is
more valid than linear, mechanistic thinking. Fears of an Environmentalist for Nanotechnology My greatest fear is that this urgently
needed relearning will be aborted if people perceive technological salvation to be just around the corner. Humans will not listen to
messages for change so long as their systems seem to be working reasonably well. We are especially prone to look to new technologies to
save our present way of life, rather than undergo a societal transformation that would have more enduring benefits. Development of
nanotechnology, even the promise that it may soon be avail-able, would forestall and probably foreclose this needed social learning.
People would continue to believe in the current false gods of society: growth, consumption, wealth, competitiveness, power, and
domination As an environmentalist, I hope that you nanotechnologists are not too "successful" too soon in developing this new
technology. Give us more time to learn. Lend us your intellect and efforts for the most urgent task of relearning our way to a societal
transformation. Are you giving your intellect and time where it is most needed? By pursuing a new technology—which is tremendously
exciting, and the rewards for the winner will certainly be great—there is a danger that in the excitement of the chase you will lose sight of
other, more urgent problems. I speak specifically of the threat to life that is posed by drastic human-induced changes in biospheric
systems. We must look beyond the expected changes in physical systems to anticipate the ramifications in social, economic, and political
systems. Every effort must be made to forestall and mitigate these disruptive changes. If you are a nanotechnological enthusiast, you are
likely to say that developing these new technologies is the way to save us. I warn you that their development in time to avert drastic
changes in biospheric systems is extremely unlikely. Developing artificial intelligence is critical to full-blown development of this new
technological regime. Humans have been trying to do that for thirty years without much success. There is little prospect that you will be
swiftly successful either. Developing nanotechnology is every bit as difficult as turning back the forces that are leading to the destruction
of global biospheric systems. But the latter is far more urgent. It is dangerously self-deceiving—and deceptive to the public—to seek
resources for developing this new technology instead of working for the societal transformation that is necessary to save our species. You
have an urgent obligation to facilitate social relearning in another regard. K. Eric Drexler recognizes that nanotechnologies are so
powerful that we must quickly learn to develop sociopolitical controls for their development and deployment.' Developing these controls
is even more urgent than developing the technologies themselves. If someone develops and deploys the technologies before we can
develop the necessary controls, we could well face the choice of becoming slaves to their domination or suffering massive physical and
societal destruction. It is not good enough to say that "development of controls is someone else's job." It is your job. Developing a
powerful new technology without having first developed satisfactory sociopolitical controls is morally wrong. It is a crime against all life.
96
Environmental Philosophy provides a good model to analyze nanotechnology because it has faced the same
ethical and moral problems before
Christopher J. Preston, visiting assistant Professor in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Montana, Missoula.
Nanotechnology Challenges; Implications for Philosophy, Ethics, and Society edited by Joachim Schummer, and Davis Baird. 2006 p.
219-221
Included within this emerging discourse are suggestions that nano-technology is so radical and its disciplinary foundations so unusual that
it requires an entirely new ethical framework, one tailor-made for the is-sues (Khushf 2004). So electric is the buzz around
nanotechnology that some of those cognizant of its implications want a completely clean ethical slate for their discussions. Here I argue a
different case. The first part of this chapter makes the case that the discipline of environmental philosophy already provides a particularly
suitable framework to bring to bear on many of the pertinent questions. The ethical issues that are most often brought up in relation to
nano-technologies are almost all issues that have arisen in relation to other environmental promises and threats. Specters such as the threat
of biological harm, the danger of runaway replicators, the creation of radically new kinds of materials, the hubris of `playing God' with
natural processes, and the threat to the meaning of being human are all familiar worries raised by previous technological developments
such as nuclear power, genetically modified organisms, ecosystem restoration, and human genetic therapies. Environmental philosophy,
one might argue, developed specifically in response to these sorts of threats. Optimistic promises by the boosters of nanotechnology such
as future material abundance, the end of pollution, and the cessation of extinction are equally familiar to environmental advocates, as is
the speculative idea of bringing extinct species back from the dead. Like nanotechnology, environmental philosophy is inherently inter-
disciplinary, building bridges between philosophy and ethics on the one hand and ecology, biology, and evolution on the other. This means
that environmental philosophy might be readily adapted to perform the cross-disciplinary investigations between chemistry, biology,
engineering, and philosophy that nanotechnology demands. Complex ontological questions raised by nanotechnology about the
relationship between the natural and the artificial are also firmly within the purview of environmental philosophy and have been discussed
by environmental philosophers in relation to biotechnology and genetics. Questions weighted with social rather than environmental
dimensions – the fear of creating a socio-economic nano-divide, puzzles about who can patent nanotechnologies, worries about corporate
and government abuse, concerns about liability for possible harms caused by nanomaterials – are also issues with which environmental
ethicists have experience. So while it is clear that nano-technology promises tremendous technological advancement, it is not so clear that
it takes us into completely new ethical terrain. Turning to an existing ethical framework provides an important economy of labor for those
addressing the difficult challenges of nanotechnology. It also provides a helpful orienting point in what might otherwise be only lightly
charted territory. So while environmental philosophy certainly should not pretend to be the only lens through which to consider the ethical
issues that nanotechnology generates, it certainly seems that the discipline might be a proficient guide for many of them. There is a further
consideration at work that makes environmental philosophy a particularly suitable framework to use. This consideration relates to a potent
guiding metaphor that frequently slips into the discussion of how to frame nanotechnological endeavor. Nanotechnology is often cast as a
way for humans to fabricate biological and evolutionary processes. It does this essentially by building from the atom or molecule up.
James Van Ehr, CEO of Zyvex, a company dedicated to producing the world's first molecular assemblers, begins his talks on nanotechnol-
ogy by offering wood and abalone shells as prototypical nanomaterials .3 Biology is the proof by example for many nanotechnological
dreams. The report on nanotechnology by the U.K.'s Economic and Social Re-search Council contains the claim that "cell biology offers a
proof that at least one kind of nanotechnology is possible" (ESRC 2003, p. 7). Kevin Yager of the Barrett Research Group at McGill
University in Canada similarly opines that "the best proof comes from nature, which has (over the course of billions of years of evolution)
created highly sophisticated nanometre-sized devices, including catalysts, motors, data encoding mechanisms, optical sensors, etc. "4 The
most audacious proponents of nanotechnology suggest that the implicit aim of the endeavor is for humans to "do better than nature and
improve on evolution" (Dinkerlaker 2003). George M. Whitesides laid down this gauntlet in Scientific American remarking that "it would
be a marvelous challenge to see if we can outdesign evolution" (Whitesides 2001). Nanotechnology, seen in this light, is a human effort to
fabricate biology and to do a better job at it than nature has done. Given this provocative guiding metaphor, it seems probable that a great
number of the ethical issues that surround the technology will reside either within environmental philosophy or at its inter-section with
bioethics.
97
Nanotech commits violence to natures ontology destroying our primary and secondary values towards
nature which results in viewing nature as an artifact which removes our ability to see the interconnectedness
of life
228-229
The first worry has been raised in an articulate way by Keekok Lee in The Natural and the Artifactual: The Implications of Deep Science
and Deep Technology for Environmental Philosophy. Through a careful discussion of the nature of artifacts, of Marx's understanding of
ourselves as homo faber, and the role of the machine metaphor in human discourse, Lee suggests that the threats to the environment that
have hitherto been considered urgent pale into insignificance when placed alongside the threat of artificial kinds produced by
nanotechnology. With nanotechnologies, environmentalists have to worry not just about the loss of `secondary values' such as nature's
complexity or its alleged stability, they have to also worry about the loss of `primary values' such as the very nature of nature as an
ontological kind. Nanotechnology, Lee claims, is capable of "turn[ing] biotic and abiotic entities into artifacts" constituting "a radical
threat to the ontological category of the natural" (Lee 1999, p. 114). This new threat means that environmental philosophy should orient
itself around combating dramatic ontological challenges rather than axiological ones. There appear to be two reasons why this creation of
artificial kinds is a problem for Lee and these reasons can both be traced to the ethical in- tuition described above. Lee appears to be
worried that the replacement of nature with a world of artifacts ("material embodiments of human intentionality") represents a significant
ontological loss in itself. Some-thing of considerable intrinsic value has disappeared to be replaced by something of less value.
Nanotechnology threatens a diminution of meta-physical kinds by replacing the products of the evolutionary process with something
artificial. The second reason, clearly not entirely separable from the first, is that this leaves humanity in an ethically and psychologically
impoverished position. Lee contends that systematic elimination of the natural leads to a "narcissistic civilization". The narcissistic
civilization created by nanotechnology would no longer have available the "radical otherness" of nature to keep itself in perspective. Lee
believes that there is something about the radical alterity of unmodified nature that is important. The independence of nature is an
"ontological value" that needs to be preserved in order to maintain an appropriate sense of where humans fit on earth (Lee 1999). A proper
sense of ourselves, Lee supposes, is strongly connected to otherness.
Not having nanotechnology because of natures ontological concerns is absurd, the impacts are overstate as
we currently live in a world with both artifacts and nature
230-231
While granting that the environmental ethic we are using as a guide will recognize a loss here, it is doubtful that this loss is quite as
significant as Lee suggests. One reason to suspect Lee is exaggerating her concern is that while she is certainly right that
environmentalists tend to see more value in cows and bison than they do in cars and washing ma-chines, few of them really want to ban
cars and washing machines. Neither the creation of artifacts, nor the creation of artificial kinds, seems in itself to ever be enough for
environmentalists to talk about prohibitions. If the creation of artificial kinds were itself morally objectionable then synthetic chemists
creating over 900,000 new chemical substances a year would receive much more scrutiny from environmentalists than they currently do
(Schummer 2001). For the most part, we seem to live alongside artifacts and artificial kinds reasonably well. In some cases, we find arti-
facts such as paintings and antique wooden furniture especially valuable and appealing. Occasionally we are glad to use artifacts – for
example, recycled plastic – to prevent us from destroying more of pristine nature. While many do lament how our lives are increasingly
surrounded by artifacts rather than by nature and while others do express some alarm at the activities of synthetic chemists, such
resistance hardly amounts to an ethical basis for a prohibition of nanotechnology. To sustain her case, Lee would have to show two
additional things. First, she would have to show that there is something particularly significant about the creation of artifacts at the
nanoscale as opposed to the creation of artifacts at the scale of plastic cups, tables and chairs, and climate-changed landscapes. There
would have to be something about human intentionality embodied at the atomic or molecular level that is more morally culpable than
human intentionality embodied at the level of tables and chairs. Unfortunately, making this case would seem to involve indicting
chemistry and particle physics at the same time, a radical position that would be difficult to maintain if those sciences are to have any
merit at all. The second thing she would have to show is that there is a real danger of the products of nanotechnology entirely replacing all
natural kinds. Except in the `grey goo' scenario – discussed in Section 4.2 – this does not seem likely. As long as one's ethic still insisted
upon the inherent value of the natural kinds produced by evolutionary processes and as long as it ensured that those natural kinds received
adequate protection even as more and more artificial kinds were created, Lee's worry about an ontological loss appears to be overstated.
An ethic based on the value of the evolutionary process simply does not do enough for a blanket prohibition on all nanotechnologies since
there is nothing about nanotechnology that logically entails the total elimination of evolved nature.
98
The use of nano assemblers are unethical because the unique features of the nanobots that are outside the
moral process of evolution which ensures natural checks and balances—the use of nanotech ignores the
interdependence of the world and threatens existence
234-237
Most people who have heard or read anything about nanotechnology have come across the uncontrolled replicator or `grey goo' problem.
It was nano-booster Eric Drexler who first raised the possibility of nanomachines going out of control (Drexler 1986). Drexler pointed out
that since molecular manufacturing takes place at such a small scale, large numbers of manufacturing units would have to be working
simultaneously on the same project in order to ever create anything useful on the macro-scale. Practical necessity would therefore
probably require that such a fabricator be able to reproduce itself. In addition to its ability to reproduce itself and perform its
manufacturing tasks, each fabricator would have to be able to solve the problem of directed locomotion in order to be able to procure
energy for itself from its environment to complete its tasks. The worry Drexler raised was that a population of such machines left to its
own devices could increase in numbers exponentially and consume itself out of an environment. The result would be an environment
transformed into a grey goo of nanobots and their waste products. `Green goo' is an artificially created self-replicating biotic entity that
carries the same risk. These possibilities are more technically termed global ecophagy by omnivorous replicators. Bill Joy, co-founder and
chief scientist of Sun Microsystems, suggested in an article in Wired Magazine in 2000 that nanotechnology masks too many dangers for
us to allow ourselves to be seduced by it (Joy 2000). He points out that a grey goo scenario could happen by accident or, more worryingly,
it could happen deliberately. The combination of technologies known as GNR (Genetics, Nanotechnology, and Robotics) is so powerful,
Joy warns, that it will "spawn whole new classes of accidents and abuses". Self-replicating nanobots will make possible knowledge
enabled mass destruction (KMD), a threat that greatly exceeds any we face today. Joy worries that "we are on the cusp of the further
perfection of extreme evil, an evil whose possibility spreads well beyond that which weapons of mass destruction bequeathed to nation
states" (Joy 2000). There are plenty of empirical questions about whether the goo threat is real. Some commentators doubt that we could
ever be foolish enough to let loose machines that are able to replicate and nourish themselves. Others suggest that the relatively high
energy requirements for such ma-chines preclude their possibility. Drexler himself has recently co-written an article that attempts to dispel
the worries that his earlier remarks created (Phoenix & Drexler 2004). Since one of Phoenix and Drexler's main points about exponential
manufacturing is that nobody but a terrorist would purposefully let loose a material that would end up consuming the whole planet – a
possibility that they refuse to dismiss – an ethical evaluation of the grey goo problem initially seems likely to follow the same path as any
discussion about a powerful technology that has the potential to be used for murderous means. The argument would essentially be that
such a technology should not be allowed to fall into the wrong hands. Nevertheless, consideration of what exactly is wrong with self-
replicating nanotechnologies in the light of our selected ethic is illuminating. An uncontrollable, environment-consuming goo is obviously
undesirable for reasons of self-interest. This is to say nothing of its lack of aesthetic appeal! But the more interesting moral issue that it
raises from an environmental ethics perspective is adroitly anticipated by Joy. Joy states that GNR technologies cross a fundamental line
when they allow the "replicating and evolving processes that have been confined to the natural world [...] to become realms of human
endeavor" (Joy 2000). If selflocomoting nanobots are able to solve problems and to replicate them-selves, then the process of natural
selection has been altered. If the fabricators sometimes produce copies of themselves that are not perfect, then they will also be able to
evolve. It is this attempt to reproduce the evolutionary process with artificially created replicators and then let this process loose on an
unprepared natural environment that is most worrying to the environmental ethicist. The fabricated biology of a nanomachine will now be
able to interfere directly with the historical evolutionary process, the very thing that is the basis of the environmental ethic. The dangers of
amending the evolutionary process to serve human ends are many. Some of these problems have already appeared with varying degrees of
severity in the case of hybridization of plants and other agricultural genetic technologies. The ecological problems of the homogenization
of the biotic community, the extinction of wild species, the evolution of more persistent insect pests, and the spread of non-native flora
and fauna into native ecosystems have all accompanied previous human interference with the evolutionary process. But each of these ex-
isting problems are just pale shadows of the troubles that self-replicating nanomachines could cause. Self-replicating nano-sized
fabricators differ from these other human interferences with the evolutionary process in at least three important ways. The first is
biological dissimilarity. The products of agricultural biotechnology are subject to several layers of natural limitation due to their biological
similarities to natural products of evolution. Because of its biological similarity, a Hereford cow, for example, is subject to many of the
same natural checks and balances as a bison. Left to its own de-vices, in fact, the Hereford cow will fare considerably poorer in the face of
natural forces than the bison. But while a cow bred for milk production and docility is biologically similar to a bison, a nanomachine is
absolutely not. The abiotic self-replicating products of nanotechnology will be so dissimilar to anything that has naturally evolved that the
chances of there being any natural checks and balances on their populations are slim. The second factor that differentiates previous
anthropogenic disrup- tions to the global ecology from those of nanotechnologies is the issue of ecological niche. When humans introduce
species like kudzu, cheatgrass, and zebra mussels into non-native environments these organisms wreak such havoc precisely because there
is nothing to check their spread out-side of their native ecological niche. Since self-replicating nanotechnologies lack any native
ecological niche at all the likelihood of there being any ecological checks on their spread is small. Other than limitations on its energy
99
supply, it is completely unclear what – if any – natural factors will limit the reproductive success of an abiotic nanobot. The third reason
that the prospect of self-replicating nanobots differs from the hybridization of flora and fauna has to do with volume. The sheer number of
entities that could be produced in a short time by self-replicating nanobots makes this prospect dramatically different from any previously
known artificially produced organism. A nanosized particle is one onehundred-thousandth of the diameter of a human hair. This means
that the number of nanomachines required to perform any task at the macro level would have to be simply vast. The power of an
exponential increase in the number of self-replicating nano-machines (if they were ever allowed to exist in these kinds of numbers) would
be simply staggering. Plagues of rats or locusts would look like trivial biological phenomena by comparison. Joy's concern about human
interference with the process of evolution seems to rest on fairly solid precautionary ground. In Section 4.1 the initial reluctance to fiddle
with the products of the evolutionary process turned out to be defeasible in the light of the fact that we create many artifacts, even
biological ones, that are often not dangerous to us. But problem-solving self-replicating nanobots co-opt not just biology but also the
evolutionary process itself for human ends. This seems to add a whole different level of ethical concern. So regardless of the empirical
likelihood of the grey goo scenario ever actually occurring, environmental ethicists seem to be on solid ground to reject any attempt to
create them. The central value of the environmental ethic upon which they rely is directly contravened and this provides a good reason to
object.
Nanotechs immortality arguments invariably remove natures role on the planet and provides humans with
no value to life
238-239
A third area of the application of nanotechnologies that raises concerns for an adherent of our environmental ethic is the area of human
enhancement. Ethical questions about enhancements of human health are not uniquely associated with nanotechnology and discussion of
this issue is already well developed in the medical ethics literature (Parens 1998, Resnik 2000). But nanotechnologies are likely in the
near future to make possible more subtle and effective enhancements including some that will involve dramatic modifications of the
human genome. The ability to operate at the scale of telomeres makes possible extending or shortening the life of a cell (Leutwyler 1998,
McKibben 2003). The projected creation of microscopic nanobots that can repair cells from the inside or wander through the bloodstream
destroying cholesterol and other undesirables promises mark improvements in longevity and quality of life. The technologies being
developed for molecular assembly will make direct genetic manipulation easier and cheaper than before. Nano-visionaries believe that
these kinds of technologies will dramatically improve health and delay aging. Some even suggest that nanotechnology brings human
immortality within reach (Drexler 1986). In addition to these versions of human enhancement that work with the patient's existing
biology, there are other areas of nanotechnology that see the real promise as lying in a new synthesis of the biotic and abiotic. The ability
to construct machines with parts that are no bigger than neurons offers the possibility of tying the electrochemical activity of the brain
directly into electronic circuits. Significant progress is being made on interfacing biological materials directly with nanomaterials
(Webster et al. 2004). The proposed area of research known as Nano-Bio-Info-Cogno (NBIC) combines nano and biological technologies
with information technologies and cognitive science. NBIC pursues the goal of human-machine hybrids (or cyborgs) that can outperform
existing humans in numerous ways. The prospect of enhanced cyborgian humans with microelectronic implants that increase their
memories or genetic enhancements that in-crease their intelligence has provoked a predictably strong reaction from political and
environmental commentators. Francis Fukuyama, address ing mainly the application of traditional biotechnologies to human enhancement
has lamented that our `posthuman' future would be a troubling one in which many of the social and political frameworks that have been
successfully developed to accompany our existing concept of human nature would no longer be effective (Fukuyama 2002). Liberal de-
mocracies work, Fukuyama believes, because they fit the way we naturally are, a condition that promises to be irrevocably changed by
biotechnology. For similar reasons, Bill McKibben – more alert than Fukuyama to how nanotechnologies bear on this debate – has asked
us to yell a technology-halting "Enough!" to post-humanism through nanotechnology. McKibben makes the case that it is our very
mortality and imperfection that makes life meaningful (McKibben 2003). Without death, or with significantly longer lives, or even with
some of the more modest enhancements promised by nanotechnicians, McKibben questions how meaning-generating pastimes such as
staying physically fit or mentally altert could continue to provide us with the same rewards
100
Neg- Timeframe
Nanotechnology won’t be available for hundreds of years if it’s even possible
Stix, 2001
(Gary, Scientific American's special projects editor, “Scientific American,” September, lexis) KMH
The danger comes when intelligent people take Drexler's predictions at face value. Drexlerian nanotechnology drew renewed
publicity last year when a morose Bill Joy, the chief scientist of Sun Microsystems, worried in the magazine Wired about the implications
of nanorobots that could multiply uncontrollably. A spreading mass of self-replicating robots-what Drexler has labeled "gray goo"-could
pose enough of a threat to society, he mused, that we should consider stopping development of nanotechnology. But that suggestion
diverts attention from the real nano goo: chemical and biological weapons.
Among real chemists and materials scientists who have now become nanotechnologists, Drexler's predictions have assumed a
certain quaintness; science is nowhere near to being able to produce nanoscopic machines that can help revive frozen brains from
suspended animation. (Essays by Drexler and his critics, including Nobel Prize winner Richard E. Smalley, appear in this issue.) Zyvex,
a company started by a software magnate enticed by Drexlerian nanotechnology, has recognized how difficult it will be to create robots
at the nanometer scale; the company is now dabbling with much larger micromechanical elements, which Drexler has disparaged in
his books [see "Nanobot Construction Crews," by Steven Ashley, on page 84].
101
Neg- AT: Time Travel

1) Our impacts occur first, if we win extinction will occur in the short term until time travel is possible
it means no one would be around for time travel—
Time Travel is Impossible, Scientists Agree
Goudarzi Staff Writer Live Science 2007

<Live Science, 7-15-08, http://www.livescience.com/technology/070307_time_travel.html>
The urge to hug a departed loved one again or prevent atrocities are among the compelling reasons that keep the notion of time travel
alive in the minds of many. While the idea makes for great fiction, some scientists now say traveling to the past is impossible. There are
a handful of scenarios that theorists have suggested for how one might travel to the past, said Brian Greene, author of the bestseller, “The
Elegant Universe” and a physicist at Columbia University.“And almost all of them, if you look at them closely, brush up right at the edge
of physics as we understand it. Most of us think that almost all of them can be ruled out.”In physics, time is described as a dimension
much like length, width, and height. When you travel from your house to the grocery store, you’re traveling through a direction in space,
making headway in all the spatial dimensions — length, width and height. But you’re also traveling forward in time, the fourth
dimension. “Space and time are tangled together in a sort of a four-dimensional fabric called space-time,” said Charles Liu, an
astrophysicist with the City University of New York, College of Staten Island and co-author of the book “One Universe: At Home In The
Cosmos.”
Backwards in Time is Impossible
MSNBC 2007
<MSNBC, 7-15-08, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17544598/>
Mathematically, you can certainly say something is traveling to the past, Liu said. “But it is not possible for you and me to travel
backward in time,” he said. However, some scientists believe that traveling to the past is, in fact, theoretically possible, though
impractical. Maybe if there were a theory of everything, one could solve all of Einstein’s equations through a wormhole, and see whether
time travel is really possible, Kaku said. “But that would require a technology far more advanced than anything we can muster," he said.
"Don’t expect any young inventor to announce tomorrow in a press release that he or she has invented a time machine in their basement.”
We can’t Go Back to Save People

Rubak 2000
<Rubak, 7-15-08, http://rubak.com/article.cfm?ID=16>
The classic concept of time travel in where we can travel back into time and meet Albert Einstein or our dead great grandparent. Could we
do it with faster than light speed? Nope. No matter how fast we are, what occurred, has already occurred. Seeing someone pull a trigger
and moving faster than light afterward could never bring you to your exact location before the event has occurred. So if this type of time
travel is to be possible it must be done with some other method. The moment of JFK's death, while famous and full of interest, holds
many details that must be discussed when considering time travel. Remember I defined a moment by the relative position of all particles
to each other. In this case, the position of the bullet compared to the position of JFK's head. However, many more things were going on at
that exact moment. Where JFK was geographically speaking, where every person and animal around them were, where objects around
them were, etc. But looking at time travel with just these details is not detailed enough. A moment in time has many other factors
including: Where the Earth was in relation to the sun, where the sun was in relation to the solar system, and where the solar system was in
relation to the universe. That moment in time is defined by the location of every atom in the universe and their precise distance from each
other. Consider traveling back in time to a nighttime situation. (Remember, it's always night time somewhere on the Earth) If our time
machine only affected the Earth, then the Sun, stars, planets, etc would be in the wrong location, and a "hiccup" would be felt by all. So
traveling back in time can't be accomplished by simply recreating the exact situation, since we must also recreate the position of the very
stars. our device would have to affect the entire universe. This is entirely impossible. Under no circumstances could we ever affect the
entire universe to replay a past event.
102

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Wildcat Debate Workshop 08 <Nanotech Aff/Neg>

Current nanotechnology industry needs something to spur research

Advantage 1- Global Warming

Second, There is a scientific consensus that CO2 is causing warming

Third, Studies disprove sun as the source of warming

G L O B A L - W A R M I N G S K E P T I C S A N D T H E S U N S P O T C Y C L E Many global-warming skeptics argue that the

Fourth, Solar Nanotechnology solves global warming

Nanotech solves for war

Nanotechnology would provide a utopia

Solvency- Plan  nanotech investment

Solvency- Short term goals lead to long term

Solvency- AT: Can’t Make Nano Solar

Solvency- AT: Nanoassemblers not possible

Solvency- AT: Grey Goo

Grey Goo wouldn’t destroy the universe even if it happened

Nanobots wouldn’t be able to find enough energy to produce grey goo

Blue goo will solve Grey goo

Solvency- EXT: AT: Grey Goo

Nobody will be able to produce self-replicating nanobots

Good kinds of nanobots will be able to defeat self-replicating bots

Grey goo is impossible – history of life proves

Nanoassemblers causing grey goo pose very little risk

Solar Nanotech- More efficient

Solar Nanotech- provides energy independence

Solar Nanotech- effective, reliable, provides world

Solar Nanotech- AT: not reliable, no production at

Solar Power, using nanotech, can receive energy at night

Solar Nanotech- AT: no mass production

Solar Nanotech- AT: Costs too much

Global Warming – Nanotubes/NanoBatteries

Global Warming- Sequestering

Global Warming- Renewables Solve

Sun Death-2AC Add On

Sun Death- Sun Death Soon

Space- Space Elevator

Development of nanotech leads to space elevators

Space- Better Ships

Space- Astronaut Health

Nanotechnology allows terraforming of mars

Space- Time Travel

Space- AT: Radiation

Space- Impact- Prevent Extinction-Disease

Space- Impact- Prevent Extinction-Militarism

Space- Impact- Prevent Extinction-Overpopulation

Space- Impact- Prevent Extinction-Meteor

Space- Impact- Solves Environment

Space- AT: Colonization = Imperialism

Space- Impact- Solves Everything

Sylvia Engdahl, 2001

Aliens- 2AC Add On

Aliens would want to destroy us

We can use Nanotechnology to create Drinkable force-fields

A molecular nano weapon can gives us super weapons

Aliens- Aliens Exist

There are other “Earths” out there

Aliens- Will be more advanced

Aliens- Want to kill us

Aliens- Nano provides invisibility

Utopia – Nanotech provides

Utopia – Solves Capitalism  Nirvana

Utopia- Nanotech gives us everything we need and

Utopia- AT: People will be bored

EMERGING INFECTIOUS DISEASES THREATEN PLANETARY EXTINCTION