Consider how nature uses atomically precise manufacturing (APM) to make organisms with amazing abilities. Using the fluid, messy molecular machinery of cells, it can produce:
Without atomic precision, these organisms wouldn't be possible. Cells wouldn't divide reliably and ribosomes wouldn't create the right proteins.
Humans have made structures that surpass biological organisms' capabilities even without relying on atomic precision. Cars can move faster than cheetahs. Skyscrapers can be taller and wider than redwoods. Computer processors perform operations faster than neurons.* However, computers still can't match the brain's parallelism, so the average computer today (2021) can't perform nearly as many operations per second as the entire brain.
Imagine what we can do with atomic precision. With APM, we'd expand the range and capabilities of products we can make today. For example, we'd be able to make laptops with a billion cores and billions of gigabytes of memory. Since we'd be arranging atoms the way we want, we wouldn't produce hazardous byproducts.**
Solar panels would be made efficient enough to supply all global energy needs, including what's needed to capture carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to reverse climate change, using negligible land area.***
* Processors that run at 3 Ghz, or 3 billion operations per second, are common. Individual neurons can operate at up to 200 Hz or 200 spikes per second. However, if we consider the average spike rate, it's much lower because many neurons are quiet. Still, this is a shallow metric because it doesn't convey how much information is transmitted per second.
To make a more meaningful comparison we could ask, "To calculate 1 + 1 = x, how much work is done by the brain vs a computer?" Or "To recognize a cat in a photo, how much work is done by the brain's visual system vs a computer vision system?" Measuring information transmitted isn't easy because "There is a growing body of evidence that in Purkinje neurons, at least, information is not simply encoded in firing but also in the timing and duration of non-firing, quiescent periods."
** We wouldn't actually be picking atoms up one by one and placing them individually. We'd be working with molecular machines—tiny versions of the machines in a typical factory—that guide atoms in parallel, putting them just where we want them.
*** On solar cells, Drexler writes, "Turning to questions of capacity and impact, to meet current global energy demand (about fifteen terawatts, including wood and dung burned for heat) would require about 0.2 percent of the Earth’s land area, or about 1 percent of the area now used for grazing and crops. With sheets of tough, abrasion-resistant composite materials used in place of fragile photovoltaic panels, rooftops and roads could provide much of the area required." - Drexler, K. Eric. Radical Abundance (p. 230). PublicAffairs.
AI IMPACTS. "Neuron firing rates in humans". https://aiimpacts.org/rate-of-neuron-firing/
Drexler, K. Eric. "Radical Abundance".
Consider how nature uses atomically precise manufacturing (APM) to make organisms with amazing abilities. Using the fluid, messy molecular machinery of cells, it can produce:
Without atomic precision, these organisms wouldn't be possible. Cells wouldn't divide reliably and ribosomes wouldn't create the right proteins.
Humans have made structures that surpass biological organisms' capabilities even without relying on atomic precision. Cars can move faster than cheetahs. Skyscrapers can be taller and wider than redwoods. Computer processors perform operations faster than neurons.* However, computers still can't match the brain's parallelism, so the average computer today (2021) can't perform nearly as many operations per second as the entire brain.
Imagine what we can do with atomic precision. With APM, we'd expand the range and capabilities of products we can make today. For example, we'd be able to make laptops with a billion cores and billions of gigabytes of memory. Since we'd be arranging atoms the way we want, we wouldn't produce hazardous byproducts.**
Solar panels would be made efficient enough to supply all global energy needs, including what's needed to capture carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to reverse climate change, using negligible land area.***
* Processors that run at 3 Ghz, or 3 billion operations per second, are common. Individual neurons can operate at up to 200 Hz or 200 spikes per second. However, if we consider the average spike rate, it's much lower because many neurons are quiet. Still, this is a shallow metric because it doesn't convey how much information is transmitted per second.
To make a more meaningful comparison we could ask, "To calculate 1 + 1 = x, how much work is done by the brain vs a computer?" Or "To recognize a cat in a photo, how much work is done by the brain's visual system vs a computer vision system?" Measuring information transmitted isn't easy because "There is a growing body of evidence that in Purkinje neurons, at least, information is not simply encoded in firing but also in the timing and duration of non-firing, quiescent periods."
** We wouldn't actually be picking atoms up one by one and placing them individually. We'd be working with molecular machines—tiny versions of the machines in a typical factory—that guide atoms in parallel, putting them just where we want them.
*** On solar cells, Drexler writes, "Turning to questions of capacity and impact, to meet current global energy demand (about fifteen terawatts, including wood and dung burned for heat) would require about 0.2 percent of the Earth’s land area, or about 1 percent of the area now used for grazing and crops. With sheets of tough, abrasion-resistant composite materials used in place of fragile photovoltaic panels, rooftops and roads could provide much of the area required." - Drexler, K. Eric. Radical Abundance (p. 230). PublicAffairs.
AI IMPACTS. "Neuron firing rates in humans". https://aiimpacts.org/rate-of-neuron-firing/
Drexler, K. Eric. "Radical Abundance".