Grey goo
Encyclopedia
Grey goo is a hypothetical end-of-the-world
scenario involving molecular nanotechnology
in which out-of-control self-replicating robots consume all matter on Earth
while building more of themselves, a scenario known as ecophagy
("eating the environment").
Self-replicating machines of the macroscopic variety were originally described by mathematician John von Neumann
, and are sometimes referred to as von Neumann machines
.
The term grey goo was coined by nanotechnology pioneer Eric Drexler
in his 1986 book Engines of Creation
, stating that "we cannot afford certain types of accidents." In 2004 he stated "I wish I had never used the term 'grey goo'."
(1986). In Chapter 4, Engines Of Abundance, Drexler illustrates both exponential growth
and inherent limits by describing nanomachines that can function only if given special raw materials:
In a History Channel broadcast, grey goo is referred to in a futuristic doomsday
scenario:
"In a common practice, billions of nanobots are released to clean up an oil spill off the coast of Louisiana. However, due to a programming error, the nanobots devour all carbon based objects, instead of just the hydrocarbons of the oil. The nanobots destroy everything, all the while, replicating themselves. Within days, the planet is turned to dust."
Drexler describes grey goo in Chapter 11 of Engines Of Creation:
Drexler notes that the geometric growth made possible by self-replication is inherently limited by the availability of suitable raw materials.
Drexler used the term "grey goo" not to indicate color or texture, but to emphasize the difference between "superiority" in terms of human values and "superiority" in terms of competitive success:
Bill Joy
, one of the founders of Sun Microsystems, discussed some of the problems with pursuing this technology in his now-famous 2000 article in Wired
magazine, titled "Why the Future Doesn't Need Us
". In direct response to Joy's concerns, the first quantitative technical analysis of the ecophagy
scenario was published in 2000 by nanomedicine pioneer Robert Freitas
.
In Britain
, Prince Charles called upon the Royal Society
to investigate the "enormous environmental and social risks" of nanotechnology in a planned report, leading to much delighted media commentary on grey goo. The Royal Society's report on nanoscience was released on 29 July 2004, and dismisses the idea as impossible.
More recent analysis has shown that the danger of grey goo is far less likely than originally thought. However, other long-term major risks to society and the environment from nanotechnology have been identified. Drexler has made a somewhat public effort to retract his grey goo hypothesis, in an effort to focus the debate on more realistic threats associated with knowledge-enabled nanoterrorism and other misuses.
context, as the required technologies do not yet exist. In the worst postulated scenarios (requiring large, space-capable machines), matter beyond Earth would also be turned into goo (with goo meaning a large mass of replicating nanomachines lacking large-scale structure, which may or may not actually appear goo-like). The disaster is posited to result from a deliberate doomsday device
, or from an accidental mutation
in a self-replicating nanomachine used only for other purposes, but designed to operate in a natural environment.
Notable examples of such a work can be found in the novel Blood Music by Greg Bear
(1985), the 2002 Michael Crichton
novel Prey
and Wil McCarthy's
novel Bloom
. The remake of The Day the Earth Stood Still
features a grey goo nanoattack on human civilization.
In the video game Deus Ex: Invisible War
, a limited form of "grey goo" has been weaponized to create so-called Nanite Detonators, a potent weapon which uses self-replicating nanites to consume an entire city, yet which is not capable of running amok across the Earth's surface.
In Ken MacLeod's 'The Stone Canal' (1996), a stored post-human culture is revived in order to answer questions, and then destroyed with Blue Goo. The ethics of life based on stored human minds are central to this and to the other three novels in the Fall Revolution sequence.
Broken Angels
, the second novel in sci-fi author Richard Morgan's Altered Carbon trilogy, features an encounter with an evolving, self-replicating colony of nano-machines.
In the Thursday Next
novel Lost in a Good Book
by English author Jasper Fforde
, the main character is warned of an impending apocalypse where all life on Earth had been converted into strawberry-flavoured Dream Topping
, in a botched attempt to end world hunger. This was described as an example of a "pink goo" scenario.
In the novel Aristoi
by author Walter Jon Williams
, the original Earth was destroyed by "Mataglap Nano", a grey goo disaster which originated in Indonesia (thus the name, which means berserk in Indonesian).
"Benderama
," a sixth-season episode of the animated series Futurama
, uses grey goo as a plot device. Bender uses a replicating device to create two smaller copies of himself, each of which does the same. The process continues until the new Benders reach the atomic scale and begin synthesizing ethanol
to use as fuel, causing everyone on Earth to become severely intoxicated.
Jeff Carlson
wrote a series of novels (Plague Year, Plague War, and Plague Zone), which took place in a world where microscopic self-replicating nanotechnology robots escape from a lab in California and kill every organism living below 10,000 feet. The world's survivors live atop mountains in the Alps, Rockies, Andes, Himalayas, etc and make short trips into the plague zone for vital supplies.
In the military science fiction
series Stargate SG-1
, the Replicator
s are antagonistic self-replicating machine
s that propagate by ingesting the metals that make up civilizations and use them to create either blocks that form the bug-like version or smaller cells that compose the human-form "Replicators". They were first mentioned indirectly in the season 3 episode , and first seen onscreen in . The Replicators are primarily the enemies of the Asgard
race, but Earth must also contend with them on several occasions. The Asurans of Stargate Atlantis
, essentially human-form "Replicators", might be related to those in Stargate SG-1
.
s in the virtual world Second Life
which work by continually replicating objects until the server crashes are referred to as grey goo attacks. This is a reference to the self-replicating aspects of grey goo. It is one example of the widespread convention of drawing analogies between certain Second Life concepts and the theories of radical nanotechnology.
Doomsday event
A doomsday event is a specific, plausibly verifiable or hypothetical occurrence which has an exceptionally destructive effect on the human race...
scenario involving molecular nanotechnology
Molecular nanotechnology
Molecular nanotechnology is a technology based on the ability to build structures to complex, atomic specifications by means of mechanosynthesis. This is distinct from nanoscale materials...
in which out-of-control self-replicating robots consume all matter on Earth
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...
while building more of themselves, a scenario known as ecophagy
Ecophagy
Ecophagy is a term coined by Robert Freitas that means the literal consuming of an ecosystem. It derives from the Greek "οικος" or Late Latin "oeco-", which refers to a "house" or "household", and Greek φᾰγεῖν phagein "to eat"...
("eating the environment").
Self-replicating machines of the macroscopic variety were originally described by mathematician John von Neumann
John von Neumann
John von Neumann was a Hungarian-American mathematician and polymath who made major contributions to a vast number of fields, including set theory, functional analysis, quantum mechanics, ergodic theory, geometry, fluid dynamics, economics and game theory, computer science, numerical analysis,...
, and are sometimes referred to as von Neumann machines
Self-replicating machine
A self-replicating machine is an artificial construct that is theoretically capable of autonomously manufacturing a copy of itself using raw materials taken from its environment, thus exhibiting self-replication in a way analogous to that found in nature. The concept of self-replicating machines...
.
The term grey goo was coined by nanotechnology pioneer Eric Drexler
K. Eric Drexler
Dr. Kim Eric Drexler is an American engineer best known for popularizing the potential of molecular nanotechnology , from the 1970s and 1980s.His 1991 doctoral thesis at MIT was revised and published as...
in his 1986 book Engines of Creation
Engines of Creation
Engines of Creation: The Coming Era of Nanotechnology is a 1986 molecular nanotechnology book written by K. Eric Drexler with a foreword by Marvin Minsky. An updated version was released in 2007...
, stating that "we cannot afford certain types of accidents." In 2004 he stated "I wish I had never used the term 'grey goo'."
Definition
The term was first used by molecular nanotechnology pioneer Eric Drexler in his book Engines of CreationEngines of Creation
Engines of Creation: The Coming Era of Nanotechnology is a 1986 molecular nanotechnology book written by K. Eric Drexler with a foreword by Marvin Minsky. An updated version was released in 2007...
(1986). In Chapter 4, Engines Of Abundance, Drexler illustrates both exponential growth
Exponential growth
Exponential growth occurs when the growth rate of a mathematical function is proportional to the function's current value...
and inherent limits by describing nanomachines that can function only if given special raw materials:
Imagine such a replicator floating in a bottle of chemicals, making copies of itself…the first replicator assembles a copy in one thousand seconds, the two replicators then build two more in the next thousand seconds, the four build another four, and the eight build another eight. At the end of ten hours, there are not thirty-six new replicators, but over 68 billion. In less than a day, they would weigh a ton; in less than two days, they would outweigh the Earth; in another four hours, they would exceed the mass of the Sun and all the planets combined — if the bottle of chemicals hadn't run dry long before.
In a History Channel broadcast, grey goo is referred to in a futuristic doomsday
Doomsday
Doomsday may refer to:* End times, a prophesied time of tribulation that would precede the Second Coming of the Messiah in Abrahamic religions-Fiction:* Doomsday , a 1927 novel by Warwick Deeping* Doomsday , a DC comic book character...
scenario:
"In a common practice, billions of nanobots are released to clean up an oil spill off the coast of Louisiana. However, due to a programming error, the nanobots devour all carbon based objects, instead of just the hydrocarbons of the oil. The nanobots destroy everything, all the while, replicating themselves. Within days, the planet is turned to dust."
Drexler describes grey goo in Chapter 11 of Engines Of Creation:
Early assembler-based replicators could beat the most advanced modern organisms. '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 made no preparation. We have trouble enough controlling viruses and fruit flies.
Drexler notes that the geometric growth made possible by self-replication is inherently limited by the availability of suitable raw materials.
Drexler used the term "grey goo" not to indicate color or texture, but to emphasize the difference between "superiority" in terms of human values and "superiority" in terms of competitive success:
Though masses of uncontrolled replicators need not be grey or gooey, the term "grey 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.
Bill Joy
Bill Joy
William Nelson Joy , commonly known as Bill Joy, is an American computer scientist. Joy co-founded Sun Microsystems in 1982 along with Vinod Khosla, Scott McNealy and Andy Bechtolsheim, and served as chief scientist at the company until 2003...
, one of the founders of Sun Microsystems, discussed some of the problems with pursuing this technology in his now-famous 2000 article in Wired
Wired (magazine)
Wired is a full-color monthly American magazine and on-line periodical, published since January 1993, that reports on how new and developing technology affects culture, the economy, and politics...
magazine, titled "Why the Future Doesn't Need Us
Why the future doesn't need us
"Why the future doesn't need us" is an article written by Bill Joy in the April 2000 issue of Wired magazine...
". In direct response to Joy's concerns, the first quantitative technical analysis of the ecophagy
Ecophagy
Ecophagy is a term coined by Robert Freitas that means the literal consuming of an ecosystem. It derives from the Greek "οικος" or Late Latin "oeco-", which refers to a "house" or "household", and Greek φᾰγεῖν phagein "to eat"...
scenario was published in 2000 by nanomedicine pioneer Robert Freitas
Robert Freitas
Robert A. Freitas Jr. is a Senior Research Fellow, one of four researchers at the nonprofit foundation Institute for Molecular Manufacturing in Palo Alto, California. He holds a 1974 Bachelor's degree majoring in both physics and psychology from Harvey Mudd College, and a 1978 Juris Doctor degree...
.
Risks and precautions
Drexler more recently conceded that there is no need to build anything that even resembles a potential runaway replicator. This would avoid the problem entirely. In a paper in the journal Nanotechnology, he argues that self-replicating machines are needlessly complex and inefficient. His 1992 technical book on advanced nanotechnologies Nanosystems: Molecular Machinery, Manufacturing, and Computation describes manufacturing systems that are desktop-scale factories with specialized machines in fixed locations and conveyor belts to move parts from place to place. Popular culture, however, remains focused on imagined scenarios derived from his older ideas. None of these measures would prevent a party creating a weaponized grey goo, were such a thing possible.In Britain
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
, Prince Charles called upon the Royal Society
Royal Society
The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, known simply as the Royal Society, is a learned society for science, and is possibly the oldest such society in existence. Founded in November 1660, it was granted a Royal Charter by King Charles II as the "Royal Society of London"...
to investigate the "enormous environmental and social risks" of nanotechnology in a planned report, leading to much delighted media commentary on grey goo. The Royal Society's report on nanoscience was released on 29 July 2004, and dismisses the idea as impossible.
More recent analysis has shown that the danger of grey goo is far less likely than originally thought. However, other long-term major risks to society and the environment from nanotechnology have been identified. Drexler has made a somewhat public effort to retract his grey goo hypothesis, in an effort to focus the debate on more realistic threats associated with knowledge-enabled nanoterrorism and other misuses.
Fiction
The term grey goo is often used in a futuristic or science fictionScience fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
context, as the required technologies do not yet exist. In the worst postulated scenarios (requiring large, space-capable machines), matter beyond Earth would also be turned into goo (with goo meaning a large mass of replicating nanomachines lacking large-scale structure, which may or may not actually appear goo-like). The disaster is posited to result from a deliberate doomsday device
Doomsday device
A doomsday device is a hypothetical construction — usually a weapon, or collection of weapons — which could destroy all life on a planet, particularly the Earth, or destroy the planet itself, bringing "doomsday", a term used for the end of planet Earth...
, or from an accidental mutation
Mutation
In molecular biology and genetics, mutations are changes in a genomic sequence: the DNA sequence of a cell's genome or the DNA or RNA sequence of a virus. They can be defined as sudden and spontaneous changes in the cell. Mutations are caused by radiation, viruses, transposons and mutagenic...
in a self-replicating nanomachine used only for other purposes, but designed to operate in a natural environment.
Notable examples of such a work can be found in the novel Blood Music by Greg Bear
Greg Bear
Gregory Dale Bear is an American science fiction and mainstream author. His work has covered themes of galactic conflict , artificial universes , consciousness and cultural practices , and accelerated evolution...
(1985), the 2002 Michael Crichton
Michael Crichton
John Michael Crichton , best known as Michael Crichton, was an American best-selling author, producer, director, and screenwriter, best known for his work in the science fiction, medical fiction, and thriller genres. His books have sold over 200 million copies worldwide, and many have been adapted...
novel Prey
Prey (novel)
Prey is a novel by Michael Crichton based on a nano-robotic threat to human-kind, first published in hardcover in November 2002 and as a paperback in November 2003 by HarperCollins...
and Wil McCarthy's
Wil McCarthy
Wil McCarthy is a science fiction novelist, Chief Technology Officer for Galileo Shipyards , and the science columnist for Syfy...
novel Bloom
Bloom (novel)
Bloom, written in 1998, is the fifth science fiction novel written by Wil McCarthy. It was first released as a hardcover in September 1998...
. The remake of The Day the Earth Stood Still
The Day the Earth Stood Still (2008 film)
The Day the Earth Stood Still is a 2008 science fiction film, a remake of the 1951 film of the same name. The screenplay is based on the 1940 classic science fiction short story "Farewell to the Master" by Harry Bates, and the 1951 screenplay adaptation by Edmund H...
features a grey goo nanoattack on human civilization.
In the video game Deus Ex: Invisible War
Deus Ex: Invisible War
Deus Ex: Invisible War is an action role-playing game developed by Ion Storm Inc. and published by Eidos Interactive. Released simultaneously for Microsoft Windows and the Xbox video game console on December 2, 2003, the game is a sequel to the critically acclaimed Deus Ex...
, a limited form of "grey goo" has been weaponized to create so-called Nanite Detonators, a potent weapon which uses self-replicating nanites to consume an entire city, yet which is not capable of running amok across the Earth's surface.
In Ken MacLeod's 'The Stone Canal' (1996), a stored post-human culture is revived in order to answer questions, and then destroyed with Blue Goo. The ethics of life based on stored human minds are central to this and to the other three novels in the Fall Revolution sequence.
Broken Angels
Broken Angels
Broken Angels is a military science fiction novel by Richard Morgan. It is the sequel to Altered Carbon, and is followed by Woken Furies.- Plot :...
, the second novel in sci-fi author Richard Morgan's Altered Carbon trilogy, features an encounter with an evolving, self-replicating colony of nano-machines.
In the Thursday Next
Thursday Next
Thursday Next is the main protagonist in a series of comic fantasy, alternate history novels by the British author Jasper Fforde. She was first introduced in Fforde's first published novel, The Eyre Affair, released on July 19, 2001 by Hodder & Stoughton. , the series comprises six books, in two...
novel Lost in a Good Book
Lost in a Good Book
Lost in a Good Book is an alternate history, fantasy novel by Jasper Fforde. It won the IMBA 2004 Dilys Award.-Plot introduction:It is the second book by Jasper Fforde and the sequel to the adventures of literary detective Thursday Next in The Eyre Affair...
by English author Jasper Fforde
Jasper Fforde
Jasper Fforde is a British novelist. Fforde's first novel, The Eyre Affair, was published in 2001. Fforde is mainly known for his Thursday Next novels, although he has written several books in the loosely connected Nursery Crime series and begun two more independent series: The Last Dragonslayer...
, the main character is warned of an impending apocalypse where all life on Earth had been converted into strawberry-flavoured Dream Topping
Icing
Icing may refer to:* Atmospheric icing, occurs when water droplets freeze on objects they contact, very dangerous for aircraft* Aufeis, also called icing, a sheet-like mass of layered ice that forms from the freezing of successive flows of groundwater...
, in a botched attempt to end world hunger. This was described as an example of a "pink goo" scenario.
In the novel Aristoi
Aristoi (novel)
Aristoi is a 1992 science fiction novel by Walter Jon Williams. It was one of the preliminary candidates for the 1993 Hugo Award for Best Novel in a particularly competitive year...
by author Walter Jon Williams
Walter Jon Williams
Walter Jon Williams is an American writer, primarily of science fiction.Several of Williams' novels have a distinct cyberpunk feel to them, notably Hardwired , Voice of the Whirlwind and Angel Stationn...
, the original Earth was destroyed by "Mataglap Nano", a grey goo disaster which originated in Indonesia (thus the name, which means berserk in Indonesian).
"Benderama
Benderama
"Benderama" is the seventeenth episode of season six of the animated sitcom Futurama, and originally aired June 23, 2011 on Comedy Central. The episode was written by Aaron Ehasz and directed by Crystal Chesney-Thompson. American comedian Patton Oswalt guest stars in the episode, voicing an...
," a sixth-season episode of the animated series Futurama
Futurama
Futurama is an American animated science fiction sitcom created by Matt Groening and developed by Groening and David X. Cohen for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The series follows the adventures of a late 20th-century New York City pizza delivery boy, Philip J...
, uses grey goo as a plot device. Bender uses a replicating device to create two smaller copies of himself, each of which does the same. The process continues until the new Benders reach the atomic scale and begin synthesizing ethanol
Ethanol
Ethanol, also called ethyl alcohol, pure alcohol, grain alcohol, or drinking alcohol, is a volatile, flammable, colorless liquid. It is a psychoactive drug and one of the oldest recreational drugs. Best known as the type of alcohol found in alcoholic beverages, it is also used in thermometers, as a...
to use as fuel, causing everyone on Earth to become severely intoxicated.
Jeff Carlson
Jeff Carlson (author)
Jeff G. Carlson is an American science fiction and thriller writer whose novels are international bestsellers.Son of a former division head at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Carlson was born in Sunnyvale, California and has since lived in several cities up and down the Californian coast...
wrote a series of novels (Plague Year, Plague War, and Plague Zone), which took place in a world where microscopic self-replicating nanotechnology robots escape from a lab in California and kill every organism living below 10,000 feet. The world's survivors live atop mountains in the Alps, Rockies, Andes, Himalayas, etc and make short trips into the plague zone for vital supplies.
In the military science fiction
Military science fiction
Military science fiction is a subgenre of science fiction in which the principal characters are members of a military service and an armed conflict is taking place, normally in space, or on a planet other than Earth...
series Stargate SG-1
Stargate SG-1
Stargate SG-1 is a Canadian-American adventure and military science fiction television series and part of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's Stargate franchise. The show, created by Brad Wright and Jonathan Glassner, is based on the 1994 feature film Stargate by Dean Devlin and Roland Emmerich...
, the Replicator
Replicator (Stargate)
In the military science fiction series Stargate SG-1, the Replicators are antagonistic self-replicating machines that propagate by ingesting the metals that make up civilizations and use them to create either blocks that form the bug-like version or smaller cells that compose the human-form...
s are antagonistic self-replicating machine
Self-replicating machine
A self-replicating machine is an artificial construct that is theoretically capable of autonomously manufacturing a copy of itself using raw materials taken from its environment, thus exhibiting self-replication in a way analogous to that found in nature. The concept of self-replicating machines...
s that propagate by ingesting the metals that make up civilizations and use them to create either blocks that form the bug-like version or smaller cells that compose the human-form "Replicators". They were first mentioned indirectly in the season 3 episode , and first seen onscreen in . The Replicators are primarily the enemies of the Asgard
Asgard (Stargate)
The Asgard are a fictional highly advanced race in the science fiction series Stargate SG-1 and Stargate Atlantis. They are first mentioned in the episode , and first seen in . In the series, the Asgard gave rise to Norse mythology on Earth, as well as accounts of the Roswell "Greys"...
race, but Earth must also contend with them on several occasions. The Asurans of Stargate Atlantis
Stargate Atlantis
Stargate Atlantis is a Canadian-American adventure and military science fiction television series and part of MGM's Stargate franchise. The show was created by Brad Wright and Robert C. Cooper as a spin-off series of Stargate SG-1, which was created by Wright and Jonathan Glassner and was itself...
, essentially human-form "Replicators", might be related to those in Stargate SG-1
Stargate SG-1
Stargate SG-1 is a Canadian-American adventure and military science fiction television series and part of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's Stargate franchise. The show, created by Brad Wright and Jonathan Glassner, is based on the 1994 feature film Stargate by Dean Devlin and Roland Emmerich...
.
Computing
Denial-of-service attackDenial-of-service attack
A denial-of-service attack or distributed denial-of-service attack is an attempt to make a computer resource unavailable to its intended users...
s in the virtual world Second Life
Second Life
Second Life is an online virtual world developed by Linden Lab. It was launched on June 23, 2003. A number of free client programs, or Viewers, enable Second Life users, called Residents, to interact with each other through avatars...
which work by continually replicating objects until the server crashes are referred to as grey goo attacks. This is a reference to the self-replicating aspects of grey goo. It is one example of the widespread convention of drawing analogies between certain Second Life concepts and the theories of radical nanotechnology.
External links
- Some Limits to Global Ecophagy by Biovorous Nanoreplicators, with Public Policy Recommendations
- Safe exponential manufacturing Paper critical of "grey goo," summarized in article Nanotechnology pioneer slays "grey goo" myths
- Online edition of the Royal Society's report Nanoscience and nanotechnologies: opportunities and uncertainties
- Goo and Paste Directory
- UK Government & Royal Society commission on Nanotechnology and Nanoscience
- Nanotechnology: Drexler and Smalley make the case for and against 'molecular assemblers' (Richard SmalleyRichard SmalleyRichard Errett Smalley was the Gene and Norman Hackerman Professor of Chemistry and a Professor of Physics and Astronomy at Rice University, in Houston, Texas...
argues that laws of chemistry imply it will be impossible to ever create "self-replicating nanobots" whose abilities to assemble molecules are significantly different than those of biological self-replicators. Some pro-nanobot responses to Smalley's argument can be found at Debate About Assemblers — Smalley Rebuttal, The Drexler-Smalley debate on molecular assembly, Of Chemistry, Nanobots, and Policy, and Is the Revolution Real?) - Nanotechnology and the Grey Goo Problem
- Be Amazing! - Humorous animation that involves a grey goo scenario