"Never invent something you can't control".
It is kinda scary. Maybe Israel sees it's military potential. Lord knows those folks are watching their backs 24/7! Imagine the bioweapons!
I'd rather not! Molecular machines programmed to seek and destroy human life? We wouldn't need an asteroid to go the way of the dinosaur.
Indeed. Picture a bioweapon that would only be triggered if its host matched a specific genetic profile and the nanobots simply responded to such a match by metabolizing oxygen in the bloodstream and producing only carbon monoxide. The victim would suffer brief anoxia, lose consciousness and die within a very short time frame. Talk about a surgical strike.
Even more chilling, suppose someone in possession of such a weapon merely wanted to wipe out...say...an entire ruling royal class. Simple. Just have the weapon match on the mitochondrial DNA (which is passed unchanged from mother to child). Boom. Instant destruction of all within a certain lineage.
And that's just the tip of the nanotechnological iceberg in terms of weaponry.
I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if, five years from now, a global moratorium on nanotechnology is demanded due to ethical considerations (as is currently the case with human cloning).
It's a shame, really. Nanotechnology holds a great deal of promise...just as the atom did in the 1940s. But it's all too easily perverted into a weapon of horrible power that all can witness but few can truly comprehend.