From newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!torn!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!comp.vuw.ac.nz!waikato.ac.nz!aukuni.ac.nz!kcbbs!nacjack!codewks!system Mon Nov  9 09:36:48 EST 1992
Article 7516 of comp.ai.philosophy:
Path: newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!torn!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!comp.vuw.ac.nz!waikato.ac.nz!aukuni.ac.nz!kcbbs!nacjack!codewks!system
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: Brain and Mind (was: Logic and God)
Message-ID: <8ocqTB3w165w@CODEWKS.nacjack.gen.nz>
>From: system@CODEWKS.nacjack.gen.nz (Wayne McDougall)
Date: Wed, 04 Nov 92 07:44:42 NZST
References: <1992Nov2.052226.1962@netcom.com>
Organization: The Code Works Limited, PO Box 10 155, Auckland, New Zealand
Lines: 40

nagle@netcom.com (John Nagle) writes:

> In article <5w1DTB3w165w@CODEWKS.nacjack.gen.nz> system@CODEWKS.nacjack.gen.n
> >Hmmm. Just a passing comment. If life is based PURELY on chemical 
> >reactions, then home come no one has created life in a test tube yet?
> >I expect your answer will be a form of "have patience". Hmmm....
> 
>       Things are a bit further along than that.  Read the ads in Nature.
> DNA synthesis services are commercially available.  Send in your datafile,
> get DNA back.  Get suitable files of existing viruses, etc. via the Internet.
> Desktop DNA synthesizers are available for under $20,000.  These interface
> to PCs.  So far, you can only synthesize a few hundred base pairs before
> errors creep in, but the technology is improving.
> 
>       All-new custom-designed enzymes Real Soon Now, apparently.  CAD
> tools are becoming available. 
> 
>      This is true direct synthesis, not "recombinant DNA" work.  
> Plants and animals have already had their genomes deliberately altered
> in controlled ways, but this is modifying life, not direct synthesis.
> Direct synthesis is still very limited, but it is into the range of
> complexity that, just barely, can be called "life".
> 
> 					John Nagle

Are you saying that for $20,000 (US, sob), I can design my own virii??

Someone should have told Saddam.

Keeping to the group topic....:

Why waste time on machine AI. Lets jsut design our own DNA to have 
super efficient large brains. (If only we knew how to make brains more 
efficient. Sigh.)

-- 
  Wayne McDougall, BCNU
  This .sig unintentionally left blank.

Hello! I'm a .SIG Virus. Copy me and spread the fun.


