Spray-on liquid glass is about to revolutionize almost everything
physorg.com
physorg.com
Yep. The year of spray-on liquid glass on the desktop!
( Previously: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1092741 )
Here's their year-end review: a burst of publicity in February, and then hardly anything apart from a November article in "Cleanroom Technology". They're using it to coat toys in a children's hospital allowing kids that would not normally be allowed to play with the toys at all to use them.
Like liquid glass?
1. The amount of time from now the collapse occurs. (most likely a logrithmic scale)
2. How far civilization falls, e.g. "back to the 19th century" or "back to the stone age"[2].
3. How "wierd" this makes the world, e.g. are there 40 degree temperature shifts in the afternoon in San Diego and warm beaches in Antarctica. Are there now hyper-intelligent wasps running the show. Do we discuss the "fragility of the fabric of space-time" much more frequently.. and so on.[3]
Finally, every "square" is actually in a state of superposition, based on the answer to the question "are there zombies[4] now" at the time of selection. Therefore if you are sure 10 days from now, early 16th century avg tech, wierd factor of .09, put in $400 worth of goods to catch the both zombies outcomes.
Winners will be chosen at the END of the collapse, before the rebuilding period. The winners will be given the location and secret combination to enter the cache. Transport and armed escort will not be provied by me or any other participant of this pool, (except by other arrangement out of scope of the pool) nor will any other form of survivability enhancement until reaching the cache.
[1] Entry fee must be in the form of non-perishable food, ammo, guns and other items traditionally considered valuable post-apocalypse
[2] Avg tech level does not include the fact that various warlords, mad scientists, intelligent creatures and other bad guys will have access to various tech remnants and caches... This is strictly about the level of technology and civilization available to the average person.
[3] Weirdness factor algorithm tbd, but it will be normalized on a 0-1 scale, with the current state of the US being .27.
[4] Zombies here includes both new and old style zombies, some forms of mutant, possibly mind-control victims, and certain types of insectoid horde. All other types of undead, mutants and creatures, as well as those with supernatural powers are actually just manifestations of the wierd factor (see [3]).
So, um. How would you define this now, given that right now I have three computers within easy reach, a big-screen television and a game console in a heated apartment with lights and a gas stove - while somewhere across the world, someone is hoping they find enough water to drink so they can finish building their mud-hut before the wolves come?
Bonus points for pointing out that while my girlfriend is playing a post-apocalyptic video game, someone is probably doing almost exactly what she's doing, except with a real gun against real people?
Oddly, I lost a bet to myself with you comment, I figgured the first bit of pedantry would be over my statement regarding prizes being awarded at the end of the collapse. Such a thing is:
1. Even harder to judge
2. A much less useful time to be giving out caches of valuable supplies than the bits on the way down.
Anyway, given it is an apocalypse, odds are neither of us would survive, strictly statistically speaking, so who cares how I judge. If I remain alive, I am honestly not going to wait around for you for the argument given you are most likely dead, and I hope for your sake you would do the same for me by prying the cache location out of my dead hands.
As for your girlfriend's game: I have heard, and seen myself, that even the places that are most "terrifying ugly and bad" (first hand: the slums of Detroit and Pre-Katrina new Orleans, second hand: mogadishu, slums of bombay, etc) are surprisingly civilized. The "crazy fight for survival" based entertainment scenarios are about as realistic as the "evil corporation", "massive government conspiracy" and "small team of highly trained operatives" ones are. Such things may exist, but they are both more boring and more interesting than any such entertainment ever will be. Just sayin...
The short of it is you have no guarantee that I will not steal cache, other than my personal beliefs and ethics prevent me from doing so.
As for me dying before your winnings can be distributed: I understand this concern. I assure you I will actively do anything in my power to prevent this. However, in apocalyptic situations this is frequently not enough :(. Of course in an apocalypse a chance at a surviving cache is still better than not having the chance, so consider it a 5th condition on the pool:
Will sophacles survive in the apocalypse to hand out the prize. If you choose yes, sign up. If you choose no, don't sign up :P.
tl; dr -- ignore that paper on my desk that says "how to fund an apocalypse stockpile without spending a dime"
>[Neil McClelland] said soon almost every product you purchase will be coated with liquid glass.
Because such things are probably good for you, right?
So yes, lets add new things to food without the testing we require of drugs, and lets do it on a massive scale.
The things that actually do revolutionize everything are usually pooh-poohed at the beginning ("Another search engine?")
As for a hoverboard - sure it's technically more interesting than a Segway, but would it truly revolutionize anything?
> As for a hoverboard - sure it's technically more interesting
> than a Segway, but would it truly revolutionize anything
Seriously though, I think that the technology behind a hoverboard would probably have far more implications than the technology behind the Segway. The product itself might not revolutionize much, but the technology behind it would.
They say a coating lasts about a year, which is what is prompting this type of questions. What happens to it after a year? Does it stick to various things that come in contact with the coating? Does it break off and fall to the floor?
There additionally may be other mechanisms by which the coating is rendered less effective within a year, but I highly doubt a significant portion of the coating detaches from the surface within a year.
I think the question was specifically about this - what has happened to that small portion?
If we spread it around as much as this article describes it seems to me like we'd greatly sanitize our environment... What happens if we greatly reduce the amount of bacteria we're exposed to daily due to some sort of invention like nano spray-on glass?
In dealing with the sick and in preparing food come to mind.
I wouldn't mind it for electronics either.
Sounds a little asbestosy to me.
Who wants to read about a new kind of steel that's slightly harder than the old one?
Product demonstration: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pEgfdr7GKow
I don't know why it isn't for sale in the US at this point. But this is not vapor-ware.
The lack of understanding about possible cancerous effects of CRT screens worries me, especially with stuff like this and "digital" displays.
The lack of understanding about possible cancerous effects of GMO food worries me...
The lack of understanding about possible cancerous effects of inert silicone gel breast implants worries me...
Someone over 30 can fill in earlier examples: "The lack of understanding about possible cancerous effects of $NEW_TECHNOLOGY_I_DONT_UNDERSTAND worries me. I'd just hate to find out 20 years down the road that $NEW_TECHNOLOGY was slowly killing us. "
Oh wait, it is actually pretty nasty stuff. Now, while the "20 years down the road" thing is a bit silly, a lack of understanding about potential adverse effects is a reason to investigate further, not to dismiss anyone who's cautious about it as paranoid.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asbestos#History_of_health_conc...
If not, you missed the point of my comment.
Lead paint, though - there's a good one. Everybody knew you shouldn't drink it, but nobody suspected the dust was a problem. (Although Japan had already banned it by the 20's, if I recall correctly, while America was still merrily painting everything in sight with toxins).
And of course, the Romans didn't even know you shouldn't drink it. Although the benefits lead plumbing in Rome due to widespread availability of clean water almost certainly outweighed the costs of some stupider Romans.
You can debate his example, but his point stands.
I'm not advocating we abandon nanomaterial research by any means. I'm hoping that it's widespread use and adoption doesn't outpace research of it's effects on humans given it's similarities with asbestos.
Compared to other health threats in the US. Before the 60's and 70's, Asbestosis was a minor concern except for people with occupational exposure (e.g. asbestos miners). Much bigger and more pressing issues were polio, malaria, measles, and the like.
Once we became rich and healthy enough to care about it, we dealt with it. It was hardly an unknown threat, just a minor one.
As such, Asbestos was never directly marketed to consumers. Asbestos exposure was also limited because it's relatively narrow scope of usefulness. Asbestos was never a cultural phenomenon.
The extremely wide range of usefulness of nanotech means that it will show up in everything everywhere. Of specific concern should be anything designed to be airborne or directly applied directly on somebody. The product in question directly matches that description. Furthermore, this product is aimed directly at consumers, and the article even mentions how it is about to "revolutionize everything", alluding to widespread adoption and use.
I'd hate for something like this to be plastered over keyboards, door knobs, floors and countertops, sunglasses, shoes, phones, surgical equipment, dishes and silverware, headphones, cosmetics, etc... Those are the targets for something like this. You know, things you touch and use every day.
You're thinking of tritium:
Radiation and it's effects are well understood and quantified with fields devoted explicitly to the research of it's effects on humans.
Animals have been continuously eating food food that's mutated since animals have been mutating.
People have not been smearing engineered nanoparticles over their face and putting them into their body in these quantities for any appreciable amount of time, except around places like coal mines, heavy industrial areas (especially where exhaust from combustion), asbestos lined buildings, and all sorts of other fun places directly linked with mesothelioma.
You are correct in your observation that dust can be harmful, and I would be surprised if concentrated nano dust behaves differently. In particular, a very real danger from spray on glass might be silicosis - a non-cancerous disease caused by occupational exposure to glass dust.
I'm only responding here to the social phenomenon of "omfg, scary new technology, CANCER", I'm not trying to engage in amateur epidemiology.
I think it was a perfectly valid comment: we really don't understand biological interactions at nanostructured interfaces all that well. See eg. all these hand-waving explanations for the supposed toxicity of carbon nanotubes http://www.nature.com/news/2008/080520/full/news.2008.845.ht...
(btw, CRT screens emit beta radiation, so if you'd sit close enough...)
Wifi is known to be safe; we understand what makes UV and higher frequency light dangerous, and know that radio frequencies are fine (ionizing vs non-ionizing). CRT screens I believe use leaded glass to block the xrays they'd otherwise bombard you with.
I'd guess GMO foods are about as safe as anything else intentionally made poisonous to insects and other field pests.
I assume this was a tongue in cheek remark. The problem is that we contain these things whilst the article is anticipating covering virtually all contact surfaces with this spray. Which will probably be fine for 20 years or so and then we'll run out of serviceable lungs.
http://www.bonkersinstitute.org/medshow/bayerheroin1901.html
I could see some public outcry when people hear that their hamburger and catheter has a "thin glass coating".
Perhaps it will have a brand name later ...
Isn't glass a thermal insulator? I guess a thin layer wouldn't create too great a temperature gradient. Sounds a nice idea. Of course you could do this now with a non-ionic liquid (oil?) but I don't fancy your jellyfishes chances.
They use non-conductive oil instead of glass ;-)
Likely why the revolution has not arrived.
How can you use water to clean it if it repels water?
"To create transparent aluminium, more power than is used by an entire city had to be focused into a dot with a diameter of less than one-twentieth the thickness of a human hair, and then could only maintain the transparent state for 40 femtoseconds."
And its only transparent to the X-rays that are needed to knock out the electron in the L-shell.
I dont get it, I ahve a glass sink and counter in my bathroom at home. I still have to clean them.
Every mirror I have ever had has been glass - I still windex them.
All my drinks at home are served to me in nothing but the finest crystal - I still have my help clean them.
etc....
2) There's a higher potential harm from new processes and materials that are used everywhere by consumers, versus being used by specialists in exposure-controlled environments.
Because of (1) and (2), if there's anything wrong with this material, the harm will be multiplied.
For example a possibly toxic material used in low-rate specialty manufacturing by protected workers is different from a possibly toxic material that's distributed in fun inhalers inside of cereal boxes.
These concerns are not at all irrational, and are in fact more empirical than reflexive anti-questioning snarkery.