Idle Chit-Chat: So if you built a replicator......

Discussion in 'Free Thoughts' started by scooter835, Feb 1, 2006.

  1. scooter835 Registered Member

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    12
    ,,,,like the things on Star trek: Next Generation.
    -------
    Let's suppose today that you managed to build a machine that could make copies of three-dimensional objects, when supplied with an original object and donor material.
    .....
    And let's assume that this machine can re-arrange molecules and atoms, but nothing smaller than individual atoms (no lead into gold for example, because that would make the whole proposition just silly). And no living things either--if you try to copy animals or plants, for some reason they always quickly die.
    .....
    And let's also assume that you are paranoid and you suspect that if anyone found out about it, you won't be allowed to keep it, and you might not survive yourself. So whatever you produce with it, you want to be able to keep the source a secret.
    .....
    But at the same time you spent years and went broke building it--so you want to draw some kind of living off of it. What do you make with it?
    ~
     
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  3. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

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    You could make new replicators, enough to give them all away for free.
     
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  5. allisone417 i'll be in my room Registered Senior Member

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    objects? anything of value, and sell sell sell until the object isnt worth anything. Then move on to useful objects...cars, toasters, etc, until everyone has them. Move on to art, put a da vinci and rouseau and van gogh in every home, whether they like them or not. Kill the animals, and repliply giant slabs of their meat. Again, sell sell sell before anyone has mutated children or cancer and links it. Then, make yourself worthy of history by replicating yourself. Or, you can just have sex with a woman, and replicate that way. probably more enjoyable, but hey, dont let me run your life.
     
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  7. Thor "Pfft, Rebel scum!" Valued Senior Member

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    What about internal organs? They're not living exactly. Or does anything organic just "die"?
     
  8. allisone417 i'll be in my room Registered Senior Member

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    living things are constantly changing themselves, replacing cell by cell with nutrients brought in...but in a very structured way. A huge, spontaneous restructuring would obviously wreak havoc and probably destroy the whole system.

    Internal organs, if you plan to use them, have to be "living"...not like a human, but most of the cells and tissues can't be dead if it's going to go on doing its job inside another human.
     
  9. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

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    You could use a pile of coal, and make the world's biggest diamond. You could use the same carbon to make long threads of carbon nanotube and construct a space elevator.
     
  10. Mmmmm, well. Now, let me see. Quite a pickle there. Off hand I suppose I'd have to venture, possibly..... money, perhaps, d'you think? Or possibly even better, gold.
     
  11. vslayer Registered Senior Member

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    4,969
    if you create enough of anything its value drops. so replicating 'precious' metals would b pointless. id replicate tons and tons of food for shipment to africa
     
  12. Thor "Pfft, Rebel scum!" Valued Senior Member

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    What about oil? You know...that stuff? The black gold
     
  13. Fafnir665 You just got served. Registered Senior Member

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    ATF Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms.

    Maybe start with a few more replicators, than mass produce in safehouses all over....
     
  14. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

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    Some killer bud, dude.
     
  15. allisone417 i'll be in my room Registered Senior Member

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    Don't replicate money. It will just go down in value.
    Instead, have people bring the things they need to you to replicate for them. Scientists who need more supplies to find cures for horrible diseases, food and vaccines to send to africa, one nice fur can become thousands of animals spared. Art supplies for school children, books and manufactured homes for the homeless...for doog.
     
  16. allisone417 i'll be in my room Registered Senior Member

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    271
    crap, im dyslexic. i meant good.
     
  17. upthorn Registered Senior Member

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    What need have I for money when I can replicate whatever I want if I can just get a friend to loan it to me?

    Indeed, what need has anyone for money?

    So, the answer is this: If I had built such a machine, I would revolutionize the world economy, and economic science in general. And soon enough everyone in the world could have whatever they desired.
     
  18. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

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    Maui, maybe Kauai. Hell, how about your own Earth?
     
  19. Fraggle Rocker Staff Member

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    A fallacy but one that is widely believed.

    Africans aren't starving because there isn't enough food on the planet. They're not even starving because people are too callous to bother shipping it to them.

    Africans are starving because their social organization has broken down. Their societies are dysfunctional. In most of the abjectly poor countries the people who have achieved the leadership positions are not just incompetent but downright evil. When free food arrives they just sell it when the donors stop looking and keep the money to build bigger palaces or equip bigger armies or buy more toys or add more women to their harems. (Yes folks they're all male like me, what a surprise. Even the most outrageously despicable women on earth rarely kill the people under their care by starving them to death. *)

    The causes of this are complex and need their own discussion. Ditto for possible solutions. But the effects are obvious. Africans are starving because their nations don't work.

    * o.k. Everybody's going to say "Marie Antoinette." That's one.
     
  20. Roman Banned Banned

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    11,560
    What do you mean by 'donor material'?

    What would the donor material for gold be? For oil? For food?

    I'd replicate gold, if at all possible. Or super precious gemstones of a very high carot and exquisitely cut.
     

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