3 ms·

I feel the term "nanotech" is meaningless. Everyone piled into the term and it has became too broad an umbrella and includes what one would usually describe as

I feel the term "nanotech" is meaningless. Everyone piled into the term and it has became too broad an umbrella and includes what one would usually describe as "materials science", "biochemistry" and "molecular biology" among others. "Data science" feels like another similar, ultimately meaningless umbrella term.

baldfat 11y ago
I would totally disagree with the term "Data Science." It maybe used loosely but it certainly is more than statistics and more akin to science. Any inter discipline study has these issues. It is science since you are taking data to answer a question. If your not answering a question or using a scientific method it falls short. Good example is all the medical data science that has been happening in the past decade or so. http://www.oreilly.com/data/free/how-data-science-is-transforming-health-care.csp http://www.oreilly.com/data/free/how-data-science-is-transfo...
- fluidcruft 11y ago
  I think the danger with opaque terms like "nanotech" and "data science" is they are so ill-defined that they become Rorschach tests. This is very good at attracting buy in--people see what they want to see and the get cover by joining a larger movement and get to ride the trend's growth. But then eventually everyone's doing "nanotech" or "data science" and people need to use other terms to clarify. Data science is already much more than statistics. That's why the term was invented in the first place. Additionally, your definition of science seems pretty lacking. Merely using data to answer questions isn't what defines science. Some questions are scientific and some are not.
- arcanus 11y ago
  I dislike prepending data as a title, because it was already implicit to any scientific discipline.
VLM 11y ago
The way electronic Turing-complete machines resulted in a new industry segment with market leaders dedicated to vertical integrated products in the field is very unusual. Usually it happens a lot more like LASERs. There is no giant LASER segment of the economy. There are just lasers in barcode readers, medical gear, machine tools, lasers in robots, lasers in survey gear, lasers in hand held power tools, lasers in pointers, all manner of things not sold by LASER Inc a giant conglomerated manufacturer or even made by a LASER economic segment of dedicated LASER companies. My gut level guess is Data Science will be more like LASERs and less like computers, as will nanotech. Everyone will be doing nanotech, they'll just call it plain old ore refining, or plain old medical care, or plain old IC manufacturing, and they'll be no Nanotech Inc company or even market sector.
- graphene 11y ago
  The counterargument is that as more and more industries start to do their engineering at the nanoscale (whether coming from above, as in materials and electronics, or from below as in biochemistry and pharmaceuticals), the physics of their systems will become more similar. This will cause their design rules to also become more and more similar, so it's plausible that you could end up with a small number of players possessing engineering expertise that can be applied to a very wide variety of sectors.
  - TeMPOraL 11y ago
    I don't think it's a counterargument, it's more a prediction for the late-game of manufacturing technology. For the mid-game, I suspect it will be like it's with chemistry, agriculture, pharmaceuticals and biotechnology nowadays - there is no unified sector encompassing all the areas above, but there are big companies, like Monsanto, 3M or DuPoint, doing all four at once, exploiting the relative similarities of the fields.

baldfat 11y ago

I would totally disagree with the term "Data Science." It maybe used loosely but it certainly is more than statistics and more akin to science. Any inter discipline study has these issues. It is science since you are taking data to answer a question. If your not answering a question or using a scientific method it falls short. Good example is all the medical data science that has been happening in the past decade or so. http://www.oreilly.com/data/free/how-data-science-is-transforming-health-care.csp http://www.oreilly.com/data/free/how-data-science-is-transfo...

fluidcruft 11y ago
I think the danger with opaque terms like "nanotech" and "data science" is they are so ill-defined that they become Rorschach tests. This is very good at attracting buy in--people see what they want to see and the get cover by joining a larger movement and get to ride the trend's growth. But then eventually everyone's doing "nanotech" or "data science" and people need to use other terms to clarify. Data science is already much more than statistics. That's why the term was invented in the first place. Additionally, your definition of science seems pretty lacking. Merely using data to answer questions isn't what defines science. Some questions are scientific and some are not.
arcanus 11y ago
I dislike prepending data as a title, because it was already implicit to any scientific discipline.

VLM 11y ago

The way electronic Turing-complete machines resulted in a new industry segment with market leaders dedicated to vertical integrated products in the field is very unusual. Usually it happens a lot more like LASERs. There is no giant LASER segment of the economy. There are just lasers in barcode readers, medical gear, machine tools, lasers in robots, lasers in survey gear, lasers in hand held power tools, lasers in pointers, all manner of things not sold by LASER Inc a giant conglomerated manufacturer or even made by a LASER economic segment of dedicated LASER companies. My gut level guess is Data Science will be more like LASERs and less like computers, as will nanotech. Everyone will be doing nanotech, they'll just call it plain old ore refining, or plain old medical care, or plain old IC manufacturing, and they'll be no Nanotech Inc company or even market sector.

graphene 11y ago
The counterargument is that as more and more industries start to do their engineering at the nanoscale (whether coming from above, as in materials and electronics, or from below as in biochemistry and pharmaceuticals), the physics of their systems will become more similar. This will cause their design rules to also become more and more similar, so it's plausible that you could end up with a small number of players possessing engineering expertise that can be applied to a very wide variety of sectors.
- TeMPOraL 11y ago
  I don't think it's a counterargument, it's more a prediction for the late-game of manufacturing technology. For the mid-game, I suspect it will be like it's with chemistry, agriculture, pharmaceuticals and biotechnology nowadays - there is no unified sector encompassing all the areas above, but there are big companies, like Monsanto, 3M or DuPoint, doing all four at once, exploiting the relative similarities of the fields.