WRT the "Eric Drexler's pixie dust" remark, what I meant was _not_ that molecular nanotechnology won't work and totally revolutionize materials science, structu

WRT the "Eric Drexler's pixie dust" remark, what I meant was _not_ that molecular nanotechnology won't work and totally revolutionize materials science, structural engineering, and a bunch of other disciplines ... but in the context of the conversation we were having at the time, nanobots with quasi-magical powers have become the lazy SF writer's magic wand _du_ _jour_, sketched into fictional life with remarkable information processing and medicinal powers that go way beyond anything we're likely to see in the short term. Sort of like "electricity" or "vital force" in the fiction of the early 19th century.