Wednesday, April 24, 2013

Final Post One: 3D Printing


With the tragedy in Boston fresh in everyone’s minds I thought now would be a good time to do a post on the bio-ethical issues in 3D printing. As we have discussed earlier in the semester, 3D printers, which as of now have few laws regulating purchases, can recreate guns.


The above link has some information about a company that is taking responsibility for the negative possibilities of 3D printers. The company MakerBot has announced, “.  .  .that it would no longer host plans for a key assault rifle part.  .  .”
Personally I think that it is great that a company is taking some responsibility for something dangerous instead of focusing only on profits. I read that the people responsible for the bombings in Boston were unconnected and found what they needed online. This being said, future impressionable radicals may have an easier time committing atrocities with technology like 3D printing available. I don’t think that this should prevent progress in 3D printing, however a little regulation is obviously going to be necessary.
For my final posts I am going to separate some issues about 3D printing into more segments and post a larger number of them.  So, I look forward to any ideas people have on the subject and look for some more posts.
Works Cited
"3D Printing Has a Bright Future With Dark Problems." Inc.com. N.p., 21 Dec. 2012. Web. 24
            Apr. 2013. Website

1 comment:

  1. Looking forward to your shedding light on this, Patrick. Last thing we need is to make it even easier to "impressionable" nut-jobs to kill and maim. Guns of all kinds DO kill, as do pressure cookers and mailed poison and inattention...

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