...It was all so weird it was hard to know where to begin.
The premise here was obviously that trained men of computer
science will think more logically than most about subjects
outside their narrow fields--or that people would
believe they did. And, it was true, if you didn't pause
to reflect, you found yourself carried out by the sheer
ponderousness of it all. "Gray goo would surely be a depressing
ending to our human adventure on earth," Joy wrote. How
true that is. On the other hand, what end to the human
adventure on earth would not be depressing?

When highly self-conscious, highly intelligent, perfectly
nice men chuck the principles on which they have built
careers and reinvent themselves as qualified enemies of
their own idea of progress, it is as disconcerting in its way as
gray goo on the kitchen floor. You see it and you know
something is up.