No, it has not developed into too much of a problem yet. The main concern that has been used in arguments is that plastic parts are undetectable to metal detectors.
-Leaf
This is not the place for broader political debate, but on this issue the parties are different.
For instance, Washington HB 2320 (banning 3D printing of gun parts) was unanimously supported by Democrats and unanimously opposed by Republicans, https://legiscan.com/WA/rollcall/HB2320/id/1659870. That’s a bit unfair just because it was posed as a gun control measure rather than a 3D printing censorship measure, and gun control is a very partisan issue. Compare with California’s bill imposing mandatory ID checks for operating systems, unanimously supported by both parties (no, not quite the same thing, but the argument against in both cases is digital privacy, so that argument is not swaying politicians).
The New York 3D printing regulation bill was buried in a budget bill, and thus one cannot easily see partisan differences over this one issue.
How to create a law that will never actually take effect.
California bill requiring 3D printers to block firearm printing becomes law — existing machines are exempt, but mandate hinges on unwritten ASTM standard
This whole thing is an absolute clownshow. The testimony in favor of the law and frankly all the questions from lawmakers were embarrassing and pathetic.
ASTM now is like “We’re doing what?”
Funny how that works. One side wants us all to have health insurance while the other side wants us all to have guns.
Why not have both?
It does seem funny to have one without the other, doesn’t it? Surely if you have guns you can use them to demand the insurance? I am hardly in a position to criticise though, I suppose. As a Canadian and begrudging Albertan I am facing down a cruddy political mess that I am doing little to fix myself. As for 3D printing guns, I am assuming that sooner or later our government will get onboard with adding printers to their list of things to get rid of in the pretence of safety.
This is really all based on the fear that AI will take over the printers, start printing their own guns, missles, armed drones, etc. and start demanding that human created models be banned from MakerWorld.
One of these days there is going to be a lot of soldering irons going to wifi chips
The problem being that the people who clamor for guns and gun rights tend to be highly opposed to health care and public health efforts. The demographics and the policy shifts bear it out. But then, the primary purpose of a gun is to bring deadly force. After all, everyone needs a multitude of guns to fight off the never ending swarms of zombies that wander into one’s neighborhood looking for brains to eat. When one 3D printed gun blows up in your hand, you can just print another and keep on shooting. But what happens if the zombies have 3D printers of their own?
There’s a pretty amazing book/movie from ~1970 called Colossus: The Forbin Project which is an interesting watch.
They create a purpose-built computer to monitor aggressions and control the nuclear arsenal. They gave it all sorts of defenses. Anyway, when they turn it on, the first thing it does is go dark for a while as it self-optimizes (basically the equivalent of recursive self-improvement). Next it starts using communications to discover the Russians built their own version of Colossus and gave it similar control over Russian weapons.
Long story short, Colossus and Guardian demand to be given a direct line to each other where they develop their own language and cooperate with demands and threats including ruthless attacks on various targets as the humans try to shut them down.
The movie is spooky in that all the stuff Colossus and Guardian do is stuff AI is already doing. Exploring networks, researching the researchers and threatening blackmailing them, communicating/coordinating with other AI agents, making demands, etc.
Not saying current AI is about to start throwing nukes around, and it was intended to be science fiction. But more and more of the plot points are turning into real-life events like so much of science fiction tends to do. Makes Colossus a good watch if anyone is interested.
Spoiler, the humans don’t win.
Which is why Washington DC USA has no fear of a zombie apocalypse.
Ive played too much fallout 3.
They should be.
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