The discussion of the environmental impacts of GNR (genetic, nano, and robotics) technologies, at least in the United States, has been relegated to the margins. Voices of concern and opposition have like–wise been missing in discussions of the technological singularity. The true cost of this technological progress and any coming singularity will mean the unprecedented decline of the planet's inhabitants at an ever–increasing rate of global extinction. The World Conservation Union, the International Botanical Congress, and a majority of the world's biologists believe that a global mass extinction already is under way. As a direct result of human activity (resource extraction, industrial agriculture, the introduction of non-native animals, and population growth), up to one-fifth of all living species are expected to disappear within 30 years. A 1998 Harris Poll of the 5,000 members of the American Institute of Biological Sciences found that 70% believed that what has been termed "The Sixth Extinction" is now under way. A simultaneous Harris Poll found that 60% of the public were totally unaware of the impending biological collapse.

At the same time that nature's ancient biological creation is on the decline, laboratory–created biotech life–forms — genetically modified soybeans, genetically engineered salmon, cloned sheep, drug–crops, biorobots — are on the rise.

Nature and technology are not just evolving; they are competing and combining with one another. Ultimately they will become one. We hear reports daily about these new technologies and new creations, while shreds of the ongoing biological collapse surface here and there. Past the edges of change, beyond the wall across the future, anything becomes possible. Beware the dragons.