![[F]](../_images/site.gif) New York Times on the Web Forums  Science
Technology has always found its greatest consumer in a nation's
war and defense efforts. Since the last attempts at a "Star Wars"
defense system, has technology changed considerably enough to make
the latest Missile Defense initiatives more successful? Can such an
application of science be successful? Is a militarized space
inevitable, necessary or impossible?
    (10689 previous messages)
rshowalt
- 10:04pm Jan 7, 2002 EST (#10690
of 10703)
Interesting thing about the B52 is that it was the last bomber
that was designed with enough information to really do the
job.
And it was a superb design job. (Mostly in 1952, based on design
data from 1930--1952, meticulously collected, and well understood.)
Structures that the engineers understood. Transsonic flows, much
tested, with controls well understood.
After that, there were mathematical problems, and a relative
dearth of test data, in a combination of flow regimes (including the
supersonci) that wasn't well modelled. (And in the '60's people KNEW
they were in analytical trouble -- people including Edward Teller,
among many others.) Bomber design hasn't been nearly as satisfactory
since (and the design "progress stall" has been similar in
commercial passanger aircraft, for similar reasons - the SST was a
barely satisfactory "stunt." )
Other design fields have had exactly analogous problems, with the
exception of some very beautiful areas in electrical
engineering.
Since the 1960's, military designers have been muddling along,
"inspired" by commercial artist sketches and their own hype, with
stuff that barely worked, barely understood.
They've abandoned calculus as a serious (or at least central)
design tool, and assumed that they could "model anything on a
computer" even if they didn't understand what they were
modelling.
rshowalt
- 10:06pm Jan 7, 2002 EST (#10691
of 10703)
Computer power FAR larger than people imagined has developed, and
the value of that analytical power has been MUCH less than any
technical person would have predicted 50 years ago. Much less.
Because the modelling being used has been defective (as some
people knew it was in the 1960's).
Somehow, with computers so fancy, and the numbers so many, people
forgot that "garbage in, garbage out."
rshowalt
- 10:10pm Jan 7, 2002 EST (#10692
of 10703)
Enter "Star Wars" - - - a ruse in the 1960's, and ever since.
Stir for 4 decades, with a lot of people paid a lot of money to
pretend they could build things. And pretend that they
understood things.
You get the current missile defense programs -- which are, by
reasonable professional engineering standards applied to commercial
projects, rotten to the core.
There are analytical and computer programming flaws, basic and
all through these programs. And human deceptions built to match.
Muddle and mistakes, at all levels, so dense that it takes some
adjusting, to get used to the density of " ---- in the swamp."
By REASONABLE standards, "STAR WARS", though Edward Teller no
doubt loved it, is rotten right to the core, and will be at least
until people fix some math, and do a lot less lying.
I hope the whole world comes to see this.
We'd all live in a safer world -- and the US would be a more
honorable and prosperous place, if we had sense enough to apply
reasonable tests to these (and other) projects.
Try to check what actually works, after all the money spent, and
all these years. Precious little does.
The Coyle Report was gently written. And what it describes is a
disaster. And the lasar program is even worse.
I'm proud to be an American, everything considered. So much is
wonderful about the USA. But I'd be prouder if we dealt sanely with
this fiasco, which stinks.
lchic
- 10:26pm Jan 7, 2002 EST (#10693
of 10703)
p.s. Do you think the hire cost of the sky crane reasonable?
p.p.s Hire cost set against purchase cost? The purchase cost must
be extremely high!
I can see a 'demand' pattern emerging for skyCrane in the small
scale model market DownUnder.
rshowalt
- 10:37pm Jan 7, 2002 EST (#10694
of 10703)
Problem with such special aircraft is that "when you need them,
you really need them" but not often.
The Russians may be charging an entirely fair price, and overall
may be losing money. Utilization factors on such planes aren't very
high -- so when they are utilized, the owners have to really charge
heavily.
rshowalt
- 10:44pm Jan 7, 2002 EST (#10695
of 10703)
Key question - can lasar MD weapons work at all? The question
here, plus some simple tests, will rule that family of systems out.
rshowalt
1/7/02 7:55pm
A whole body of "Buck Rogers" planning hinges on the idea that
lasar weapons are effective. . See The Next Battlefield May Be in
Outer Space by JACK HITT http://www.nytimes.com/2001/08/05/magazine/05SPACEWARS.html
Some answers ought to be SIMPLE.
gisterme?
out.
lchic
- 10:46pm Jan 7, 2002 EST (#10696
of 10703)
Thinking on it -- IT fell over in 2001 ... no investment funds to
put up new systems. So the Russians may have now think 'don't put
all your eggs in one basket' .. on the EU front the countries who
had 'internal' economies have done rather better than Germany
(export dependant).
lchic
- 10:58pm Jan 7, 2002 EST (#10697
of 10703)
robprod
"The Economy-- A Moderated Forum" 1/7/02 2:58pm Interesting
thoughts here re Citizen inputs into decision making ... should more
policies be put before the people more often -- costed and compared
to alternative expenditure demands that more closely match
individual citizen need.
lchic
- 11:21pm Jan 7, 2002 EST (#10698
of 10703)
quote:
mazza9
- 12:34am Jan 8, 2002 EST (#10699
of 10703)
Louis Mazza
eLchichen:
If Fools Gold was worth anything, you'd be a rich man. Why don't
you mind your own business since this forum is for grownups!
LouMazza
  (4
following messages)
  
New York Times on the Web Forums Science
Missile Defense
| 
