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Missile Defense

Russian military leaders have expressed concern about US plans for a national missile defense system. Will defense technology be limited by possibilities for a strategic imbalance? Is this just SDI all over again?

rshowalter - 06:04pm May 11, 2001 EST (#3704 of 3705)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

The role of the internet in communication and academic discourse is just evolving -- Dawn Riley and I have worked hard to advance the state of the art -- and I believe we have accomplished something.

Here is an excerpt of a piece I wrote about a Mysteries of the Universe forum, Reality Bytes - that I wish could be archived.

http://www.wisc.edu/rshowalt/rbcrit/

. I believe that REALITY BYTES has looked at map-territory interfaces more effectively than any erudite, stark journal article (or journal series) could have done. REALITY BYTES is the most useful, distinguished discussion of map-territory issues I know of in the English language. My own thoughts and feelings about simulation are clearer, more informed, and more developed because of REALITY BYTES. A forum like REALITY BYTES which is informal, multidisciplinary, and well umpired, can be a great place for challenging material, a great place for focusing and definition, and great place for intellectual discourse in the highest liberal and cultural traditions. On issues that are strongly multidisciplinary, involving high stakes, it may be one of the only places our culture has to offer. I think The New York Times forums are important assets to our culture. I'm glad to be able to read them. I'm grateful for the chance to participate in this one.

REALITY BYTES shows me, with more force than any textbook or journal article could, that there ARE serious muddles at the interface between scientific modeling ideas, and scientific notions of what reality is. Scientists ARE concerned about them, and DO NOT have good answers for them. It will take work to get better answers than the scientific culture now has.

rshowalter - 06:04pm May 11, 2001 EST (#3705 of 3705)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

Here is an excerpt from http://www.wisc.edu/rshowalt/whytimes2/

If one is to have hope of working out a problem, one must first sharply, carefully describe it.

Prior to sharp description, one may face a mystery, an unspeakable mystical strangeness in some body of relations.

Sometimes, after the work of sharp, careful, well checked description, a mystery may be transmuted into something much different and far more precious. The hard thought and description may have generated a sharp, defined contradiction.

Such a clearly defined contradiction is a target identified, a place to reassess and rebuild, a source of hope. A mystery is a call to awe and stasis. A contradiction is a call to thought and action.

The forums can facilitate this descriptive sharpening.