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Missile Defense

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?

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rshow55 - 07:35pm Mar 28, 2003 EST (# 10676 of 10677)
Can we do a better job of finding truth? YES. Click "rshow55" for some things Lchic and I have done and worked for on this thread.

Islamic cultures have messes, inconsistencies, sureties that must be wrong - and that degrade those who believe them. We do, too.

2860 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@28.TiAvaHrS6qc.2101267@.f28e622/3566

The things Eisenhower warned of in his FAREWELL ADDRESS of January 17, 1961 http://www.geocities.com/~newgeneration/ikefw.htm have happened. The subversive, cancerous patterns developed, after much borrowing from Germany, to fight the Cold War have evolved, and now diffused all through government, politics, and business. At the same time, our nuclear controls have been left, almost untouched in decisive ways, for thirty years, and we are in a new world. There are things that need to be checked about those controls, lest the world perish. And all over our society, there are problems that American need to understand, and fix, with the world watching, and checking. When we do, we'll be much better off, the world will be a more beautiful place, and we'll almost all of us feel better about ourselves, our country, and the world.

You can "call me Ishmael" or not, as you choose. If I'm Ishmael, I've been at it, consistently, for a long time. Within my limitations, I'm doing the best I can, and I'm trying to be a patriot, too.

http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@28.TiAvaHrS6qc.2101267@.f28e622/216 from March 3, 2002 included two long sentences that still seem right now.:

. If the United States could, and would, explain its national interest -- distinct from the interests of its military-industrial complex, and explain how its interests fit in the interconnected world we live in -- and do it honestly, and in ways that other nations could check, it could satisfy every reasonable security need it has, without unreasonable or unacceptably unpopular uses of force.

. The rest of the world, collectively, and in detail, would try hard to accomodate US needs, if it understood them, and could reasonably believe and respect them.

Thereafter, I collected some very important, perceptive questions raised by almarst , just in the few weeks before that time. There have been many perceptive postings - as well as excellent links since then.

183 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@28.TiAvaHrS6qc.2101267@.f28e622/217

184 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@28.TiAvaHrS6qc.2101267@.f28e622/218

185 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@28.TiAvaHrS6qc.2101267@.f28e622/219

186 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@28.TiAvaHrS6qc.2101267@.f28e622/220

As for the idea that lunarchick doesn't post perceptively (and even perceptively about primates ) -- here are links from a July 4th of 2001 discussion about Koko - the linguistically gifted gorilla, and things that even a monkey should be able to see. (It starts with references from the same http://www.winternet.com/~mikelr/ that bbuck links).

http://www.mrshowalter.net/a_md6000s/md6557.htm

http://www.mrshowalter.net/a_md6000s/md6567.htm

http://www.mrshowalter.net/a_md6000s/md6577.htm

http://www.mrshowalter.net/a_md6000s/md6586.htm

http://www.mrshowalter.net/a_md6000s/md6596.htm

http://www.mrshowalter.net/a_md6000s/md6606.htm

I've often thought that almost anybody careful could see the arguments on missile defense referenced to 84 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@28.TiAvaHrS6qc.2101267@.f28e622/99 - - but perhaps these arguments are hard, in the face of what Rev. Forbes refers to as "deeper motivations" http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/09/weekinreview/09GOOD.html

So God's Really in the Details? by Emily Eakin http://www.nytimes.com/2002/05/11/arts/11GOD.html ... explained probability judgements well - and the fact that ideas can be "reasonable" - and convincing -- and yet not necessarily be right based on the arg

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