New York Times on the Web Forums Science

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?

Read Debates, a new Web-only feature culled from Readers' Opinions, published every Thursday.

gisterme - 01:34am Apr 10, 2003 EST (# 11230 of 11235)

fredmoore - 05:17pm Apr 9, 2003 EST (# 11221 of ...) http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@28.fWgXaBTW6TG.1464061@3d7aa9@.f28e622/12780

Interesting proposal, Fred. I agree with you that after air, water and food, energy is probably the most important single factor in technological societies. So I'm not trying to discorage you or belittle your fine suggestion by asking these quesitons:

"...A. Converting major power stations to dry rock geothermal..."

http://www.ees4.lanl.gov/hdr/

Looks like a promising technology; but is that suitable for large-scale electrical production? "Converting" major power stations would mean moving them to locations suitable for dry rock geothermal mining?

What would be the long term effect of removing heat from the body of the earth and releasing it in the atmosphere? It would certainly seem less threatening than the release of equivalent heat along with the products of combustion that result from use of fossil fuels.

"...B. Developing and implementing Thermoelectric fabrics (eg polythiophene) for urban and agricultural power generation...."

Sounds good but you'd need much more local storage to be able to make use of such fabrics, at least with any thermoelectric fabrics I've heard of. Don't you need a temperatrue differential to get any current out of those things? Just mass producing existing photo-electric technology wouldn't seem much more expensive. Why wouldn't that be an equally good option?

"...C. Developing space based solar collectors and microwave transmission of power from space..."

Sounds possible but not like it would provide much "bang for the buck". Still, the technological development that would have to take place for that to become a practical option would undoubtedly yield long-term payoffs in other areas.

"...D. Terminating every stormwater and major farm runoff in an engineered wetland..."

That's something that needs to be addressed with great care. Some recently developed and highly touted "engineered wetlands" have become stinking messes. I have no problem with the idea of "engineered wetlands" but I don't think we quite know as much as we may think about how wetlands work in the natural ecology. What do the engineered wetlands have to do with energy production, Fred?

I agree that an energy conservation and emmissions redution accord would be a good idea if for no other purpose than to establish a permanent standards benchmark. Like you, I think it needs to be fair to all parties but require all parties to meet the same standards...at their own cost.

Otherwise negotiation of any such accord becomes a political football game with all sorts of unseemly posturing for economic/political advantage...just like the current Kyoto accord. That's why I'm glad the US isn't tangled up in that.

gisterme - 01:48am Apr 10, 2003 EST (# 11231 of 11235)

"...Be positive. NOW the UN has teeth. That is a POSITIVE..."

That has always been positive hasn't it fred? It's just that there's been no ability to focus up enough will to use those teeth what with all the back-stabbing and behind-the-scenses intrigue that goes on when everybody is trying to get their own pound of flesh before the UN uses it's teeth. Those who fear their cash cow might be gored by UN action do everything possible in the UN to prevent action. Recent events are stark testimony to that.

"...I don't believe UN delegates will dwell on past failures when future success beckons..."

I sincerely hope you're right about that, Fred. However I have to admit that I'm skeptical that the UN will want to anything but continue with "business as usual". I do hope you're right.

gisterme - 02:04am Apr 10, 2003 EST (# 11232 of 11235)

almarst2003 - 09:57pm Apr 9, 2003 EST (# 11227 of ...) http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@28.fWgXaBTW6TG.1464061@.f28e622/12786

"...What is clear is the fact of thousends of death and wounded..."

Mostly Iraqi combatants with most of the wounded on the road back to health.

"...The billions of destroyed infrustructure..."

That remains to be seen. The coalition attack has not been against infrastructre.

"...And the hatered fueled by humiliating defeat and impotence of Arab and Muslim World..."

I think you're overreacting, almarst. If they should feel humiliated or impotent it's because they couldn't (or wouldn't) do anything about Saddam themselves. I don't think Saddam is an icon that represents the feelings of the "Arab world". I'm sure that the "Arab world" of 20+ million within Iraq would agree with that statement.

The only people in the "Arab world" who want tyrants like Saddam to be icons are those who want to find some cause to inflame the "Arab world" aginst the US and the west. Those mostly fall into the general category of terrorists.

I for one haven't been too concerned by Al Jezerra's apparantly biased new coverage of the Iraq war...because the "Arabized" stuff they were putting out was mostly untruthful. Sooner or later the truth will be known, as it is now becoming known. All those folks who watched that Al Jezerra coverage are going to be asking themselves how there can be two truths. It won't be long before they realize that there can't be. They're not stupid either and will soon learn to consider their sources.

(3 following messages)

New York Times on the Web Forums Science Missile Defense