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.

rshow55 - 04:44pm May 20, 2003 EST (# 11837 of 11848)
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.

11834 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.IhSTaZozb6v.875222@.f28e622/13447

Whoever they are working for, or whatever their motivations are - to know who they were would be interesting.

If I'm right about who I was meeting with (and people in the government and at the NYT know whether I am or not) 11738 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.IhSTaZozb6v.875222@.f28e622/13348 and that fact were conveyed to senior people at Deutsche Bank Securities - I probably could get some funding - and be permitted to work.

A lot hinges on a relatively few facts. That's often the case. And it is usually the case that to get those facts established takes some trouble, some money, and (often) some power.

http://www.mrshowalter.net/etterToDeutscheBankSecuritiesXd.html

A while ago, someone purporting to be from the CIA called me, my wife, and someone else and said, verbally - that "CIA has no interest in any of Robert Showalter's work." If I had that in writing - or in any bureacratically usable form - that would count for a lot, too.

rshow55 - 05:04pm May 20, 2003 EST (# 11838 of 11848)
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.

rshow55 - 09:51am May 20, 2003 EST (# 11816 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.IhSTaZozb6v.875222@.f28e622/13429

"On the "big basics" ( energy - food - water - clothing - shelter ) Lchic 11763 there is no substitute - or no reasonable, workable substitute - for some large scale approaches that inherently involve planning, and the interaction of business and national and international government.

" And - here is a center of some of my work - sometimes the right solutions are unique - and that is clear once the jobs are clearly defined."

- - -

Within the last few years, the government of Australia has build a transcontinental railroad. Some of the most basic engineering is identical to that on railroads 150 years ago. Because the basic technology of the railroad is a unique solution to a major technical problem - for very important and stable physical and economic conditions.

There are others.

I was asked to look for some others - and clarify conditions where unique optimality of a technical solution could be shown. I did an internship in DC in 1967, where that was what I worked on.

Abraham Lincoln would have understood the reason why some technical solutions are unique very well. He was a very successful politician and railroad lawyer. Pretty honest, usually, too.

The idea that there are unique solutions to technical problems - especially important ones - is "politically incorrect" these days. But to avoid some dangers and horrors - it is a point that needs to be faced.

We need to solve the world's energy problems - the global warming problem - nutrition problems - and some other large scale problems in ways that make technical sense - and fit our social arrangements to the technical imperitives.

Usually, a free unplanned market is the way to do things. But not always by any means. Unfettered capitalism is, from many perspectives

"a helluva way to run a railroad."

A lot of people ought to be clear about that. Abraham Lincoln was.

(10 following messages)

New York Times on the Web Forums Science Missile Defense