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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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cantabb - 10:24am Oct 29, 2003 EST (# 15882 of 15888)

I won't make too much of the lull. lchic has dragged in her usual quota of irrelevancies here. And his barnyard follower has already been here.

cantabb - 10:38am Oct 29, 2003 EST (# 15883 of 15888)

In "Psychwar...", rshowalter - 04:38pm Oct 22, 2003 BST (#458 of 458)

"This NYT thread output is as it is, for instance - and it seems to have met high enough standards to elicit the fine work of fredmoore."

[Wow !!! Mutual admiration ?]

And the obligatory:

"I am deeply grateful for this thread, and indebted to the Guardian-Observer for letting me post here."

Didn't see the statements about me thee, however. May be elsewhere.

bluestar23 - 10:53am Oct 29, 2003 EST (# 15884 of 15888)

Perhaps he is really at work on one of his many threads....we really have no idea how many it is......I still have not gotten to the bottom of his Guardian threads, some of which are quite hard to find...

lchic - 12:23pm Oct 29, 2003 EST (# 15885 of 15888)
ultimately TRUTH outs : TRUTH has to be morally forcing : build on TRUTH it's a strong foundation

Bluey's 'a 180 degree turn' - switich - in the logic :

'' bluestar23 - 10:12am Oct 29, 2003 EST (# 15881 of 15884)

Showalter's not posting so much, so things are looking up around here, more like normal... ''

rshow55 - 12:33pm Oct 29, 2003 EST (# 15886 of 15888)
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.

Want a list? Call me. Actually, I was cleaning up loose ends - looking at a movie - My Fair Lady and some things by and about George Bernard Shaw - and catching up. My wife lets me keep NYT papers until I've had a chance to look at them, and clip a few things from them. Sometimes it gets to be a pile - and then there really isn't much good alternative to going back, making some decisions or a "resorting" nature - and throwing out some old papers.

Also relaxing. There's a question - when you read Shakespeare, or Shaw -and the question is

Is there anything new under the sun - when it comes to understanding plots, negotiations, cruelties, nice interchanges, and negotiations between people? Are there really any new plots? Is there anything new or useful or beautiful to be learned? Or are we just recycling the same old stuff?

The answer to all these questions has parts that are "yes" and other parts that are "no." There's no contradiction about that. The most basic plots have been repeated and set out many times - and some of the best stories told and retold many times.

But there are new things - that don't devalue any of the old - but that are useful.

Patterns like those in

How a Story is Shaped. http://www.fortunecity.com/lavendar/ducksoup/555/storyshape.html

A Communication Model http://www.worldtrans.org/TP/TP1/TP1-17.HTML

Yesterday, Jorain asked me if I had any hope of anything that would improve things - and wanted specifics. Been thinking about that. Using some internet tools available here - and some skills - and some insights like those linked just above - we might sort a lot out so that people can avoid problems that stump them now.

A foundation should support work like that - linked to this thread - and could under easily imaginable circumstances. With easily surmounted, but basic, administrative barriers standing in the way of that.

We could take worthwhile steps toward unifying "the two cultures" that CP Snow talked about - in workable ways.

We could do it by fighting in interesting ways. Or not fighting in interesting ways.

But this is out of sequence - I haven't read the thread since my last post.

rshow55 - 12:36pm Oct 29, 2003 EST (# 15887 of 15888)
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.

If you have a mismatch between two or more code systems - say a differential equation model description - a statistical model description - and a description in language and pictures - that comfortably fits for people - you don't necessarily have any contradictions.

But you have some technical problems of translation. Sometimes some perspective and emotional problems, too.

Translation problems often can get solved.

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New York Times on the Web Forums Science Missile Defense