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 - 09:31am Nov 4, 2003 EST (# 16491 of 16497)
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.

There's a great scene in Gaily, Gaily (1969 ) http://www.hollywood.com/movies/detail/movie/163364 . A cub reporter deals with his editor, in a whore-house, the editor partly the worse for drink - but in full possession of key faculties.

Do you KNOW . . . asks the editor in a theater shaking voice . .

What a SEX FIEND does?

. . .

The cub admits he doesn't.

The editor explains, in a thundering voice that must have stressed the theater's audio equipment:

" A sex fiend SELLS NEWSPAPERS ! ! ! ! ! ! "

If this thread isn't to the advantage of The New York Times - it seems to me that it is the paper's own fault. Or shows the limits of its negotiating skills and imagination.

. . . Or a situation where the paper is so bound up with old committments and fossilized rules that it should do some thinking - and so should its readers.

lchic - 09:33am Nov 4, 2003 EST (# 16492 of 16497)
ultimately TRUTH outs : TRUTH has to be morally forcing : build on TRUTH it's a strong foundation

Krugman's been slogging away at the reader-thinking problem for years ....

lchic - 09:38am Nov 4, 2003 EST (# 16493 of 16497)
ultimately TRUTH outs : TRUTH has to be morally forcing : build on TRUTH it's a strong foundation

Is it the hip-pocket nerve and pulling-in the belt, together, that cause a shift in thinking ...

lchic - 09:42am Nov 4, 2003 EST (# 16494 of 16497)
ultimately TRUTH outs : TRUTH has to be morally forcing : build on TRUTH it's a strong foundation

Cantabb throw a time factor into the logic ....

Out!

rshow55 - 09:52am Nov 4, 2003 EST (# 16495 of 16497)
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.

Re hip pocket nerves, and belt tightening.

16040 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.hSncbqJTUs4.0@.f28e622/17755 includes this:

" If anyone at The New York Times Company asked me to do a job - and paid my expenses - I'd feel obligated (and honored) to work for free - for quite a lot of time. I have no whiff of a feeling they'd want anything of the kind. But if they did, I'd owe them that, beyond any question.

" A project I'd love to work on would be figuring out how they could use their power, within American usages, to make more money honorably.

- - -

Maybe I couldn't help at all. It might be more than enough if the NYT people thought about the issues involved themselves. But an outsider can sometimes raise new questions - and provide a different view.

I don't think that the NYT staff understand their own role in the American sociotechnical system - as it applies to economic relationships. That's a loss to the company - and the country as well. I think if they understood, both the company and the country would run better.

The greatest need for that understanding, I think, is right at the top of the company .

Might work well if I could make my points to Howell Raines - who could judge if I had anything to contribute, without bothering people with responsibility now.

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New York Times on the Web Forums Science Missile Defense