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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?

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

lchic - 03:09pm Aug 10, 2002 EST (#3613 of 3637)

Oppenheimer - Quotes - (Powers/Tremain p27-8)

"Everybody was moaning and wringing their hands"

Lis Alvarez, a physicist at Los Alamos during the war, describing the dramatic change in atmosphere after his return from Hiroshima. Elation at the achievement had completely disappeared.

"Oppie says tht the atomic bomb is so terrible a weapon that war is now impossible,"

Popular report at Los Alamos after Hiroshima.

"If you ask,
'Can we make them more terrible?' the answer is yes.
If you ask:
'Can we make a lot of them?' the answer is yes."

Oppenheimer to Time magazine, October 29, 1945.

"Mr. President, I have blood on my hands."

Oppenheimer to Truman in 1946.

"Don't you bring that fellow around again. After all, all he did was make the bomb. I'm the guy who fired it off."

Truman to Dean Acheson after his meeting with Oppenheimer.

"Some people profess guilt to claim credit for the sin"

The mathematician John von Neumann, following Oppen heimer's well-publicized hand-wringing over his role in developing atomic weapons.

On returing from Bikini [where atomic weapons were tested in July 1946] one is amazed to find the profound change in the public attitude toward the problem of the atomic bomb.
Before Bikini the world stood in aw of this new cosmic weapon ... Since Bikini this feeling of awe has largely evapourated.

William L. Laurence, a reporter for The New York Times August 1946

In conjunction with other mass destruction weapons it is possible to depopulate vast areas of the earth's surface, leaving only vestige remnants of man's material works.

General Curtis LeMay in 1947, reporting on the atomic bomb tests on Bikini the year before.

lchic - 04:10pm Aug 10, 2002 EST (#3614 of 3637)

Economy UK|USA

http://www.guardian.co.uk/recession/story/0,7369,772294,00.html

concludes | As well as downbeat productivity figures for the second quarter, the US released revisions for last year which showed productivity fell for both the first and second quarters as the US plunged into recession - not just the first quarter, as previously thought.

lchic - 05:37pm Aug 10, 2002 EST (#3615 of 3637)

If thinking on MD were cp to sources -
( http://library.uncwil.edu/is/infocycle.htm )
then first thoughts would be primary, second thoughts secondary (that could be a <contradiction) and last thoughts tertiary (an overall reflection - looking back ... were back the past - yet it could still be the future!)

rshow55 - 06:40pm Aug 10, 2002 EST (#3616 of 3637)

I believe that this thread, if properly attended to, might save many millions or billions of lives, many trillions of dollars, and make a permanent contribution to human culture.

I believe that this thread, properly attended to, ought to make The New York Times proud - and make the organization money, as well.

Maybe that's a crazy view. But since lchic is involved, it doesn't seem overstated to me. We're dealing with key issues of human function. Not esoteric out-of-the-way things. Matters of life and death. Logical issues at the most basic, most important, most frequently used level -- the level of cliche - and (sometimes) monotonous error. I believe some monotonous errors can be fixed. And, for safety and decency, have to be. Some headway's being made.

rshow55 - 06:43pm Aug 10, 2002 EST (#3617 of 3637)

Mazza has about 700 postings since his first posting on June 20, 2001 - - - and the great majority of them seem to me to be pernicious, dishonest, evasive nonsense. The more you believe what he says about himself as a person (and I talked to him for 3 hours - mostly listening) and the more you sympathize with him as a human being - something I find it fairly easy to do, in some ways -- the more blameworthy, dangerous, and discredible the consequences of his basic logical position becomes.

The basic position of Mazza, and it is a very common stance - is the stance of the public relations professional.

Lies, evasions, and especially evasions of closure are acceptable -- there is no truth - but only interest -- and neither people, nor moral standards can force checking.

Unless that changes, there is no real hope on some of the most fundamental, wrenching problems people face.

I think this thread, cumbersome as it is (in a format without effective umpiring) has taken some real steps forward.

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New York Times on the Web Forums Science Missile Defense