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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.

lunarchick - 10:03am Jan 3, 2003 EST (# 7268 of 7287)

^{Of course the above doesn't apply to the guys, inculuding Aussie-David, hauled up in Cuba .... they have no status ... they used to be human beings -- but the USA put paid to that}

lunarchick - 10:31am Jan 3, 2003 EST (# 7269 of 7287)

Gisterme asked (04:14am Jan 3, 2003)

Do you disagree that where there is no infidelity in a marriage there is no question about paternity of the children that result?

lunarchick - 11:01am Jan 3, 2003 EST (# 7270 of 7287)

The bbc had an interesting radio docco on Afghanistan.

Looking at 'morality' second take 'reality' ... it appears that prostitution was undertaken by deserted women/widows to get money to feed the family ... so who had the money, and who employed them --- The Taliban .... but ... hey ... didn't these freaks develop their cult to such a high that women ceased to exist!?

AfgProfile

rshow55 - 12:28pm Jan 3, 2003 EST (# 7271 of 7287)
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.

7266 commondata 1/3/03 9:30am

- Commondata - I'll get back to you - and if not, ask me again - but for now - torture can be an essential part of a system. That was true of ancient Rome. Much to be said in favor of Rome. It was beautiful in some ways. Ugly in other ways - some well set out in the movie Sparticus .

I've been trying to handle things in an order that seems right to me, and so I'm not taking time to reorganize my head to fit the order responding to your question requires right now. Will try to do so later.

Just now, I'm doing a number of things involving some questions keyed to pieces of work I did in the past, trying to achieve order, symmetry, and harmony - applied to systems - in ways I thought might work, or lead to something that could work.

There was a suggestion to Saddam and his regime, on how he might as for and get help in facilitating the checking and persuasion challenges Iraq faces.

There were suggestions to North Korea, and the NYT people who had been contacted by N. Korea.

I made a request in a postcard.

Sometimes, good suggestions are rejected, for valid reasons - and not reconsidered when the reasons for the old rejection have changed enough that re-evaluation might be fruitful.

It seems to me that people might also check what has happened against what they expected - and look for pattens, good and bad, in terms of order, symmetry, and harmony in the ways that matter to them.

rshow55 - 12:29pm Jan 3, 2003 EST (# 7272 of 7287)
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.

The President knows many, many things I can't, and many decisions depend on weights. Based on what I know, and can possibly know, it seems to me that the best thing that could happen, right now, would be for people to keep talking. It seems to me that the talking is working pretty well, considering. That's just my opinion.

Yesterday, talking to Lunarchick, I did express an opinion about a clear choice-risk that I believe Bush faces. I won't repeat that opinion in public, but I hope Bush is clear on the point. Bush can't care about my opionion very much, or he, or someone under him with a name, would call me on the telephone.

Just my opinion, now. Both Iraq and North Korea are making hard, interesting efforts to implement change. Saddam's ability to empty his prisons, and organize his system for inspections as well as he has, impresses me.

I think the logic of extermination is too easy, just now - though that logic has its uses, as well as its problems, as Roman history can show.

I think, as Franklin Roosevelt and many, many other people have thought - that modern societies work best as mixed systems - with both capitalistic and state-socialistic aspects. Bill Casey, who managed Ronald Reagan's first campaign for president - thought so, too. You don't have to trust me on that one. Almost anybody can check that one.

Pardon me for moving slowly. I'm trying to work carefully. Just now, it seems to me, just from looking at the papers, that some things are moving too fast for comfort, and people should be a little more careful - and stay reasonably rested.

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New York Times on the Web Forums Science Missile Defense