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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.

wanderer85us - 02:14pm Jan 15, 2003 EST (# 7676 of 7680)
Bush is stupid.

What about Iraq?

commondata - 02:14pm Jan 15, 2003 EST (# 7677 of 7680)

Shhhh, I love an rshow parable!

rshow55 - 02:16pm Jan 15, 2003 EST (# 7678 of 7680)
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.

Sometimes, a stance can be rejected clearly at one time - and that exact same stance - after repetition - can be accepted in every way that matters - but in more calibrated form - at a later time.

rshow55 - 02:21pm Jan 15, 2003 EST (# 7679 of 7680)
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.

North Korea Calls Offer of U.S. Talks 'Deceptive Drama' By REUTERS Filed at 10:50 a.m. ET http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/international-korea-north.html

Courships among the birds - and in other species, too - have some elements of "deceptive drama" built into them. They can be ugly or beautiful or both.

Stability and instability differ in key ways - but look alike in some others. For mating to work - everything has to be right. That's how it is supposed to work - for unchangeable mathematical reasons.

Diplomacy has some formal resemblences, and we'd be safer and richer if we knew them.

When weapons are involved - some issues are especially touchy.

rshow55 - 02:31pm Jan 15, 2003 EST (# 7680 of 7680)
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 Iraqi situation is easier in some ways - but touchier in some others - though bird mating has some analogies there, too.

A key problem is that, for mating to occur (or peacemaking) - there are some key stabilities in the physical and social environment that are obligatory. Saddam and Bush have a technically awkward problem in that respect - and thank God neither one of them are virgins in any sense. If they were, it would be hopeless. As it is - if people move carefully - something workable, and fairly decent - is likely if people take their time.

I wish my big computer hadn't been knocked out. I had my heart set on a simulation of the Iraqi case - but haven't touched it. Sorry I'm moving slowly. I'm trying to be careful - but clear.

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