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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 - 07:29am Nov 4, 2003 EST (# 16450 of 16472)

rshow55 - 06:39am Nov 4, 2003 EST (# 16446 of 16446)

Too late for yet another re-hash. And quest for poster IDs.

Nothing here that hadn't been dismissed as senseless slop many times before.

It seems to me good - and not a breach of confidence - to post excerpts from my Oct 26 letter to Sulzberger here:

"A tremendous amount of my effort on the Missile Defense board has been to solve TECHNICAL problems of negotiating stable outcomes to "games" and negotiations, including those that result in wars, that involve complexity, competition, cooperation and high emotional stakes. These problems have been major barriers to progress in international relations and commerce.

"The NYT editorial page often asks diplomats to arrange things that they do not know how to do technically. I think that if you'd authorize someone at NYT to meet with me - we're quite close to a situation where general and simple solutions to this class of problems can be demonstrated and explained so that they can be solved routinely and practically. With a model of the kind of solution needed in general worked out - in the presence of a record that I believe many people and organizations can and will learn from.

"The question is how you produce a "win win" solution under circumstances where negative sum outcomes are also possible, and instabilities are a problem. Currently, such circumstances result in stasis, unnecessary losses, and wars.

" . . . . The thread embodies the hard work and hopes of many NYT people. I hope to do everything I can to make the interaction between me and the TIMES a positive sum game.

"I'm hoping that the Missile Defense thread - after a meeting and an exchange of short letters, will clearly demonstrate how to solve the TECHNICAL problems of negotiating stable outcomes to complex games involving both competition and cooperation. In a case big enough to study, but not too big. With real stakes, but not stakes too high to permit intelligent function of intelligent people.

"I believe that the work done on the Missile Defense board, which has plainly been an expense to The New York Times, should be a credit to The New York Times, not a source of problems. An investment of time and good faith worthwhile for the Times in terms of both status and money for the Times. [emphasis added]

You grovel in the letter & then you malign (on the thread).

And you got your answer in about 8 days. Lucky. Some posters have complained about the lack of response from NYT moderators !

New York Times people may never meet face to face with me - and maybe never should, though I'd like to. But since that time, I think that the NYT has handled the situations involved with this thread very well. ... The support, it seems to me, should come from a foundation, or from business interests willing to associate themselves with the eff

More speculations !

rshow55 - 06:42am Nov 4, 2003 EST (# 16447 of 16448)

"Connecting the dots" is important - and this thread has illustrated a good deal about the technique.

What "technique" ? This is the way I think I've seen it work

1. Suspect a poster for being X -- some one in politics here or elsewhere, or NYT] 2. State that 3. Repeat it [your "Loop Test"], despite denials 4. Re-interpret his/her posts 5. Construct a conspiracy theory (with able asssistance from lchic), and 6. finally realize that it could NOT have been so -- 7. wait a while, 8. Then resurrect the same thing, and repeat Steps 1 through 6 as often as required by the "Loop Test," or ad infinitum, which ever 'comes later'.

NB: The "Dots" being whatever you can come up with ("truth" and evidence optional].

"Can we (rshow55, as elegized + lchic] do a better job of finding truth?"

Am not sure ! And, you kept provi

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