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 - 01:12pm Nov 12, 2002 EST (# 5671 of 5701)
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.

Here are some things that I care about - and a sense of vision, and mission - related to this thread and related Guardian Talk threads:

From God is the Projection of Man's Unrealized Potential #1496 http://talk.guardian.co.uk/WebX?14@@.ee7b2bd/1662

#1492 http://talk.guardian.co.uk/WebX?14@@.ee7b2bd/1657 might interest somebody, also.

I'm off for the next hour - to eat and do some bookeeping chores.

commondata - 01:26pm Nov 12, 2002 EST (# 5672 of 5701)

rshow55 11/12/02 12:55pm

Call me on the phone - you're a better expositor than I am.

I guess you must be talking to someone else; trust me, you exposit beautifully. But, yeah, I think the problem is complex enough that it has to be modelled rather than calculated. The "in a weekend" thing may just have been a bit of bravado. I think you could have a model of some sort "in a weekend" as a first approximation - but its accuracy would be proportional to the number of weekends. And you wouldn't get far before you'd have to consider, in detail, bits of metal and how they behave in turbulent flows ... and that's a lot of beer and pizza.

rshow55 - 01:50pm Nov 12, 2002 EST (# 5673 of 5701)
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.

You'd be surprised how much I've worked with turbulent flows.

. . .

The scenario I suggested for undergraduate engineering teams was about right.

But the job in the "3-d world" that you referred to - I think we could do in a weekend.

Though we might have to be a little moderate about the beer.

To get transfer functions on real missiles (or model airplanes) - you "put a real system through its paces" - - measure - - and then model, using polynomials that fit the format of the rest of the calculation - - and if the model is "right enough" -- (and it helps if "right enough" is good) - you've got workable stuff.

mazza9 - 03:15pm Nov 12, 2002 EST (# 5674 of 5701)
"Quae cum ita sunt" Caesar's Gallic Commentaries

Hey Robert:

I just waded through a hundred odd postings with little or no attempt at even uttering the words "missile defense". I thought you had a random generator to insert this missive more frequently!

Tell me, what was the characteristics of Mr. Clinton that you admired the most. His sodomite behavior in the Oval Office? His Abuse of Women? Was his false testimony under oath to a judge, (who just happened to be a student of his when he "taught" Consititutional Law)? Maybe his failed diplomacy in Haiti, Somalia, a North Korea were praiseworthy?

Robert I want to lobby the NYTimes editorial board. We should change the of this forum to the RShowalter cow patty party!

(27 following messages)

New York Times on the Web Forums Science Missile Defense