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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.

almarst2002 - 10:41pm Dec 15, 2002 EST (# 6696 of 6716)

gisterme 12/15/02 7:55pm

Iraq vs. France WWII.

Do you sincerely believe Saddam is seen as a foreign power by Iraqi people? May be Hitler believed the same regarding Stalin?

BTW. The shah of Iran was not a particular example of democracy the West supported. May be you would suggest the Saudi Arabian or Jordanian "models of democracy"?

No, manjumicha is absolutly tight in his characterisation of the nature of your intellectual and moral "integrity".

gisterme - 10:54pm Dec 15, 2002 EST (# 6697 of 6716)

fredmoore 12/15/02 9:59pm

"...decrease global entropy .... stroke nature's mane and watch her smile. But beware, she is always ready to bite your hand..."

Heh heh. Brings to mind the article that Robert posted just above, "The Odds of That".

I think that life itself is the "anti-entropy" feature of the physical universe. It's folks and critters who are about the business of filling ther niches in nature that actually change the odds of any particular thing happening. The living things who accomplish that don't think of the things they do in terms of "the odds" of course. They just do things that wouldn't happen otherwise in the absence of their existance.

Isn't it life itself that transforms combinations of lower chemical-energy compounds to higher chemical-energy compounds? For example, the oil we use for fuel is mostly carbon and hydrogen. Neither alone is a very good fuel. How did the two accomplish the highly unlikely, anti-entropic feat of becoming combined into a wonderful, handy compact high-density source of stored chemical energy? Why by having an encounter with life, of course...

gisterme - 11:08pm Dec 15, 2002 EST (# 6698 of 6716)

"...Do you sincerely believe Saddam is seen as a foreign power by Iraqi people?

Didn't say that almarst. Saddam is not seen as a foreign power in Iraq. He's seen as a cruel opressor just as Milosevic was in Yugoslavia. All I said is that the Iraqis may well welcome some foreign help to get rid of a dictator they can't otherwise do anytning about, just like the French and Serbs did.

"...May be Hitler believed the same regarding Stalin?..."

Even Hitler was smart enough to recognize that. What die Fuhrer wasn't smart enough to recognize is that despite their problems with Stalin the Russian people would not abide their homeland becoming a German provence. The Russians won their victories over Hitler in spite of Stalin not because of him. That's much to their credit I'd say.

almarst2002 - 11:15pm Dec 15, 2002 EST (# 6699 of 6716)

gisterme,

Do you believe any foreign government has the right to interfere in other nations internal affairs it deems in need to be improved?

bbbuck - 11:16pm Dec 15, 2002 EST (# 6700 of 6716)
"You can't eat this, it's people, it's people"-B....."What about the cherry pie?"

One thing is clear, if Russia would not have fought and sacrificed 1/4 of their population, Hitler would have won the war.
This after Stalin starved 10-15million ukranians, and executed or sent to the gulag 9 of 10 of the military officers.
Truly one of the great miracles of human civilization.
The western world's victory over Germany in WWII would not have been possible without Russia's contribution.

almarst2002 - 11:18pm Dec 15, 2002 EST (# 6701 of 6716)

One thing is clear, most nations prefere their own tyrans over those placed by the foreigners.

gisterme - 11:23pm Dec 15, 2002 EST (# 6702 of 6716)

almarst2002 12/15/02 10:41pm

Previous post #6698 should also include the above reference.

"...No, manjumicha is absolutly tight in his characterisation of the nature of your intellectual and moral "integrity"..."

Whatever that characteriztion may be, almarst, manju is entitled to manju's opinion...and you are entitled to agree with it or not.

I'm pleased to concur with you that manju is most likely "tight" on something. What do you suppose the odds are that we would agree on something at just this moment in history, almarst? Kind of spooky isn't it? Do you suppose it could be a conspiracy?

:-)

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