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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.

rshow55 - 06:52pm Jan 2, 2003 EST (# 7232 of 7243)
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.

Some issues of reproductive convention, that go very deep, are sources of some of the strongest and intractable problems and ill feelings.

Should men proved to be not the biological parent have to support a child regardless? From Guardian Talk .. Nov 3-6, 2000 http://www.mrshowalter.net/a_md01000s/SupBast.htm deals with an issue that the Islamic culture cares a great deal about. Men all over the world care about this - in America, perhaps more than they admit, or will talk about.

Islamic nations have a lot of trouble accomodating patterns of modernity - and a lot of those problems connect to some deeply embedded committments to assure paternity. I happen to think that abortion, regrettable as it may be, is often the lesser evil in America, and has to be permitted. But it seems to me more clear that, when assuring paternity is an absolutely uncompromisable value, as it certainly seems to be in Islamic nations, genetic testing and abortion may offer much better solutions than some that Islamic people are committed to now. I'd say that even though abortion may be ugly from many perspectives, it may be an orderly, symettric, and harmonious solution to some problems in Islamic cultures. From my point of view - if the alternative is an occasional abortion, within agreed upon conventions, or the restrictions of the Burka, I'd find abortion the better solution overall. I know personally that if I had a choice, and if my wife concieved a child I did not sire, in a way I did not agree to, I'd want either the marriage or the pregnancy terminated.

These issues go very deep, and involve Americans in disagreement, as well. Foes of Abortion Push for Major Bills in Congress By ROBIN TONER http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/02/politics/02ABOR.html

7209 rshow55 1/2/03 7:32am

To be orderly about something specifically defined, you have to be disorderly about some other things.

To be symmetrical in some defined ways, if things are complicated enough - you have to break some other symmetries.

To be harmonious in some defined ways, if things are complicated enough - you have to have conlict in some other senses.

These things are not contradictions - but they do require some care to keep sorted. People from different circumstances and cultures are very similar in some key ways - but astonishingly different in others. N! increases as fast as it does with N, and the number of possible cultures, and conventions in the world is astronomical - people will never be able to feel and think in the same ways about everything. When it matters enough, they can sort out enough so that they can communicate, and keep from killing each other. It seems to me that the notion of disciplined beauty is a very good checking code, when things have to be sorted out, with people comparing notes about what they are being orderly about, symmetric about, and harmonious about. Not so that anyone can convert anyone. But so that people can sort out conflicts, when it matters enough. It takes care.

We need to learn to exercise that care, if we're to avoid some avoidable fights. And if we apply checks for order, symmetry, and harmony - in ways we can define - we can often solve our own problems better, in our own terms, and find ways of interfacing with people with other systems, as well.

I'll be attending to recent postings, but I have a new computer and monitor - a wonderful advance in my standard of living and working, and I'm taking time to set it up - - and think and rest, as well.

lunarchick - 07:25pm Jan 2, 2003 EST (# 7233 of 7243)

Some situations are ruled by

The head

others

the heart

'Nature' steps in and takes control

... perhaps for the better

almarst2002 - 08:41pm Jan 2, 2003 EST (# 7234 of 7243)

Speaking of a "golden rule"...

Robert,

What golden rule would be for one, locked in a cage with Mike Tyson?

gisterme - 09:00pm Jan 2, 2003 EST (# 7235 of 7243)

lunarchick 12/26/02 8:46am

"...The function of convictions has to be to enable sucessful survival leading to achievement and growth.

Growth occurs within the self, locally, entrepreneurally, regionally, nationally and internationally..."

All are reasons why communism has been, is now and will always be doomed to failure.

Thanks for pointing that out, lunarchick. Based on that it would seem to be time for a few of our posters here to change their convictions just a bit.

Kim Jong Il could take that advice as well. Perhaps his people would not be starving if he did. Perhaps NK would not need to rely for their survival on handouts from others who have already learned that lesson.

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