testa-j%osu-20@OHIO-STATE.ARPA (08/05/86)
Clayton Cramer writes: >What bothers me most about the opposition to SDI (whose value as a >system is completely separate from the advisability of building it), >is the desire to solve an essentially POLITICAL problem with MORE >POLITICS. It is, indeed, "much better to simply prevent the missles >from ever being fired", but that is rather like saying "it is much >better to simply prevent bad things from happening". The unavoidably >adversarial nature of free societies and the Soviet Union make it >impossible for sufficient trust to be developed in both directions >that nuclear weapons can go away. > >Why do some people have more trust in TECHNICAL solutions than >POLITICAL solutions? Because TECHNICAL solutions require no trust of >the Soviet Union, something likely to change over time in >unpredictable ways. IF a technical solution can be developed, it >doesn't require trust of the good intentions of the Soviet Union -- >something that many people in this country manage to delude >themselves about, time and time again. The problem here is that a technical "solution" is not a solution in the same sense that y=cos xt is a solution to a wave equation. Like trust in the Soviet Union, the PROBLEM to be solved will certainly change over time. In attacking a problem of human vs. nature, a technological solution can be determined to "work" since nature (at least at the most fundamental level) does not change over time -- but in a problem of human vs. human, no technological solution can be final since the other side will just think up new ways to sabotage the other's solution. When the problem is military, this leads to a faster and faster arms race. A political solution doesn't "require trust of the good intentions of the Soviet Union". We can still come to a political "solution" even if we decide that the Soviets are scum with the worst possible intentions. As long as they do not ACT to violate the terms of a treaty, there will be no danger to the US if the treaty was thought out carefully enough. -joe testa testa-j%osu-20.ohio-state.arpa ------- -------