From: Technotranscendence (neptune@mars.superlink.net)
Date: Sat Feb 15 2003 - 09:49:32 MST
Thought this snippet of a discussion on Starship Forum might be of
interest.
Cheers!
Dan
http://uweb.superlink.net/neptune/
From: Dennis May determinism@hotmail.com
To: Starship_Forum@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Friday, February 14, 2003 10:13 PM
Subject: [Starship_Forum] Re: Weaponizing space revisited
[big snip]
Monart Pon wrote:
> Do you mean that weapons development often
> has causal ~primacy~ over social and political
> development a la Marxian dialectical materialism?
> Or: that socio-political (and moral) development
> first spurs weapons development, which in turn
> affect further socio-political development in a
> sort of feedback loop? I can see, for example,
> how nuclear weapons proliferation leads to
> anxiety about mass destruction and then to
> disarmament treaties. But originally, political-
> military goals created the Manhattan Project
> and the first atomic bombs.
> Assuming that weapons development can drive
> socio-political development, how would this be
> even more true in space? What special conditions
> of space would accentuate this causal sequence?
Weapons of mass destruction change everything.
In space, the scale of mass destruction grows
without bound.
Differing levels of the knowledge and availability
of weapons changes military strategies and the
societies which support them. Feedback is part of
the process as societies adapt to the requirements
of the military technologies/strategies they have
developed to deal with outside/inside pressures.
Military technology/strategy is a part of the
political structure of any society.
Kings could send their well trained soldiers in
heavy armor to rape and pillage peasants as they
saw fit, until crossbows made armor and long bow
training largely obsolete. Kings could hide in
castles, largely impervious, until black powder
and cannon [offensive weapons] rendered that
kind of defense obsolete. The strategies of
kings and tyrants had to adapt to the military
technology/strategies of their time.
To this day the first step in any successful
tyranny is to dis-arm the populace. It is not
just the soldier which can be laid to rest by
common weapons, but the tyrant himself.
In space, the family truckster could be a kinetic
energy WoMD by its very nature. The power plant
to run farms could be a dual use producer of
fissionable materials for atomic weapons. Mining
equipment could steer a large rock down a
gravitational well and destroy whole civilizations.
How can space tyrants disarm a populace when dual
use includes WoMD capabilities?
The next question is how to defend against
individuals and terror groups wielding these
same common industrial WoMD.
Space societies, including Earth bound societies,
will have to adapt to these changes or be wiped out.
WoMD are getting cheaper and cheaper. With an
increasingly wealthy society their cost will become
trivial and the knowledge of WoMD common.
It has to change the arrangement of human societies.
Aliens will have the same problem - hence my solution
to the Fermi Paradox - only those who hide live in
the long run. SETI's theory is to look for local loud-
mouths living contrary to this military model. They
might eventually find a loudmouth, an accidental signal,
or a lure designed to expose other civilizations. We
should expect these to be rare give the implications
of WoMD.
Dennis May
~ * ~
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