Re: SUO: Multi-Source Ontology (MSO) Draft Ballot Question
John F. Sowa wrote:
> Murray,
>
> Mars is only the cover story:
>
>>I'd begin tying everything to Mars. WordNet will help us
>>understand the Martians, so we need WordNet to get us to
>>Mars. The current administration has shown its willingness
>>to buy into anything considered "intelligence" so perhaps
>>we should actually try to sell them some.
>
> The people who manipulate Bush's strings don't care
> about Mars. They want the moon for the same reason
> that the Chinese want the moon: it is strategic
> high ground in any global conflict. The pretense
> of going to Mars is only a smokescreen for funding
> a moon base.
John,
I was just being silly, but yes, I'm aware. There have been dozens
of news articles on the subject, typified by:
Heading for the Stars, and Wondering if China Might Reach Them First
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/22/international/asia/22SPAC.html
Bush Mission to Mars: it's all about militarizing space
http://progressivetrail.org/articles/040115Nimmo.shtml
Industry Hopes Soar With Space Plan:
Energy and Aerospace Firms Have Long Lobbied NASA
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A21186-2004Jan15.html
Fly me to the moon
http://www.globalsecurity.org/org/news/2004/040126-fly-moon.htm
where basically the militarization of space and an enormous
windfall for a small number of military contractors are in
the cards. The cost will be to all of us an enormous increase
in taxation, the likelihood of a new arms race, missiles launched
from space, and an enhanced ability to perform ground surveillance.
Everybody from Cheney to Ashcroft must be just grinning like
baboons on absinthe. And we all thought Bush was just being a
doofus in announcing something zany, something whacky, something
heroic like JFK might have done. There was a plan. There's always
a plan. "Develop drilling technology on Mars" my ass.
This doesn't stop us from using Mars to promote WordNet and in
the process siphoning off billions of dollars from the military,
funnelling it instead towards computational linguistics research.
Even if it ended up being a complete waste of time, perhaps it
would cripple their ability to put ICBMs up in orbit.
Or maybe not, but we can all do our part for world peace by
sucking up as much military money as possible and using it for
domestic purposes! Like getting out of debt!
[and we now return to our regularly scheduled orange alert...]
Murray
......................................................................
Murray Altheim http://kmi.open.ac.uk/people/murray/
Knowledge Media Institute
The Open University, Milton Keynes, Bucks, MK7 6AA, UK .
"Iraqi sovereignty will be established by appointees
appointing appointees to select appointees to select
appointees. Add the fact that Bremer was appointed to
his post by President Bush and Bush to his by the US
Supreme Court, and you have the glorious new democratic
tradition of the appointocracy: rule by an appointee's
appointee's appointees' appointees' appointees' selectees."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1130138,00.html