RE: SUO: Multi-Source Ontology (MSO) Draft Ballot Question
AFAIKAC, the Chinese haven't signed the treaty
to keep space demilitarized. And even if they did,
how would we be able to monitor compliance? Therefore,
if they go there, we have to go there also. It would be
irresponsible for Bush (or the congress) to ignore
threats of nuclear weapons in space, whether from
satellites or from the moon. We'll need mor
antiantimissilemissiles, SDI, and all that stuff to
counter the threat.
The world has lots of justice and light, but it also
has lots of injustice and darkness.
WordNet is secondary to effective defense. Even
Mars and the Moon are secondary to effective defense.
But that doesn't mean we have to spend all that much
money to protect ourselves. Look at the research
going on about the space elevator:
http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/technology/space_elevator_020327-1.html
Once we have the carbon nanotube technology down, the
cost of putting mass into space drops from about
$10,000 per pound with the space shuttle to just
$100 per pound using the elevator. That means we can
hoist stuff into orbit at the cost of an elevator
ride.
Then think about another smaller elevator on the Moon,
built with materials from both worlds. That makes a
moon base very reasonable for mining water. Then think
about another one on Mars, so you can bring mass from
space to Mars and back very cheaply. Add this all
together, and you have very inexpensive and highly
productive business opportunities.
Bush's budget increase for this year is very reasonable,
about a five percent increase.
JMHO,
Rich
Murray Altheim wrote
> John F. Sowa wrote:
<snip/>
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