Space

Define “Suffered”

In a Corner piece today, Jonah Goldberg discusses the humanitarian benefits that would have accrued had we forced a regime change in Moscow in 1946. But he states one of what he considers the down sides:

While the space program would have suffered without the Space Race, it seems a sure bet that the net gain of liberated human genius would more than have compensated for that.

While I agree with his post overall, I don’t agree that the “space program would have suffered.” Oh, we certainly wouldn’t have gotten to the moon as quickly, but as I argued at TCSDaily a week and a half ago, that wasn’t necessarily a good thing.

I also think that, even absent the superpower adversary of the USSR, we still would have found surveillance and communications satellites quite useful. And of course, had we removed the Stalin regime, it’s likely that we would have eventually picked up all of the German rocket team, and not just the ones that managed to escape with von Braun as the Soviets advanced. If you were a German who wanted to build rockets, given a choice between living in America, and Russia, even a free Russia, it’s seems most likely that most of them would have wanted to come here.

Space

Define “Suffered”

In a Corner piece today, Jonah Goldberg discusses the humanitarian benefits that would have accrued had we forced a regime change in Moscow in 1946. But he states one of what he considers the down sides:

While the space program would have suffered without the Space Race, it seems a sure bet that the net gain of liberated human genius would more than have compensated for that.

While I agree with his post overall, I don’t agree that the “space program would have suffered.” Oh, we certainly wouldn’t have gotten to the moon as quickly, but as I argued at TCSDaily a week and a half ago, that wasn’t necessarily a good thing.

I also think that, even absent the superpower adversary of the USSR, we still would have found surveillance and communications satellites quite useful. And of course, had we removed the Stalin regime, it’s likely that we would have eventually picked up all of the German rocket team, and not just the ones that managed to escape with von Braun as the Soviets advanced. If you were a German who wanted to build rockets, given a choice between living in America, and Russia, even a free Russia, it’s seems most likely that most of them would have wanted to come here.

Space

Define “Suffered”

In a Corner piece today, Jonah Goldberg discusses the humanitarian benefits that would have accrued had we forced a regime change in Moscow in 1946. But he states one of what he considers the down sides:

While the space program would have suffered without the Space Race, it seems a sure bet that the net gain of liberated human genius would more than have compensated for that.

While I agree with his post overall, I don’t agree that the “space program would have suffered.” Oh, we certainly wouldn’t have gotten to the moon as quickly, but as I argued at TCSDaily a week and a half ago, that wasn’t necessarily a good thing.

I also think that, even absent the superpower adversary of the USSR, we still would have found surveillance and communications satellites quite useful. And of course, had we removed the Stalin regime, it’s likely that we would have eventually picked up all of the German rocket team, and not just the ones that managed to escape with von Braun as the Soviets advanced. If you were a German who wanted to build rockets, given a choice between living in America, and Russia, even a free Russia, it’s seems most likely that most of them would have wanted to come here.

General Science

FL Stands For Flatland

This is kind of an interesting bit of data. I moved from the state with the second greatest disparity between high and low points (between Mount Whitney and Badwater in Death Valley–only Alaska is higher, because of Denali) to the one with the least.

But I was surprised to see that several states rival it, including Delaware and DC (which isn’t really a state–I also have a little trouble believing that the elevation of the Potomac in the district is only one foot above sea level). Louisiana is pretty flat as well. But Florida is striking to me because it’s so big, so the fact that it has so little variation in altitude is all the more remarkable. And depressing, to someone for whom (like me) mountains almost define scenery.

[Update a few minutes later]

As someone in comments notes, there are some people (like those wheelchair bound) who prefer it flat for obvious reasons. I had never considered this before, but Patricia mentioned to me that she knew people who had been brought up in New York who were actually afraid to drive on hills (a concept totally bizarre to me, but then, I have my own phobias). So I guess that a place like Florida would actually appeal to them. But I suspect that most people who like Florida don’t do so for its flatness, but because there are a lot of other things they like about it (year-round warm weather, golfing, boating) and are simply indifferent to whether or not the terrain has any relief.

Media Criticism

Media Brain Drain

An interesting post, and a lot of interesting (and validating) comments about the intergenerational clash between old and new media within the newsrooms. Ed Driscoll has further thoughts.

I remember a few years ago, when I first started writing pieces for on-line publications, that the editors I was dealing with viewed the web as a foreign land. They initially requested pieces in Microsoft Word, with instructions as to where to put the links, that they could edit and then hand off to their “web people” to put on line. Note that these were not original pieces, but supposedly the best of my blog posts for the time period in question. What they were asking was for me to take the HTML (the native language of the original posts), and convert it to Word, so they could then reconvert it back to HTML (with all the potential for screwups therein). It took a while to persuade them to simply accept my HTML in the first place (since they didn’t even understand what HTML was–that was one of those “techie” terms, that they let their “techies” handle).

Technology and Society

A Disruptive Technology

Three-dimensional home printers:

More importantly, prices for 3-D printing machines have been falling rapidly, reaching $20,000, and the day is foreseeable when they will fall below $1,000 and become home appliances, says Phil Anderson of the School of Theoretical and Applied Science at Ramapo College in New Jersey.

The results, he warned, could be economically “disruptive.”

“If you can make what you need in your own home quickly, then manufacturers become designers, with no need for factories, warehouses or shipping,” Anderson told LiveScience.

Given the drawbacks discussed in the article, I think that this is likely to be a gradual transition, that will allow time us to adapt.

Media Criticism

All The News That’s Not Fit To Print

When it’s criticism of those reporting it:

As I understand it, your measure of worth is how many front page stories you have written and unfortunately some of you will compromise your integrity and display questionable ethics as you seek to keep America informed. This is much like the intelligence analyst whose effectiveness was measured by the number of intelligence reports he produced. For some, it seems that as long as you get a front-page story there is little or no regard for the “collateral damage” you will cause. Personal reputations have no value and you report with total impunity and are rarely held accountable for unethical conduct.

Given the near instantaneous ability to report actions on the ground, the responsibility to accurately and truthfully report takes on an unprecedented importance. the speculative and often uninformed initial reporting that characterizes our media appears to be rapidly becoming the standard of the industry. An Arab proverb states – “four things come not back: the spoken word, the spent arrow, the past, the neglected opportunity.” Once reported, your assessments become conventional wisdom and nearly impossible to change. Other major challenges are your willingness to be manipulated by “high-level officials” who leak stories and by lawyers who use hyperbole to strengthen their arguments. Your unwillingness to accurately and prominently correct your mistakes and your agenda-driven biases contribute to this corrosive environment. All of these challenges combined create a media environment that does a tremendous disservice to America. Over the course of this war tactically insignificant events have become strategic defeats for America because of the tremendous power and impact of the media and by extension you the journalist.

More thoughts here.

[Update on Monday]

I edited the transcript above to get it out of all caps, and correct a couple minor grammatical issues, since it does seem to be a transcript of a spoken speech.

Media Criticism

All The News That’s Not Fit To Print

When it’s criticism of those reporting it:

As I understand it, your measure of worth is how many front page stories you have written and unfortunately some of you will compromise your integrity and display questionable ethics as you seek to keep America informed. This is much like the intelligence analyst whose effectiveness was measured by the number of intelligence reports he produced. For some, it seems that as long as you get a front-page story there is little or no regard for the “collateral damage” you will cause. Personal reputations have no value and you report with total impunity and are rarely held accountable for unethical conduct.

Given the near instantaneous ability to report actions on the ground, the responsibility to accurately and truthfully report takes on an unprecedented importance. the speculative and often uninformed initial reporting that characterizes our media appears to be rapidly becoming the standard of the industry. An Arab proverb states – “four things come not back: the spoken word, the spent arrow, the past, the neglected opportunity.” Once reported, your assessments become conventional wisdom and nearly impossible to change. Other major challenges are your willingness to be manipulated by “high-level officials” who leak stories and by lawyers who use hyperbole to strengthen their arguments. Your unwillingness to accurately and prominently correct your mistakes and your agenda-driven biases contribute to this corrosive environment. All of these challenges combined create a media environment that does a tremendous disservice to America. Over the course of this war tactically insignificant events have become strategic defeats for America because of the tremendous power and impact of the media and by extension you the journalist.

More thoughts here.

[Update on Monday]

I edited the transcript above to get it out of all caps, and correct a couple minor grammatical issues, since it does seem to be a transcript of a spoken speech.

Media Criticism

All The News That’s Not Fit To Print

When it’s criticism of those reporting it:

As I understand it, your measure of worth is how many front page stories you have written and unfortunately some of you will compromise your integrity and display questionable ethics as you seek to keep America informed. This is much like the intelligence analyst whose effectiveness was measured by the number of intelligence reports he produced. For some, it seems that as long as you get a front-page story there is little or no regard for the “collateral damage” you will cause. Personal reputations have no value and you report with total impunity and are rarely held accountable for unethical conduct.

Given the near instantaneous ability to report actions on the ground, the responsibility to accurately and truthfully report takes on an unprecedented importance. the speculative and often uninformed initial reporting that characterizes our media appears to be rapidly becoming the standard of the industry. An Arab proverb states – “four things come not back: the spoken word, the spent arrow, the past, the neglected opportunity.” Once reported, your assessments become conventional wisdom and nearly impossible to change. Other major challenges are your willingness to be manipulated by “high-level officials” who leak stories and by lawyers who use hyperbole to strengthen their arguments. Your unwillingness to accurately and prominently correct your mistakes and your agenda-driven biases contribute to this corrosive environment. All of these challenges combined create a media environment that does a tremendous disservice to America. Over the course of this war tactically insignificant events have become strategic defeats for America because of the tremendous power and impact of the media and by extension you the journalist.

More thoughts here.

[Update on Monday]

I edited the transcript above to get it out of all caps, and correct a couple minor grammatical issues, since it does seem to be a transcript of a spoken speech.

Biting Commentary about Infinity…and Beyond!