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From: henry@utzoo.UUCP (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: can.politics
Subject: Re: Canadian participation in Star Wars.
Message-ID: <5697@utzoo.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 18-Jun-85 15:36:47 EDT
Article-I.D.: utzoo.5697
Posted: Tue Jun 18 15:36:47 1985
Date-Received: Tue, 18-Jun-85 15:36:47 EDT
References: <893@mnetor.UUCP> <5642@utzoo.UUCP> <896@mnetor.UUCP> <5685@utzoo.UUCP>, <2008@watcgl.UUCP>
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
Lines: 60

>   What would a reasonable probability of nuclear war be? If we include
>   war precipitated by accidental detonation/launch or phantom attacks
>   being percieved by "defense" installations as well as actual planned
>   attacks then perhaps a probability greater than 0.0000000....0000000001
>   would be resonable.  How about the consequences?  Since we are talking
>   about what would very likely be the complete anihilation  of all life
>   on earth I think a value of infinity would be appropriate.

As I've said before, this reasoning indicates that our only rational course
of action is to surrender to the Soviets immediately.  Why are you not out
campaigning for this?  For that matter, why are you living in Canada instead
of New Zealand (which would not be immune to nuclear winter, but would be a
lot less likely to be badly affected in the absence of n.w.)?  Clearly you
yourself believe that some risks are worth taking.
 
> > As witness the lack of popular revolt against the current situation (the
> > anti-nuclear marchers are numerically insignificant against the population
> > of the nations involved), most people are willing to take a (perceived)
> 
>  What do you consider insignificant? Polls indicate more than half of
>  the canadian public does not want cruise testing in canada. Anywhere
>  from 50,000 to 80,000 people (depending on whose estimates you want
>  to believe) were in the last vancouver peace march ( I know that this
>  is insignificant compared to the US/USSR populations but it is large
>  for Canada and we do participate in the nuclear arms race in one
>  way or another).

50,000-80,000 *is* insignificant in a population of 25,000,000, dammit!
That's a small fraction of one percent of the total population of Canada.
It doesn't matter what fraction of the public would prefer not to have
cruise testing in Canada, what matters is how many of them care enough
about it to act.  Since very few do, obviously most of that "more than
half" are really almost indifferent, with only a slight bias against.

>   Are you really that confident that Ron would rather give in to the
>   soviets than commit global holocaust.  Are you also sure that a war
>   will not be started by mechanical/electronic/human-judgement error?

I have no confidence that any of our world leaders, Soviet, US, or for
that matter Canadian, would surrender rather than trigger catastrophe.
I see no difference between Reagan and almost any other potential US
president in this regard.

> > As for the temporary nature of Soviet domination, when "temporary" is
> > defined as centuries, it's permanent as far as most folks are concerned.
> > -- 
>   Well as far as I personally/physically am concerned it is permanent
>   too.  However from a racial perspective it is but the bat of an eye
>   whereas nuclear war is the end.  Making decisions and promoting
>   behaviour whose beneficial consequences will not be experienced for
>   extremely long periods is, I hope, not completely foreign to the
>   human race.

Not completely foreign, but damn close.  My point is that "it's only
temporary" is an attempt to make the prospect of a Soviet-controlled
world more palatable, and it fails completely because the time span
is far too long.
-- 
				Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
				{allegra,ihnp4,linus,decvax}!utzoo!henry