Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!uflorida!ukma!rutgers!att!cbnews!nmm@apss.ab.ca From: nmm@apss.ab.ca (Neil McCulloch) Newsgroups: sci.military Subject: Re: Cold fusion on the battlefield... Summary: Impact of Fusion Message-ID: <5196@cbnews.ATT.COM> Date: 29 Mar 89 03:21:02 GMT References: <5138@cbnews.ATT.COM> <5170@cbnews.ATT.COM> Sender: military@cbnews.ATT.COM Organization: Alberta Public Safety Services Lines: 43 Approved: military@att.att.com From: nmm@apss.ab.ca (Neil McCulloch) [mod.note: I've received several replies to my position on the Cold Fusion topic. Mostly, the readers seem interested in the concept and it's progress, and especially in military applications, but don't want lots of pie-in-the-sky. Mr. McCulloch sums it up pretty well... - Bill ] Hi! Yup, I'm interested in what the implication of this new technology might be in the military sphere, though the preliminary postings on the matter in sci.military have been disappointingly of the gee whiz what if category and then the imaginations take off. As I see it the sci part of the topic here concerns: Look, it may be fusion and it may work, but it ain't necessarily gonna change anything. What matters is energy density and this is a really big concern. So the point is, try to consider the implications of this *scientifically*. Novel concept! Given that it does work, the implications geopolitically are enormous. Consider, distributed power grids, cheap energy, what happens to oil and so on. A large portion of the world's military posture is concerned with the protection of oil supply routes. Note that this is a civilian "advance" that may have impact on military activity. Somewhat different from the opposite which is what has usually happened. Lot's of interesting side bars to this story, but the gee whiz stuff send to /dev/nul please. BTW, was the transistor a civilian or military development. I suspose the question is, what was the source of funds that Shockley et al used to develop the transistor? Have a nice day, eh! neil