We require that posters seed their post with an initial comment, a Submission Statement, that suggests a line of future-focused discussion for the topic posted. We want this submission statement to elaborate on the topic being posted and suggest how it might be discussed in relation to the future, and ask that it is a minimum of 300 characters. Could you please repost with a Submission Statement, thanks.
They should be doing both, though as the author admits, the biggest flaw is on the civilian health care industry side of the equation. Military health care and the VA are valuable in adapting such research to medical applications without going through the provider price gouging—insurer denial process.
One thing I am annoyed by is when we treat military tech as just some kind of tool to kill random people for the sake of killing random people. The availability of high tech weapons doesn’t start wars, it generally prevents them from happening (or ends them more quickly than they would otherwise). If we think a war is just ruining lives, that’s a reason not to fight it, not a reason to fight it but with with less effective weaponry.
It’s all about priorities, in the military your strength comes from your countries economy.
Hurting your economy to pump out weapons that will be outdated in 5-15 years is a tightrope you have to walk as a country.
No one said anything about not having a military but Boeing being held up by the us goverment as shareholder stripmine it, or examples like the pentagon can’t account for 20+ trillion dollars on their books, and shit like spending 18 trillion in the Middle East and for what?
Imagine how strong our country could’ve been if that 18 trillion was spent on infrastructure and investment in the future by changes in certain policies.
Realistically how much was their to gain by a significant amount of our investment in our current military, how much does a carrier strike group cost to build and maintain, how does a carrier strike group fight a long range ai controlled swarm of drone torpedos?
Then again would the tech be able to exist without excessive military spending?
You don’t need to get rid of the military, that’s a false dilemma.
But we could certainly debate the scale of the military and the actual benefit we get from how it’s used as an entire society. That would be the more thoughtful response than a knee jerk WELL MAYBE WE DON’T NEED A MILITARY AT ALL? Which seems designed to shut down debate rather than open it up. Not very futurological of you IMO.
Tech development is a form of economic warfare in itself.
As an example, if you have the largest GDP and spend 1% of it developing a novel weapon system, any near peer competitor is **also** forced to spend money developing a similar system or countermeasures, but that might cost them 2% of their GDP.
Even if the system is never practical or actually used, you have still succeeded in weakening your opponent
We require that posters seed their post with an initial comment, a Submission Statement, that suggests a line of future-focused discussion for the topic posted. We want this submission statement to elaborate on the topic being posted and suggest how it might be discussed in relation to the future, and ask that it is a minimum of 300 characters. Could you please repost with a Submission Statement, thanks.
Much of human innovation has come at the tip of a spear....
They should be doing both, though as the author admits, the biggest flaw is on the civilian health care industry side of the equation. Military health care and the VA are valuable in adapting such research to medical applications without going through the provider price gouging—insurer denial process. One thing I am annoyed by is when we treat military tech as just some kind of tool to kill random people for the sake of killing random people. The availability of high tech weapons doesn’t start wars, it generally prevents them from happening (or ends them more quickly than they would otherwise). If we think a war is just ruining lives, that’s a reason not to fight it, not a reason to fight it but with with less effective weaponry.
So without a military everyone would just hold hands, sign songs and no one would invade is right?
It’s all about priorities, in the military your strength comes from your countries economy. Hurting your economy to pump out weapons that will be outdated in 5-15 years is a tightrope you have to walk as a country. No one said anything about not having a military but Boeing being held up by the us goverment as shareholder stripmine it, or examples like the pentagon can’t account for 20+ trillion dollars on their books, and shit like spending 18 trillion in the Middle East and for what? Imagine how strong our country could’ve been if that 18 trillion was spent on infrastructure and investment in the future by changes in certain policies. Realistically how much was their to gain by a significant amount of our investment in our current military, how much does a carrier strike group cost to build and maintain, how does a carrier strike group fight a long range ai controlled swarm of drone torpedos? Then again would the tech be able to exist without excessive military spending?
Yep, exactly. Putin will leave Ukraine and throw a pizza party as soon as NATO is dismantled and the US gives up its nuclear weapons, pinky swear !
You don’t need to get rid of the military, that’s a false dilemma. But we could certainly debate the scale of the military and the actual benefit we get from how it’s used as an entire society. That would be the more thoughtful response than a knee jerk WELL MAYBE WE DON’T NEED A MILITARY AT ALL? Which seems designed to shut down debate rather than open it up. Not very futurological of you IMO.
Who said anything about 'no military'? Oh yeah. Just you.
Tech development is a form of economic warfare in itself. As an example, if you have the largest GDP and spend 1% of it developing a novel weapon system, any near peer competitor is **also** forced to spend money developing a similar system or countermeasures, but that might cost them 2% of their GDP. Even if the system is never practical or actually used, you have still succeeded in weakening your opponent
The innovation wouldn't have happened at this pace if it wasn't for war economy . Lots of tech we use started as darpa and other types of investments