On Thu, 8 May 2008 05:36:20 +0000 (UTC), Andrew Plotkin
<erkyrath@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>Here, Gene <gene@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>> Andrew Plotkin <erkyrath@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote in news:fvtru2$3le$1
>> @[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>> > I categorize tracks and bullets as technologies that really
>> > will never go out of style.
>> Sort of like swords.
>You mean the way nobody makes or uses knives any more?
No, the way nobody makes or uses *swords* any more. Knives and
swords are different. In particular, knives are still very good
general-purpose cutting tools. Swords, like guns, are really only
good for one thing[1], and swords have been completely outclassed
at that one thing.
Technologies do go out of style, even though they are just as good
as they always were at doing what they do. Weapons technologies, in
particular, go very quickly and thoroughly out of style, as that's
one area where "it still works as well as it always did, so why do
I care that the neighbors have something better?" is a really silly
question.
When we develop sidearms that are as superior to slug-throwing pistols
as pistols were to swords, pistols will go out of style. Everyone who
is serious about fighting and can afford one will hang their guns over
the fireplace next to great-grandpa's sabre and buy the new tech, and
everyone else will say, "gee, I hope the people with the fancy new
weapons turn out to be nice, because I'm not fighting them".
Most people on Earth can't afford AK-47s[2]. Most people on Earth can
afford bows and arrows, which are just as effective at killing people
as they were when the Mongols used them to conquer half the known world.
The number of people using bows and arrows to fight other people using
AK-47s, is about nil.
>Expecting slug-guns to be replaced by laser pistols is like expecting
>swords to be replaced by light sabers.
Depends on how narrowly you define "laser pistol". But expecting
firearms to be replaced by *something*, that's just common sense.
It's almost certain that, within this century, we will be able to
build hand-held laser weapons that are massively superior to ordinary
pistols. Whether they have the handgrip-and-barrel form factor of
a "pistol", whether they will be called "laser pistols", I'm not
sure. I don't think it matters.
But the only thing that is going to stop them from almost completely
displacing the current sort of pistol sometime in this century or the
next, is the general collapse of civilization, or the development of
some weapon that is even better still.
[1] Or perhaps one very closely-related group of things, if you're
being particularly picky about it.
[2] Or could afford them if it were legal, but can't close the deal
on the black market.
--
*John Schilling * "Anything worth doing, *
*Member:AIAA,NRA,ACLU,SAS,LP * is worth doing for money" *
*Chief Scientist & General Partner * -13th Rule of Acquisition *
*White Elephant Research, LLC * "There is no substitute *
*John.Schillin@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
* for success" *
*661-718-0955 or 661-275-6795 * -58th Rule of Acquisition *
|
