perfidy

In response to Johno's post about Sterling's Luddite screed:

Bruce is an insightful and clever guy, mostly. What he is willfully ignoring here is the provisional nature of all technology. As the Connestoga wagon was relentlessly consumed by the recreational vehicle, so all technologies are on death row, waiting for their final appeal to fail. Then they are replaced by something cheaper, more efficient, or better. These ten technologies are no worse, or better than hundreds of others. What he is offering is a purely aesthetic evaluation of the technologies he'd most like to see replaced by their more advanced descendents.

For example, coal, while not an optimal solution to our energy needs, is a good enough fit that it provides for a quarter of our energy requirements. Certainly, orbital solar power satellites or the perennially twenty-years distant cheap fusion power would be better in most respects. Less environmental impact, cheaper, less waste, and fusion reactors look really cool on the back of a DeLorean. However, the primary stumbling block to the adoption of these superior technologies is that they do not yet exist.

All technologies, with certain exceptions, are awkward compromises between cost, performance, and safety. Like the joke about NASA, "Better, faster, cheaper: pick two." We could all wish for the inhead, superultramegahigh definition tv with the dolbyphonic 9.3 3D surround sound that comes straight from the ether directly into your cranium. And it won't scratch like a DVD! But the premature destruction of these technologies would not advance the process of getting their replacements. With coal, most obviously.

But as a space nut, I take particular exception for his call for the immediate demise of space travel - just as it looks like the whole thing might be going somewhere. Given Sterling's general political leanings, I would think that he would be happy that private grass-rootsy space exploration endeavors are on the verge of actually working. Killing what little we have now would make it impossible to get to the next, better stage.