Russell McMahon wrote:

> If it is possible to keep the Genie in the bottle, and it probably 
> isn't, 

I don't think it can be possible to keep any such genie in the bottle. One
reason for this is that we, collectively, as a species, seem to have /much/
more fun trying to find new genies and opening their bottles than trying
only a small fraction as hard to find ways to keep them in the bottle once
we find them. 

> For example (only) if acquiring as much of the world's Palladium ASASASAP
> was liable to make a substantial difference to the widespread
> implementability of CF then palladium acquisition by *every* means
> possible may seem suitably compelling to merit implementation. 

Well, in this case, maybe. But then... imagine the US (or any other)
government trying to buy up all available Palladium. I don't think that the
traders worldwide are so disconnected as to not notice that -- probably the
next day this hits the trading news. And I don't think that the scientists
worldwide are so far off the track once they hear from the traders what's
going on with Palladium and the US (or any other) government. 


> The intent of the statement is, hopefully clear.

Not really, not to me at least. But I guess that goes beyond the
permissible content here.

> * Note that "all countries that have used nuclear weapons" is not
> publicly known with certainty if testing is included in "used" as it
> probably should be. 

Well, whether it should be included or not, I didn't mean to include it,
and neither did seemingly you (in your original statement). At least the
statement doesn't seem to make much sense if you in fact included it.


>> I don't see, however, that spending efforts in discovering it first will
>> do anything to prevent the feared disaster.
> 
> See above and example only re eg Palladium.

And see my answer. While one doesn't exclude the other, I think efforts to
keep the various genies in their various bottles would be wiser than
efforts to get them out faster than the neighbor. (And I'm not talking
about international treaties here. This is an effort that goes far beyond
nations and contracts. This is /real/ hard work :)


>> If anything, it will speed up the discovery process of everybody else --
>> so the to be feared organizations will have the capability sooner
>> rather than later, but they will get it.
> 
> It doesn't matter too too much WHEN it happens if it's going to happen.
> What matters is how well you can control the event. And odds are, if it
> ever happens, it won't be very controllable.

/This/ is exactly my point. It seems to make all your other points moot,
doesn't it?


>> I don't see how this is affected by the sequence of discovery; it can
>> happen no matter what. As far as the timeline goes, as I said before
>> I'm rather convinced that an early discovery by the US (or anybody
>> else) only speeds up the discovery by everybody else -- but doesn't
>> delay or even prevent it.
> 
> If, say, [...] discovered CF and kept it a secret and it was not semi
> simultaneously steam engined elsewhere then the announcement would be
> liable to be delayed for some while, made in many locations worldwide
> simultaneously and be very very very loud 

I don't buy that discovering it elsewhere earlier would prevent such a
scenario, if it is indeed possible. We're talking about CF here, not
nuclear weapons. No country will just sit there and let the US (or any
other country) hoard all of the one (to follow your argument) element
that's necessary for the process --  this would be suicide for all other
economies. So this one element, one way or another, will be widespread --
and much more than Plutonium or Uran, if CF is what we are assuming it will
be under the chosen scenario. Even if the technology is not published, at
least not right away, any decent-sized country will have, sooner or later,
access to it and the means necessary.

Again, I don't think efforts to free the genius from the bottle are the
best way to keep it in there. I think something else would be needed -- but
that is, unluckily, harder to get by than Maxim chips in low production
quantities :)

Gerhard

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