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</o:shapelayout></xml><![endif]--></head><body bgcolor=white lang=EN-US link=blue vlink=purple><div class=WordSection1><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><div><div style='border:none;border-top:solid #B5C4DF 1.0pt;padding:3.0pt 0in 0in 0in'><p class=MsoNormal><b><span style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Tahoma","sans-serif";color:windowtext'>From:</span></b><span style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Tahoma","sans-serif";color:windowtext'> extropy-chat-bounces@lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces@lists.extropy.org] <b>On Behalf Of </b>Anders Sandberg<br><b>Sent:</b> Saturday, September 08, 2012 12:50 PM<br><b>To:</b> ExI chat list<br><b>Subject:</b> Re: [ExI] Power sats as weapons<o:p></o:p></span></p></div></div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><div><p class=MsoNormal>On 08/09/2012 16:32, spike wrote:<o:p></o:p></p></div><blockquote style='margin-top:5.0pt;margin-bottom:5.0pt'><div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><div><p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:12.0pt'><span style='color:#1F497D'>>>…</span><span style='color:#1F497D'>A disadvantage I can see is that a space based laser might not be effective in maintaining the old paradigm of mutual assured destruction</span><span style='color:#1F497D'>…</span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div></blockquote><p class=MsoNormal><br><span style='color:#1F497D'>>…</span>More importantly a broken solar sat produces *loads* of fragments in the same orbit: it might be that you don't need any weapons for MAD, but that the Kessler fragmentation cascade will make any solar-sat system impossible<span style='color:#1F497D'>…</span>--<span style='color:#1F497D'> </span>Anders Sandberg,<o:p></o:p></p><pre><span style='color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></pre><pre><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></pre><pre><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>Ja, Anders, but the Kessler frag cascade doesn’t really apply to GEO, at least in the accidental case. In that orbit, everything is going in the same direction, unlike LEO, where the meltdown of all assets is becoming a palpable risk. If some bad actor decided to take out everything in GEO, that is also a risk. Since everything there is more or less in a line, it may be theoretically possible to kill everything in GEO with one shot, oy vey.<o:p></o:p></span></pre><pre><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></pre><pre><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>That was the idea behind mid-sats such as Iridium: use a bunch of interconnected mid-level orbits such that they wouldn’t be vulnerable to LEO frag cascade and wouldn’t be nearly as vulnerable to some cable company CEO who wanted to damage or destroy the competitors.<o:p></o:p></span></pre><pre><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></pre><pre><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>spike<o:p></o:p></span></pre></div></body></html>