Whorled View

The war on Terror costs money. Lots of it. It seems then that the best way to win the war on terror is to free up tons of money, making it available to the economy so the war on terror can be funded.

Where to get such money? Well, according to the results of a British researcher: http://torontosun.com/Lifestyle/2007/10/20/4590932-sun.html we could very likely solve heart disease problem cheaply and efficiently. Heart disease is the #1 killer in the United States. It costs Americans more money every year by far than does the Iraqi conflict. The wild thing is that tons of research backs up this claim the cheap doses of Vitamin E (an antioxidant), cheap resveratrol (another antioxidant), and cheap megadoses of Vitamin C can prevent, and even reverse the conditions that lead to heart attacks, and yet our “noble” allopathic tradition discourages it, claiming that it’s dangerous because it can give you diarrhea … or even worse: it might make you fart!

Oh! The horrors!

Meanwhile the war on terror is bankrupting the world, yet heart disease costs even more. Same thing with Cancer (costs more than the war on terror), which disease is also very treatable, very effectively by extremely cheap IV based ascorbate treatments (as high as 200 mg/day, but usually 70 mg twice/week is adequate). So if we started using these cheap treatments and reinvesting that money usually spent on Cancer and Heart Disease into the economy then we would have more than enough to pay for the War on Terror. Not to mention it would save 100,000,000’s lives every year worldwide - allowing the patients to live full and productive lives.

But then who’s going to pay for all the yachts? No wonder the AMA and your very own doctor frowns upon anything that has anything to do with Vitamin C. And so we’ll bankrupt the economy of the world. Just remember - it wasn’t the war that did it. It was the refusal to save money where money could have been saved.

Further brainstorming over a solar array / weapons defense system did produce one interesting possibility: a low-cost space-based mirror array for CSP (concentrated solar power). The idea seems silly at first glance because it seems far easier to place the optics on earth close to the energy converting apparatus - however some out-of-the-box thinking (as shown below) reveals that space-based optics could be far easier, cheaper, maintenance free, and effective than an earth-based solution (note that optics can be the biggest cost and maintenance for CSP):

1) Orbiting the earth are giant concave mirrors (parabolic in shape), each 7 square miles in area made from ultrathin reflective fabric (like mylar) stretched between 3 structural points (2 miles between each point in this example). Each mirror keeps its parabolic shape by solar wind. Secondary optics are also located at the focal point of the mirror and continually adjust to redirect the beam of concentrated light back to a receiving solar plant on the earth where the suns rays would be converted to usable energy.

Above: a small section of a giant array of parabolic reflective fabric mirrors.

2) Innumerable additional 7 sq.mile mirrors can be simply added, each requiring only one additional structural point, 7 more square miles of reflective fabric, and optics at the focal point of each mirror to send the concentrated solar power to a receiving solar plant on earth.

3) The incoming solar power would be distributed among receiving solar plants strategically placed on earth, so each plant would receive the maximum amount of suns possible without damaging the energy conversion facilities. Maintenance could be performed on these earth-based solar plants at night.

The solar reflectors, being in the vacuum of space, would never require any kind of maintenance. Periodic adjustments can be made to keep them approximately facing the sun via temporarily collapsing one mirror to let solar wind push the array back into orientation. The focal point optics necessary to send each mirrors rays to the right location on earth would be powered by solar power of course.

Oh yeah, another thing … this can indeed also be used as an anti-missile defense system if multiple arrays are used, providing round-the-clock protection, while being tons cheaper than any other Star-Wars type technology. It overcomes all the problems of the Solar Missile Defense scenario posed below and has countless advantages.

Also, nighttime surveillance in other parts of the would could be as easy as turning on a light bulb, and can you imagine the psychological effect it could have on the enemy?

Just now one of my neurons dedicated to solar power just misfired into the part of my brain reserved for missile defense technology and I had a Reese’s moment … why don’t we mix the two?!

Solar Two facility in California

All the top scientists agree that the best renewable energy is CSP (concentrated solar power), and 100’s if not 1000’s of CSP plants need to be deployed if solar is to provide the bulk of our nation’s energy. Refocusing all 1 million mirrors on the incoming missile is just a matter of a million stepper motors and calibration (could periodically done with a satellite, one mirror at a time).

Another beautiful hypothesis destroyed by an ugly fact.

I’m certain that focusing the power of a million suns on a warhead will destroy the electronics within a few seconds rendering the missile useless. Then the other neuron in my brain kicked in and reminded me that solar arrays only work 10 hours/day (oh yeah, duh!). Besides, due to the curvature of the earth it won’t work until the missiles are nearly in striking range (again, oh yeah, duh!). Okay. Another beautiful hypothesis destroyed by an ugly fact. Make that 2 ugly facts. I’m sure I could think up some more ugly facts if given more time. Back to the drawing board. I suppose we could always use solar purely for the far less glitzy cause: saving the planet. Ho hum.