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jjk16610/01/20241 replyview on HN

Mutually assured destruction is a technical solution - when it is suicidal for either side to attack each other (because of a large and robust nuclear arsenal), both can be confident the other won't attack.

There are potentially other technical solutions. Anti-ballistic missile systems could make nuclear strikes non viable, as could more advanced defenses. One could imagine weapons designed to remotely pre-detonate nuclear weapons making them more dangerous to possess than to use. You could by subterfuge render your adversary's nuclear capabilities inoperable. You could find technical solutions to the issues that make the countries adversaries in the first place, for example eliminating dependence on a resource you compete over. You could spread propaganda to install a friendly government.

There could be and almost certainly are even better technical solutions that I don't know, and perhaps no one currently knows. Every problem ever solved was at some point unsolved.


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asmor10/01/2024

You are misunderstanding me bringing up mutually assured destruction. Sure, it prevents preemptive strikes, but it doesn't prevent accidental launches, broken early warning systems and bad communication.

Do you think the fact that we haven't done any of these other measures to a degree that the danger is no longer substantial in 70 or so years is a matter of technology or priority? If it's priority, how do we prioritize? Is that, perhaps, a non-technical problem? If it's a tech advancement problem, how do not constantly have a rolling window of uncontrolled potentially civilization-ending technology?

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