From: Eliezer S. Yudkowsky (sentience@pobox.com)
Date: Fri Jul 20 2001 - 23:27:24 MDT
John Clark wrote:
>
> James Rogers <jamesr@best.com> Wrote:
>
> > The reason spherical decoys work is that from many aspects, the cone shaped
> > warhead looks essentially identical to the spherical decoy to the optical
> > sensor. Therefore, a sphere always takes on a theoretically valid profile
> > of a real warhead, thereby serving its purpose.
>
> Let me see if I understand this, from certain very specific directions a cone
> can look like a sphere so really a sphere is more like a cone than a cone is
> like a cone. You know, that really does sound like something a military man
> would say, like the Vietnamese war general who said "We destroyed the
> village to save it".
I don't see why you're making fun of this; it made sense to me. From
certain very specific directions a cone can look like a sphere. From all
directions, a sphere looks like a sphere. Most other decoy shapes will,
in some orientation, not look like a possible shape of a cone. A sensor
must respond to all possible signatures of a cone. A sensor must not
respond to all possible shapes of a decoy. The intersection of [sensor
signatures] with [cone decoy profiles] is less than the intersection of
[sensor signatures] with [sphere decoy profiles].
A sphere [decoy] is more like a cone [missile] than a cone [decoy] is like
a cone [missile].
A sphere is more like a cone than a cone is like a cone.
Makes sense to me...
-- -- -- -- --
Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/
Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence
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