God of Thunder and Rock'n'Roll (archmage) wrote,
God of Thunder and Rock'n'Roll
archmage

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British Scientists Slam US Plasma Weapon

So, it's like this. US military R&D funding went to research on something referred to as the "Pulsed Energy Projectile" (PEP) device which "fires a laser pulse that generates a burst of expanding plasma when it hits something solid". According to the New Scientist, the basic thing is that you get incapacitated with pain instead of killed.

So, non-lethal fighting. Seems like a pretty human thing to do, especially for the US military. But a group of pain researchers are not happy. they doubt there's a solid ethical basis for the research, and say the weapon could be used for torture.

OK, first off, you can make claims on both sides of the "ethics" argument, but non-lethal weapons would seem to be right in line with "humane" actions (of course, so would "not fighting", but hey, baby steps I guess). As for being used for torture? Hey, guess what, Sir Stupid, so can electricity, baseball bats, and water. Should THESE things be stopped, as well? Christ, you can torture someone with lots of things, but torture is kinda useless if the person is incapacitated...hard to get info out of someone that can't talk.

The whole things seems goofy to me...but that's worldwide politics for ya.
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