Deterrence itself is not a preeminent value; the primary values a... by Herman Kahn

Deterrence itself is not a preeminent value; the primary values are safety and morality.

Herman Kahn

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Categorized in : Safety Morality Primaries

Risk-taking is the essence of innovation. by Herman Kahn

Risk-taking is the essence of innovation.

innovation risk essence

Authority is not power; that's coercion. Authority is not knowledge; that's persuasion, or seduction. Authority is simply that the author has the right to make a statement and to be heard.

seduction persuasion coercion

I'm against ignorance. I'm against sloppy, emotional thinking. I'm against fashionable thinking. I am against the whole cliché of the moment.

emotional ignorance thinking

From a scientific perspective there is some indication that a nuclear war could deplete the earth's ozone layer or, less likely, could bring on a new Ice Age - but there is no suggestion that either the created order or mankind would be destroyed in the process.

ozone war order

Failures of perspective in decision-making can be due to aspects of the social utility paradox, but more often result from simple mistakes caused by inadequate thought.

perspective simple mistake

Because of new technologies, new wealth, new conditions of domestic life and of international relations, unprecedented criteria and issues are coming up for national decision.

issues technology decision

The objective of nuclear-weapons policy should not be solely to decrease the number of weapons in the world, but to make the world safer - which is not necessarily the same thing.

objectivity weapons numbers

My guess is that nuclear weapons will be used sometime in the next hundred years, but that their use is much more likely to be small and limited than widespread and unconstrained.

next weapons years

To the extent that these advanced weapons or their components are treated as articles of commerce, perhaps for peaceful uses as in the Plowshare program, their cost would be well within the resources available to many large private organizations.

peaceful organization use

A healthy and fully functioning society must allocate its resources among a variety of competing interests, all of which are more or less valid but none of which should take precedence over national security.

resources healthy should

Projecting a persuasive image of a desirable and practical future is extremely important to high morale, to dynamism, to consensus, and in general to help the wheels of society turn smoothly.

wheels important helping

For if enough people were really convinced that growth should be halted, and if they acted on that conviction, then billions of others might be deprived of any realistic hope of gaining the opportunities now enjoyed by the more fortunate.

growth opportunity people

Nuclear war is such an emotional subject that many people see the weapons themselves as the common enemy of humanity.

emotional war people

Only those who are ideologically opposed to military programs think of the defense budget as the first and best place to get resources for social welfare needs.

welfare-programs military thinking

A surprising number of government committees will make important decisions on fundamental matters with less attention than each individual would give to buying a suit.

government numbers giving

Nevertheless, during the sixty years of the twentieth century many problems have come increasingly into the realm of acceptable public discussion.

century problem years

Many people believe that the current system must inevitably end in total annihilation. They reject, sometimes very emotionally, any attempts to analyze this notion.

sometimes believe people

It is immoral from almost any point of view to refuse to defend yourself and others from very grave and terrible threats, even as there are limits to the means that can be used in such defense.

limits views mean

In a world which is armed to its teeth with nuclear weapons, every quarrel or difference of opinion may lead to violence of a kind quite different from what is possible today.

differences may world

In 1960 I published a book that attempted to direct attention to the possibility of a thermonuclear war, to ways of reducing the likelihood of such a war, and to methods for coping with the consequences should war occur despite our efforts to avoid it.

effort war book