Originally posted by Clavius 
Yes, one less reason to go to war over... That just leaves reasons like, religion, living space, ethnic cleansings, poor/rich differences, general stupidity and...
Who needs a reason anyway?! I am 100% certain that certain nations just go to war because they want to. (Example: Iraques imaginary WMD's that gave the green light to rape the whole country. War was forged with that country, even though international inspection crews swore that there were no WMD present.)
The sudden appearence of "free energy" from such devices may just even start wars. What if the discoverer doesn't want to share the technology with other nations? What if certain nations just don't want other nations to develope the same technology? A current example of that is the US that doesn't want Iran to have nuclear power. Or, what happens when the main source of income (oil) for certain countries, suddenly vanishes?
When I put on my tinfoil hat, I can imagine that they already have the technology ready, but left it in fridge to save for when we run out of oil.
Well, there are a lot of justifications for wars, certainly, which wouldn't go away whatever the weapon system. (I remain unconvinced that LENRs would make like death rays any more practical than they are now, really.
) Certainly the balance of power issues would have to sort out when such a technology appears, but sometimes there really is a blocking factor when it comes to self-interest: I'd think it more likely that those who currently *have* wealth and power who'll as always try to block newer technology that would change their relative position.
But even really predatory people seem to have a limit as to how much they'd let destructive conflicts get unprofitable. If this technology became feasible, though, sooner or later it would get out, and you'd have countries like Brazil who'd probably be quite happy to obtain it and make it available: they'd like to increase their standard of living without being resource-exporters : they've pretty much got all it takes to *become* a substantial world power if they can stop gutting their own environment to do it.
Similar Threads 
