Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!genrad!decvax!harpo!seismo!hao!hplabs!sri-unix!SASW@MIT-MC From: SASW%MIT-MC@sri-unix.UUCP Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers Subject: Dr. Strangelove and "The Doomsday Machine" Message-ID: <2563@sri-arpa.UUCP> Date: Sat, 2-Jul-83 00:25:00 EDT Article-I.D.: sri-arpa.2563 Posted: Sat Jul 2 00:25:00 1983 Date-Received: Mon, 27-Jun-83 22:46:13 EDT Lines: 14 From: Steven A. SwernofskyFrom: Newman.ES at PARC-MAXC.ARPA Actually, the "Doomsday Machine" portrayed in this movie was a quite serious proposal made by Herman Kahn of the RAND Corporation in the early 1960's. The title character is a parody of Kahn, and the movie satirizes, among many other things, the type of "thinking about the unthinkable" made infamous by Kahn and other RANDites. I was told instead that the title character was a parody of Kubrick's government professor at Harvard. Guess who that is? (Hint -- he later became a key adviser to a Republican President.) -- Steve