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Ask HN: Aren't you afraid of a possible world conflict?
81–90 of 131 posts
Re: Ask HN: Aren't you afraid of a possible world conflict?
#82The thing is, I no longer trust any news source. They all exist to serve their agenda, while rarely providing the real picture. So there is no way for me, as a regular citizen, to truly know what happens in the world or a particular regional conflict. So while I do worry that there might be a bigger war, I also realize that the picture painted by the news, or the "promises" that different country leaders make, are me…
> The thing is, I no longer trust any news source. They all exist to serve their agenda, while rarely providing the real picture. So there is no way for me, as a regular citizen, to truly know what happens in the world or a particular regional conflict. This is what the authoritarians want. It’s not actually hard to understand the major trends are in the world, with accurate information available, but that’s bad for…
I find statement like "there is objective truth" - dangerous.
The objective truth in the 70s was, "smoking is good for you". Since then, the narrative changed. Politics, and even s̶c̶i̶e̶n̶c̶e̶ scientific research (to a degree) -- are subjective, despite what world leaders or politicians want you to believe. You can manipulate the data in a way that suits you or your agenda, you can buy scientific researches, etc. It's happening right now in all major, and minor conflicts.
Statements like "objective truth" tend to remind me of the grumpy old engineer who thinks that his way of doing things "is the only correct way", and rejects any modern approach to software engineering.
Now, I don't say you should ignore all statements, or news source. You should be informed enough to a degree you think is relevant for you, while understanding that there will be no objective truth, and unless you have a motivation (be it power, money, or something else) to continue to believe in your established world view, you need to be willing to revisit your "objective truth" every once in a while.
Re: Ask HN: Aren't you afraid of a possible world conflict?
#83No.
This may sound weird but being afraid or worrying about something that I don't have much influence on is a waste of time and energy.
Yes, I do vote and are engaged in local politics, but ultimately it is up to the leaders we elect to make the decisions. But in critical situations it may be actions that does not favor me at all.
And I am fine with that, I go on with my life, while preparing as best as I can to handle whatever the future throws in my way.
Re: Ask HN: Aren't you afraid of a possible world conflict?
#84Earlier quoted context omitted.
> war profiteering As with anything, there will be the ones who profits from it. Always has been, always will be. But the overall description is a ridiculous oversimplification of what is happening.
feel free to add details you think are missing.
On the highest level it is the war for the world order between democracies and autocracies.
On the level below it is a war for the spheres of influence between China and US.
Next, it is Russian war for the control of the Europe and middle east.
Below it is the wars by Iranian/Russian/Chinese proxies to help with the goals mentioned above.
In all ongoing conflicts the parties are aligned with the China on top of the chain in one side of the conflict and the US on the other.
Profits from stealing goods, people, or territories are just a means to ease the path to the goal or to improve the strategic position, but not the source of the conflict itself.
Re: Ask HN: Aren't you afraid of a possible world conflict?
#85[deleted]
Re: Ask HN: Aren't you afraid of a possible world conflict?
#86Military victory has been a precondition to military punishment for all of human history. You had to disable the enemy’s forces before you used the threat of further violence to enact your political will. In fact for all of recorded warfare, it was expected that the victors would be able to commit what we today call war crimes with impunity. The default consequence of defeat was all of your men being killed, all of y…
I always have trouble with claims that our time is unique,because I can quickly construct arguments for just about any other time. So yes, our era is unique, but is it uniquely unique?
It depends on who you are. Peasent? nothing different until 1750, Aristocrat? unique pretty much any time humanity invented something.
Re: Ask HN: Aren't you afraid of a possible world conflict?
#87TL;DR people don't understand the dangers. They grossly underestimate the complexity and fragility of our current global supply chain and they especially underestimate their dependence on it. A major world conflict would make it difficult even to feed my cat. COVID should have been a wake-up call, but that has receded safely into the past as the "normal" ppl craved has resumed.
Re: Ask HN: Aren't you afraid of a possible world conflict?
#88Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The thing is, I no longer trust any news source. They all exist to serve their agenda, while rarely providing the real picture. So there is no way for me, as a regular citizen, to truly know what happens in the world or a particular regional conflict. This is what the authoritarians want. It’s not actually hard to understand the major trends are in the world, with accurate information available, but that’s bad for…
I find statement like "there is objective truth" - dangerous. The objective truth in the 70s was, "smoking is good for you". Since then, the narrative changed. Politics, and even s̶c̶i̶e̶n̶c̶e̶ scientific research (to a degree) -- are subjective, despite what world leaders or politicians want you to believe. You can manipulate the data in a way that suits you or your agenda, you can buy scientific researches, etc. It…
I would say it differently. Even using your example, "smoking is good for you" is objectively less true than "smoking is bad for you". We know that now.
The problem is that 1) we don't always have enough data to know what is true, and 2) we have a lot of people working as hard as they can to obscure the truth in order to push their own agenda.
All those post-modernist philosophers that I scoffed at were on to something: If we cannot determine the truth from the data available to us, then in practice, there is no truth. That may not have been the point they were trying to make, but for us who are living in it, it works out the same.
Re: Ask HN: Aren't you afraid of a possible world conflict?
#89I could make some arguments about economics, world order, and devastating weapons, but i think this above all: governments barely got their people to go along with covid measures.
Re: Ask HN: Aren't you afraid of a possible world conflict?
#90Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The thing is, I no longer trust any news source. They all exist to serve their agenda, while rarely providing the real picture. So there is no way for me, as a regular citizen, to truly know what happens in the world or a particular regional conflict. This is what the authoritarians want. It’s not actually hard to understand the major trends are in the world, with accurate information available, but that’s bad for…
I find statement like "there is objective truth" - dangerous. The objective truth in the 70s was, "smoking is good for you". Since then, the narrative changed. Politics, and even s̶c̶i̶e̶n̶c̶e̶ scientific research (to a degree) -- are subjective, despite what world leaders or politicians want you to believe. You can manipulate the data in a way that suits you or your agenda, you can buy scientific researches, etc. It…
> The objective truth in the 70s was, "smoking is good for you". Since then, the narrative changed.
Your misunderstanding of the history doesn’t mean it was ever good for you. People didn’t call cigarettes “coffin nails” because they thought it was good for you and e.g. the specific lung cancer link was known at least as far back as the 1920s. The reason why it wasn’t named earlier is the same reason you’re wrong about it today: it was an enormously profitable industry and they were able to produce the ads you’re remembering which got far more attention than those pesky scientists who had been correct for half a century by that time – and many smokers blamed people for not telling them earlier, even though they had downplayed the warnings given at the time. A very similar story unfolded with climate change where people like to say that it was confused or contradictory for a long time when it was settled by the late 1970s because they didn’t want to admit having given equal weight to the fossil fuel lobbyists as they did climate scientists.
That’s the key distinction here: we have processes for verifying and testing theories. Yes, scientific research has had fraud but we know about those because their work has been critically examined. We should expect that everywhere rather than giving up on the concept.