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How Apocalyptic Is Now?

unherd.com

11–20 of 98 posts

Re: How Apocalyptic Is Now?

#11
post #6

Russian civil war was also the result of the 400 years of continuous tsarist expansion (among many other reasons); absorbing that much occupied land from baltics to pacific, and a lot of diverse people should be hard. dramatically the ruling family (romanovs) among the 3 most successful expansionist dynasties next to english & spanish were totally annihilated at the end by their own people.

Should Djenghis Khan and his successors not also be on that list?

Re: How Apocalyptic Is Now?

#12
When our immune system is over-fit to the wrong kind of thing, we call that an allergy. People who have been raised with animals or who have had to fight off parasites tend to have less allergies. I think this idea holds for our society; our societal immune system needs to be tested too, otherwise we attack ourselves (identity politics, the culture wars...) So I disagree with the author, I think we will be better off when this is done. We will go back to the bars and we will enjoy our lives more, we will think about our long term goals and make better efforts to get to them.

Re: How Apocalyptic Is Now?

#13
post #7

Interesting predictions. However, they do not fit the facts on the ground, at least here in Poland, which is some weeks ahead of the US with respect to the development of the epidemic. (I'm relieved that) people have gotten sick and tired of the restrictions, about 50% (and growing every day) are not wearing the masks inside anymore, or bother with the distancing, despite official requirements. All restaurants and ba…

They’ll resist the lockdown again until people start dying in large numbers and hospitals fill up and then it will be too late.

Re: How Apocalyptic Is Now?

#14
post #2

Always amuses me how the apocalypse of Inidgenous Americans never seems to make the cut...

Winners don't talk about the people they murdered to win. Same thing about Australia, Canada and less so New Zealand. It is also hilarious that the USSR is the only country apart from Japan to successfully industrialize and avoid a colonial genocide from a Western power. If you could pick a place to live being a Russian in Moscow 1919 would give you a much better chance of surviving compared to being an Indian in Man…

Russia was a Western power as far as Central Asia and the Caucasus were concerned

Re: How Apocalyptic Is Now?

#15

Unherd.com have had some of the best journalism of the crisis so far. In particular some of the interviews with epedimiologists: https://youtu.be/bfN2JWifLCY https://youtu.be/6cYjjEB3Ev8 https://youtu.be/bl-sZdfLcEk

Indeed and they are lining up new ones next week

https://mobile.twitter.com/freddiesayers/status/126132013778...

Re: How Apocalyptic Is Now?

#16
post #2

Always amuses me how the apocalypse of Inidgenous Americans never seems to make the cut...

It's sad but true. People even deny native genocide. I had a comment yesterday saying the natives didn't experience genocide but were simply "moved off their land".

But I guess I can understand it somewhat. It took me a long time to come to terms with it as well. The genocide of the natives didn't sink in until I saw a list of the native languages that were wiped out along with the natives. It was dozens and dozens of languages. Many times more languages than exists in the whole of europe.

Re: How Apocalyptic Is Now?

#17

When our immune system is over-fit to the wrong kind of thing, we call that an allergy. People who have been raised with animals or who have had to fight off parasites tend to have less allergies. I think this idea holds for our society; our societal immune system needs to be tested too, otherwise we attack ourselves (identity politics, the culture wars...) So I disagree with the author, I think we will be better off…

Herd immunity

Re: How Apocalyptic Is Now?

#18
post #7

Interesting predictions. However, they do not fit the facts on the ground, at least here in Poland, which is some weeks ahead of the US with respect to the development of the epidemic. (I'm relieved that) people have gotten sick and tired of the restrictions, about 50% (and growing every day) are not wearing the masks inside anymore, or bother with the distancing, despite official requirements. All restaurants and ba…

They’ll resist the lockdown again until people start dying in large numbers and hospitals fill up and then it will be too late.

It's evident by this point that you can avoid total lockdowns and still control infections. Permanent lockdown is simply not a realistic solution, so I expect we'll all start tending towards the Swedish model, regardless of how much gnashing of teeth and fiery twitter rhetoric such decisions will generate.

As for the apocalyptic atmosphere - it doesn't seem possible to really predict how bad/good things will get. How many predicted during WW2 that upon its exit would be a period of unprecedented social progress & economic equality?

Re: How Apocalyptic Is Now?

#19
post #11
post #6

Russian civil war was also the result of the 400 years of continuous tsarist expansion (among many other reasons); absorbing that much occupied land from baltics to pacific, and a lot of diverse people should be hard. dramatically the ruling family (romanovs) among the 3 most successful expansionist dynasties next to english & spanish were totally annihilated at the end by their own people.

Should Djenghis Khan and his successors not also be on that list?

Genghis and his descendants certainly conquered a huge area, but the empire quickly broke apart after Möngke (Genghis' successor) died, into the Ilkhanate, Yuan dynasty, Chagatai Khanate, and Golden Horde. Most of these didn't last more than a century, but more relevantly, the Mongols weren't particularly interested in spreading their culture and largely kept their language a private matter. Subsequently Mongolian (the language) basically doesn't exist outside of Mongolia/Inner Mongolia (China) and culturally there is far less influence as compared to say, the Russian or Spanish empires.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Division_of_the_Mongol_Empire

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