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Can men live without war? (1956)

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Re: Can men live without war? (1956)

#61

Post by kikokikokiko »

openrisk wrote: post #51

When a child is born there is nothing remotely resembling large scale warfare inscribed in its genes and the discretional cultural path that must be travelled before such detrimental collective phenomena come to be seen as innate and inevitable is enormous. Our predicament in relation to our war "habit" is similar to many other challenges we are facing: malignant social patterns that got established before a successi…

Even purely instinct based animals, like chimps amd lions, engage in war between groups. A human child is still a primate, and no ammount of cultural bs will make your assumption of purity at birth a reality. Life is, in all it's forms, a war between organisms to see who can get more resources. Life is war, unfortunately.

Re: Can men live without war? (1956)

#62

Post by sparky_z »

jokoon wrote: post #14

In an ideal future, firearms would be banned worldwide. A body like interpol would investigate the entire world, to surveil if anybody is trying to make firearms. People would make bows and spears, but it would be more difficult to conduct war. It would not make war and violence impossible, but it would certainly be a better world. EDIT: lots of pedants: obviously there would be an joint army answering to an internat…

After Interpol's surveillance determined that someone was illegally making firearms, what would happen next? Presumably some sort of enforcement to stop them? How would that enforcement be conducted?

Re: Can men live without war? (1956)

#63

Post by GeoAtreides »

nyc_data_geek wrote: post #3
hnthrowaway0328 wrote: post #2

No we cannot. A small percentage of humans are wired with a strong territorial mind and/or a greedy personality. It's in the gene. Some of them eventually become leaders.

A small percentage of humans can catch some hands and get stuffed into lockers by the rest of us who would prefer not to be led by them.

> get stuffed into lockers

great way to make bug-controlling supervillains, wouldn't recommend it

Re: Can men live without war? (1956)

#64

Post by shrubble »

jokoon wrote: post #14

In an ideal future, firearms would be banned worldwide. A body like interpol would investigate the entire world, to surveil if anybody is trying to make firearms. People would make bows and spears, but it would be more difficult to conduct war. It would not make war and violence impossible, but it would certainly be a better world. EDIT: lots of pedants: obviously there would be an joint army answering to an internat…

It's been tried in the past, and the disarmed populace is often killed by their own government or invaded and displaced via demographic changes that the compromised/paid off government leaders allow.

Re: Can men live without war? (1956)

#65

Post by XorNot »

akira2501 wrote: post #39
graeme wrote: post #23

The thing is without force your stuff gets taken. We haven't got a good way around this. Our current peace is heavily based on nuclear weapons and the implied threat of force. Don't like the status quo? Use force to try to change it. Do like the status quo? Use force to try to keep it that way. We don't have a stable equiliubrium where no force exists in the system. Many in this thread effectively say "You can do wha…

> and land get taken. It's always land. This is because land is scarce. You can keep things that aren't scarce without force. > Is there any convincing argument for getting out of this equilibrium? The total destruction of artificial scarcity?

Why would you think scarcity is artificial? Have you tried growing your own food lately? Do you have an army of robots who are doing it for you?

Re: Can men live without war? (1956)

#66

Post by pphysch »

ocschwar wrote: post #45
graeme wrote: post #23

The thing is without force your stuff gets taken. We haven't got a good way around this. Our current peace is heavily based on nuclear weapons and the implied threat of force. Don't like the status quo? Use force to try to change it. Do like the status quo? Use force to try to keep it that way. We don't have a stable equiliubrium where no force exists in the system. Many in this thread effectively say "You can do wha…

1945 gave us a way out of this equilibrium. Not the nukes. The Bretton Woods principles. It was not a kumbayah exchange of platitudes. It was an agreement to let things be settled in the free market. Want more oil from Nigeria? Offer them more money than the other buyers. Want to fish the waters around Tuvalu? Radio them and offer more money. Want Congolese cobalt? Same idea. This was the brainchild of John Maynard K…

> That could have brought us to a world wide peace in 1945, but only the First World went along with this idea. The Second World rallied around endless revolution and war until we get a worker's paradise. And the Third World tried to stay out altogether. (Reminder: by the original definition, Switzerland was in the Third World).

How does your thesis explain the countless violent coups orchestrated and death squads funded by the First World, for example Guatemala 1954?

Re: Can men live without war? (1956)

#67

Post by nvy »

akira2501 wrote: post #39
graeme wrote: post #23

The thing is without force your stuff gets taken. We haven't got a good way around this. Our current peace is heavily based on nuclear weapons and the implied threat of force. Don't like the status quo? Use force to try to change it. Do like the status quo? Use force to try to keep it that way. We don't have a stable equiliubrium where no force exists in the system. Many in this thread effectively say "You can do wha…

> and land get taken. It's always land. This is because land is scarce. You can keep things that aren't scarce without force. > Is there any convincing argument for getting out of this equilibrium? The total destruction of artificial scarcity?

How exactly would we eliminate the scarcity of land?

Re: Can men live without war? (1956)

#68

Post by mmmmmmtoes »

akira2501 wrote: post #39
graeme wrote: post #23

The thing is without force your stuff gets taken. We haven't got a good way around this. Our current peace is heavily based on nuclear weapons and the implied threat of force. Don't like the status quo? Use force to try to change it. Do like the status quo? Use force to try to keep it that way. We don't have a stable equiliubrium where no force exists in the system. Many in this thread effectively say "You can do wha…

> and land get taken. It's always land. This is because land is scarce. You can keep things that aren't scarce without force. > Is there any convincing argument for getting out of this equilibrium? The total destruction of artificial scarcity?

scarcity's been around since the dawn of time, even if it's sometimes intentionally worsened. do you see some way of truly eliminating it?

Re: Can men live without war? (1956)

#69

Post by delichon »

nvy wrote: post #67
akira2501 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> and land get taken. It's always land. This is because land is scarce. You can keep things that aren't scarce without force. > Is there any convincing argument for getting out of this equilibrium? The total destruction of artificial scarcity?

How exactly would we eliminate the scarcity of land?

Terraforming or depopulation. I prefer the former.

Re: Can men live without war? (1956)

#70

Post by [deleted] »

apantel wrote: post #60
doubloon wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

half of those are not proxy wars in any way shape or form.

In the era of the atomic bomb, conventional war no longer takes place directly between tier 1 (nuclear) powers because the rulers can’t have that. The rulers on both sides ultimately want to enjoy their wealth and power. They want to go to the brothel at the end of the day. So they won’t risk getting into a nuclear war. This is even truer in the era of Globalism where enjoying wealth and power generally means enjoyin…

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