i wish i could live in as simple a universe as this person. maybe our anger stems from boiling down the "other" to "crazy" and "stupid" and "ignorant" rather than giving them the benefit of the doubt and making an honest attempt to understand them.
Why war is coming, in our lifetime
11–20 of 34 posts
Re: Why war is coming, in our lifetime
#12"Technology and globalization radically expanded the pie, but they also shrank the number of people who got the big pieces." All this talk of US income and wealth inequality... First of all, global inequality is falling. This is indisputable! Secondarily, the pie should be measured in actual consumption, not in income or wealth. Look at what Mark Zuckerberg consumes, not what he earns!
> Look at what Mark Zuckerberg consumes, not what he earns!
I disagree; what one person hoards isn't available for others to consume. Both wealth and consumption are worth examining.
Re: Why war is coming, in our lifetime
#13War is coming, but military power is also more asymmetric than ever. The US fared relatively poorly in the skirmish-like proxy wars of the last 50 years, but that's a different type of warfare than another world war would be. The goals aren't to win and hold territory, the goals are to create a stable environment. All the opponent has to do is create chaos with guerrilla warfare and the US loses.
When you're talking about a total war scenario, the US is effectively unbeatable for a lot of reasons. Ignoring the amount we spend (much of which is wasted on graft and ineffective procurement), we hold the distinct advantage of geography. We're fully capable of building a war machine all by ourselves -- we have the raw materials, the industry, and most important of all: a several-thousand mile long buffer zone between the US and any potential enemy looking to disrupt production.
China is the only real rising threat, and even then, they have two or three decades of catching up to do. And ultimately, I'm not convinced there are any resources that China and the US both covet so much as to go to war with each other: both are large, geographically diverse countries with a wide range of natural resources. The Chinese also have very little to gain by a shooting war: they will naturally eclipse the US in a global economy in the next 100 years anyway, so why bother fighting a dangerous enemy on the battlefield when you have better economic weapons?
Re: Why war is coming, in our lifetime
#14The end has been nigh nigh on forever.
Yup. I'm honestly sick of it. Everyone I talk to seems to think "the country has gone to shit" or another world war is just around the corner.
Maybe I just don't see how bad things are from my little bubble, but the people I hear it from seem to be doing fine.
My guess is it's caused by consuming too much media, watching CNN or Fox News for too long seems to put fear into people.
Re: Why war is coming, in our lifetime
#15So this anonymous person (seriously: do a whois on the domain) posts a list of vague conspiracies and ... we're supposed to do what? Tremble? Change? How is this on Hacker News?
> How is this on Hacker News?
It's not very different from dossiers that (intelligence, financial, political) analysts write about different scenarios all the time. While the text does contain more emotional imagery and blog-style tag lines, you'll basically find the same content in many organizations' databases.
Personally I think there is at least some merit to the reasoning behind this specific scenario: the population of the West is beginning to reject the globalisation effects that have brought global peace but left many disadvantaged, while religious and ideological radicalism is sharply on the rise world-wide. As the intellectual level of discourse is declining, the influence of populist ideas is becoming ever greater. From a bird's eye perspective, it seems humanity overall is in the process of rejecting peace, science, and secularism in favor of short-sighted economic considerations and dubious promises.
Re: Why war is coming, in our lifetime
#16"Technology and globalization radically expanded the pie, but they also shrank the number of people who got the big pieces." All this talk of US income and wealth inequality... First of all, global inequality is falling. This is indisputable! Secondarily, the pie should be measured in actual consumption, not in income or wealth. Look at what Mark Zuckerberg consumes, not what he earns!
You and I know that in absolute terms people are better off now than they were 30 years ago. But, that's simply not how regular people view the world. Their evaluations are relative. They will always be relative.
And as the essay mentions - "But human psychology doesn't work in absolute terms. It works in relative ones." - this is how psychology works.
As much as all the "logical" and "rational thinking" folks in the world want to ignore and dismiss emotions and politics in decisions and actions, the truly rational thinking and logical decisions and actions understand, accept, and take into account emotions and politics.
Re: Why war is coming, in our lifetime
#17[deleted]
Re: Why war is coming, in our lifetime
#18As a nationalist, I can certify that the author gets their understanding of our motivations completely wrong. Indeed, every time Trump or Le Pen are dismissed as "crazies", our resolve only gets stronger.
The abject refusal of the Left to even so much as attempt to understand this incipient uprising is shocking.
Re: Why war is coming, in our lifetime
#19James Allworth wrote something similar that made the case better:
https://medium.com/@jamesallworth/brexit-trump-and-the-ultim...
Re: Why war is coming, in our lifetime
#20"Technology and globalization radically expanded the pie, but they also shrank the number of people who got the big pieces." All this talk of US income and wealth inequality... First of all, global inequality is falling. This is indisputable! Secondarily, the pie should be measured in actual consumption, not in income or wealth. Look at what Mark Zuckerberg consumes, not what he earns!
> Look at what Mark Zuckerberg consumes, not what he earns! I disagree; what one person hoards isn't available for others to consume. Both wealth and consumption are worth examining.
That's not how the economy works. Without savings/investments you cannot produce goods or services. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_Rule_savings_rate