The implication being that we should have a Nobel War Prize? (after all alfred nobel himself made bombs)
Are humans too aggressive to justify having a Nobel Peace Prize?
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Re: Are humans too aggressive to justify having a Nobel Peace Prize?
#12"...if humans do have a big capacity for peace shouldn’t we expect to find more accomplished people on this list?"
Go look at the list of Nobel Peace prize winners:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Nobel_Peace_Prize_laur...
Some of the winners probably didn't deserve the prize and are now disappointing to see on this list (e.g. Obama or Arafat).
Some of the winners are symbols of inspiration rather than people who have accomplished much themselves (e.g. Malala Yousafzai).
However, there are a lot of highly accomplished people on this list who have made a huge impact on the world. Many of them just aren't as famous as some of the disappointments.
Alfred Nobel was a merchant of death. The fact that people striving for peace now feel honored by a Nobel Prize is deeply ironic, but perhaps this also shows that, even among those of us with the most blood on our hands, there exists the yearning for a more peaceful future.
Re: Are humans too aggressive to justify having a Nobel Peace Prize?
#13Yes, and we have a whole clown show along with the bloody circus. Always the same prophets at the sideline, wrinkling there noses in disgust- but also condeming those who pacify the situation with a constant surplus as greedy and disgusting human beeings. We have parasites that condemn killing mammoths, but know exactly how to cut it up and redistribute it. We have a whole caste of social controll freaks, who know ex…
There was an awful lot of war in your "60 years of peace".
Only between nations where one or both didn't have nuclear deterrence.
Re: Are humans too aggressive to justify having a Nobel Peace Prize?
#14The list forgets to mention Obama, who promised Gitmo would be closed.
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Re: Are humans too aggressive to justify having a Nobel Peace Prize?
#15It's exactly because there is so much violence that we need to reward actors who work to reduce it.
Seriously. If anything that is the stated purpose of the creator of it after contributing to so much violence with dynamite.
For Harvard this is intensely stupid.
Re: Are humans too aggressive to justify having a Nobel Peace Prize?
#16Earlier quoted context omitted.
There was an awful lot of war in your "60 years of peace".
Only between nations where one or both didn't have nuclear deterrence.
Or internally. Or at the behest of nuclear powers.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ongoing_armed_conflict...
And I guess those are just 'direct' deaths so it doesn't count all the deaths of refugees or plague or starvation that arose from the conflicts.
Re: Are humans too aggressive to justify having a Nobel Peace Prize?
#17There's two reasons why this argument doesn't make any sense.
1. "Too aggressive" relative to what? There's probably never going to be an absolutely perfect, peaceful human being, simply due to our evolutionary roots. To suggest that this means we should abandon the peace prize is absurd. There's never going to be some perfect embodiment of peace, but that's not what the peace prize is for.
2. http://www.icanw.org/pledge/ If this list is "bottom-of-the-barrel-scraping" then please, scrape more of the "bottom of the barrel". Would we rather reward someone for managing 100+ nations to sign a treaty like this, or reward someone who posts indignant and borderline self-righteous rants in an internet blog? Again this is a throwback to the above point of relativity.
Bonus point: The Dalai Lama, Desmond Tutu, and Mother Teresa aren't good indicators that this prize has a purpose?
Edit: Added Desmond Tutu above because I'm a big fan
Re: Are humans too aggressive to justify having a Nobel Peace Prize?
#18There's two reasons why this argument doesn't make any sense. 1. "Too aggressive" relative to what? There's probably never going to be an absolutely perfect, peaceful human being, simply due to our evolutionary roots. To suggest that this means we should abandon the peace prize is absurd. There's never going to be some perfect embodiment of peace, but that's not what the peace prize is for. 2. http://www.icanw.org/pl…
> "Too aggressive" relative to what?
Other humans (Homo not Sapiens). Sadly, we'll probably never know for sure, because it looks like we were responsible for wiping most of them out 10,000s years ago.
> Mother Teresa
Usually isn't a good example to bring up ... Mother Teresa has had her fair share of controversy.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Mother_Teresa
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2015/02/25...
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/fighting_wor...
Re: Are humans too aggressive to justify having a Nobel Peace Prize?
#19This is why I think that all Nobel Peace Prizes should be awarded only to those already deceased. It removes their ability to mess it up like some of the people from the list now.
Re: Are humans too aggressive to justify having a Nobel Peace Prize?
#20Yes, and we have a whole clown show along with the bloody circus. Always the same prophets at the sideline, wrinkling there noses in disgust- but also condeming those who pacify the situation with a constant surplus as greedy and disgusting human beeings. We have parasites that condemn killing mammoths, but know exactly how to cut it up and redistribute it. We have a whole caste of social controll freaks, who know ex…
There was an awful lot of war in your "60 years of peace".
It was an awful lot less than most 60 year periods in human history.