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1) The issue is that violence is a poor metric for progress. Pinker has made it clear that the description of declining violence is done in order to describe th

by ABCLAW 9y ago

1) The issue is that violence is a poor metric for progress. Pinker has made it clear that the description of declining violence is done in order to describe the improvement of the human plight, as most succinctly crystallized in the title of his first work on the point, and the overarching research thesis of his second. The structure of his first argument also points to this: violence has decreased, and all of the reasons have to do with humanity getting better, smarter and more empathetic. Here I suggest that in order to make that claim, broadly, we need to understand what violence is, and why its reduction may actually be a symptom of things getting worse for people. I am not the only one to make this distinction. Many groups advocating for historical 'have-nots' make the same counterpoint in reaction to Pinker's work. 2) With regards to the legal system, the issue is tremendously worse than it used to be. There was a time when "normal people" had better access to justice - the fact that you even need to ask this question should cause readers to pause and reflect upon what that means for the system. The legal system, like measures of international violence, have social purposes - this is where Pinker's arguments fall flat to me. Think of them as pressure release valves. If the negative causal force (i.e. Conflict) causing those systems to need to act aren't actually being reduced, yet the system is systemically reacting less and less to the stimuli it is receiving, it is akin to a server reporting that it is A+ Okay and only under 25% load, but ignoring that it is discarding 99% of requests to it. No sane engineer would think things are getting better if the report drops to 24%, given the full context.

resu_nimda 9y ago
You have yet to provide even a hint of a demonstration of how the have-nots have it worse than before. It should be pretty simple, just one example of backward progress that you think is more relevant than reduction of violence. Your second paragraph is pure logical fallacy and fully uncompelling.
- ABCLAW 9y ago
  Yugoslavia under Tito is a great example of a cauldron of economic and sectarian violence being temporarily held in check by a violent warlord. Given none of those issues actually got solved during his time, the complete disintegration of his country which followed his death is a great example of actual conflict not being accurately tracked by violence figures. Feel free to check out the development figures for the bloc countries and read up on the history. Should be instructive. >Your second paragraph is pure logical fallacy and fully uncompelling. Well, I haven't seen your argument demonstrating that that's the case, but from the tone of this reply, I'll have to stop responding to your points as I don't think there's very much effort towards understanding and discussion.
  - shamino 9y ago
    "The issue is that violence is a poor metric for progress." Just to echo the commenter, I don't think Pinker is stating that humans are progressing in general - he is just stating that violence is decreasing. I also agree this is a measurable metric, that Pinker does well to argue for. If he claims things "are getting better", I think he says that "violence is decreasing", where "violence" is a measure of worseness. If we want to talk about progress, though, we would have to define what progress really means. Will Durant (from "The Lessons of History") says progress is more like the increasing ability of mankind to control his environment. If so, I would think there is some evidence for that. In terms of social injustice, Will Durant also makes an argument that there will always be this. Power is always concentrated to the few (that's just how it works in order to have organization), and those not in power will always have some level of injustice. The amount of people in power and their motives can change depending on the era/civilization/society.
  - ust 9y ago
    I'm sorry, but your comment about Yugoslavia is extremely simplistic, if not outright wrong. While ethnic tensions certainly played a large role, the causes for the war were numerous, and also include outside influences (end of Cold War, geopolitical situation, etc.). BTW, Tito was dead for 11 years before the war started, and while he certainly was a dictator, albeit somewhat more lenient than other communist dictators, describing him as a "violent warlord" is a mischaracterization.
    - ABCLAW 9y ago
      I don't understand the objection; if resolving ethnic tensions was actively impeded by Tito's dictatorship, then the argument that violence was suppressed rather than resolved is untouched. The characterization of Tito himself isn't important (call him a benevolent strongman if you prefer - I don't have a horse in the race), other than to examine the role of a system which suppressed violence rather than resolved conflict.
- poir00t99 9y ago
  If you're gonna be all "Nuh uh you're wrong." bring a better argument than "Nuh uh you're wrong." I agree with the parent. Justice is expensive, like healthcare. Wages are down. Debt for the proles is up. Social mobility is down. Incarceration rates are up Suicide among the proles is up. Authoritarian control of resources and economic output is up. Addiction is up. And by "up" I mean the ratio of people suffering from one or more relative to the rest. Not just a raw count. These are easily found data points and they contradict all your "nuh uhs" readily. It's very much a myth among the neoliberal crowd that things are better for the proles, while they kick it eating avocado toast and massaging each others egos over losing followers on Twitter The HN crowd is just as stuck in its own filter-bubble when it comes to progress. Go to the shanty towns and bum camps that are popping up all over and growing. Tell me things are better.
torstenvl 9y ago
There was a time when "normal people" had better access to justice - the fact that you even need to ask this question should cause... ...you to realize that your propositions are not accepted uncritically and you should support them with evidence.
- ABCLAW 9y ago
  This seems so open ended so as to be fruitless - We aren't going to peruse 300 page UNDP or 50 page CBA methodological reports to define the issue, then jump into the data sets themselves on this forum. But they exist, and they're easy to search for if you want to satisfy yourself. This just isn't the place, nor is that the point of the assertion. If you have a particular observation or set of data which contradicts what I'm saying maybe I can be more helpful.
  - TulliusCicero 9y ago
    Are you serious? If you're making the assertion here, it's on you to support it. Don't try to put the burden on others to disprove something you've shown zero evidence for, that's ridiculous.
    - ABCLAW 9y ago
      Entirely. The burden is placed upon the objector to have even a passing argument against the initially held position, otherwise you can raise infinite substance-less objections against an otherwise strong point and 'win'. This tactic is used in court and in point-based debate systems to game the system (in the first to drive up expenses, and in the second to score uncontested points). The bar doesn't need to be high, but at least something needs to be offered as a counterpoint beyond someone telling an expert in their own field that they don't believe them. It helps to establish that the counterargument is made in good faith and requires effort on the part of the objector, indicating that they have some skin in the game.
      - deleted 9y ago
        [deleted]

by ABCLAW 9y ago

resu_nimda 9y ago

You have yet to provide even a hint of a demonstration of how the have-nots have it worse than before. It should be pretty simple, just one example of backward progress that you think is more relevant than reduction of violence. Your second paragraph is pure logical fallacy and fully uncompelling.

ABCLAW 9y ago
Yugoslavia under Tito is a great example of a cauldron of economic and sectarian violence being temporarily held in check by a violent warlord. Given none of those issues actually got solved during his time, the complete disintegration of his country which followed his death is a great example of actual conflict not being accurately tracked by violence figures. Feel free to check out the development figures for the bloc countries and read up on the history. Should be instructive. >Your second paragraph is pure logical fallacy and fully uncompelling. Well, I haven't seen your argument demonstrating that that's the case, but from the tone of this reply, I'll have to stop responding to your points as I don't think there's very much effort towards understanding and discussion.
- shamino 9y ago
  "The issue is that violence is a poor metric for progress." Just to echo the commenter, I don't think Pinker is stating that humans are progressing in general - he is just stating that violence is decreasing. I also agree this is a measurable metric, that Pinker does well to argue for. If he claims things "are getting better", I think he says that "violence is decreasing", where "violence" is a measure of worseness. If we want to talk about progress, though, we would have to define what progress really means. Will Durant (from "The Lessons of History") says progress is more like the increasing ability of mankind to control his environment. If so, I would think there is some evidence for that. In terms of social injustice, Will Durant also makes an argument that there will always be this. Power is always concentrated to the few (that's just how it works in order to have organization), and those not in power will always have some level of injustice. The amount of people in power and their motives can change depending on the era/civilization/society.
- ust 9y ago
  I'm sorry, but your comment about Yugoslavia is extremely simplistic, if not outright wrong. While ethnic tensions certainly played a large role, the causes for the war were numerous, and also include outside influences (end of Cold War, geopolitical situation, etc.). BTW, Tito was dead for 11 years before the war started, and while he certainly was a dictator, albeit somewhat more lenient than other communist dictators, describing him as a "violent warlord" is a mischaracterization.
  - ABCLAW 9y ago
    I don't understand the objection; if resolving ethnic tensions was actively impeded by Tito's dictatorship, then the argument that violence was suppressed rather than resolved is untouched. The characterization of Tito himself isn't important (call him a benevolent strongman if you prefer - I don't have a horse in the race), other than to examine the role of a system which suppressed violence rather than resolved conflict.
poir00t99 9y ago
If you're gonna be all "Nuh uh you're wrong." bring a better argument than "Nuh uh you're wrong." I agree with the parent. Justice is expensive, like healthcare. Wages are down. Debt for the proles is up. Social mobility is down. Incarceration rates are up Suicide among the proles is up. Authoritarian control of resources and economic output is up. Addiction is up. And by "up" I mean the ratio of people suffering from one or more relative to the rest. Not just a raw count. These are easily found data points and they contradict all your "nuh uhs" readily. It's very much a myth among the neoliberal crowd that things are better for the proles, while they kick it eating avocado toast and massaging each others egos over losing followers on Twitter The HN crowd is just as stuck in its own filter-bubble when it comes to progress. Go to the shanty towns and bum camps that are popping up all over and growing. Tell me things are better.

torstenvl 9y ago

There was a time when "normal people" had better access to justice - the fact that you even need to ask this question should cause... ...you to realize that your propositions are not accepted uncritically and you should support them with evidence.

ABCLAW 9y ago
This seems so open ended so as to be fruitless - We aren't going to peruse 300 page UNDP or 50 page CBA methodological reports to define the issue, then jump into the data sets themselves on this forum. But they exist, and they're easy to search for if you want to satisfy yourself. This just isn't the place, nor is that the point of the assertion. If you have a particular observation or set of data which contradicts what I'm saying maybe I can be more helpful.
- TulliusCicero 9y ago
  Are you serious? If you're making the assertion here, it's on you to support it. Don't try to put the burden on others to disprove something you've shown zero evidence for, that's ridiculous.
  - ABCLAW 9y ago
    Entirely. The burden is placed upon the objector to have even a passing argument against the initially held position, otherwise you can raise infinite substance-less objections against an otherwise strong point and 'win'. This tactic is used in court and in point-based debate systems to game the system (in the first to drive up expenses, and in the second to score uncontested points). The bar doesn't need to be high, but at least something needs to be offered as a counterpoint beyond someone telling an expert in their own field that they don't believe them. It helps to establish that the counterargument is made in good faith and requires effort on the part of the objector, indicating that they have some skin in the game.
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]