5 ms·

We saw a Pinker-like optimism before- at the beginning of the 20th century. We had gone nearly a century since Waterloo without a major war. (Plenty of smaller

We saw a Pinker-like optimism before- at the beginning of the 20th century. We had gone nearly a century since Waterloo without a major war. (Plenty of smaller conflicts however to create national republics out of monarchies or fragmented city states.) People said interlocking global trade made countries too dependent on each other to fight each other. Then what happened? The 75-year great 20th century war from 1914 to 1989. It had three or four phases: WWI, WWII, the cold war, the wars of southeast Asia. I would not get too confident again.

JumpCrisscross 8y ago
> Then what happened? The 75-year great 20th century war from 1914 to 1989 The 20th century was the least violent century in human history on a per capita basis. We know this, in part, thanks to Pinker's research.
jopsen 8y ago
So... a baseless assumption that war is cyclic, despite this being disproven with data in Stevens previous works. The world 200 years ago and the world today is different.. politics are different and out global community is VERY different. In fact UN has been pointed to as one of the reasons why we have less war..
- cm2187 8y ago
  I think nukes contributed a lot more than the UN. Western Europe would have been invaded by the Soviet Union twice otherwise.
  - a3n 8y ago
    The UN may have contributed in a non-obvious way, as a one-stop-shopping experience for spies. Not knowing your adversaries' capability and intentions can contribute to pre-emptive strikes and invasion. Knowing your adversaries' secrets can lead to "meh, they're not such a threat."
  - jopsen 8y ago
    I don't recall the data supporting this, do you have any? In many ways, being able to say that is also what's cool about Pinkers book. Sure, it doesn't reference all studies ever done, but it does attempt to argue what worked and what didn't.
    - DEADBEEFC0FFEE 8y ago
      It does however reference all the papers, that he uses.

JumpCrisscross 8y ago

> Then what happened? The 75-year great 20th century war from 1914 to 1989 The 20th century was the least violent century in human history on a per capita basis. We know this, in part, thanks to Pinker's research.

jopsen 8y ago

So... a baseless assumption that war is cyclic, despite this being disproven with data in Stevens previous works. The world 200 years ago and the world today is different.. politics are different and out global community is VERY different. In fact UN has been pointed to as one of the reasons why we have less war..

cm2187 8y ago
I think nukes contributed a lot more than the UN. Western Europe would have been invaded by the Soviet Union twice otherwise.
- a3n 8y ago
  The UN may have contributed in a non-obvious way, as a one-stop-shopping experience for spies. Not knowing your adversaries' capability and intentions can contribute to pre-emptive strikes and invasion. Knowing your adversaries' secrets can lead to "meh, they're not such a threat."
- jopsen 8y ago
  I don't recall the data supporting this, do you have any? In many ways, being able to say that is also what's cool about Pinkers book. Sure, it doesn't reference all studies ever done, but it does attempt to argue what worked and what didn't.
  - DEADBEEFC0FFEE 8y ago
    It does however reference all the papers, that he uses.