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Also US. I think WW3 is a more pressing threat for most in the developed world than climate change is. https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/please-dont-give-up-on-

by boppo1 2y ago

Also US. I think WW3 is a more pressing threat for most in the developed world than climate change is. https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/please-dont-give-up-on-having-kids https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/please-dont-give-up-on-havi... There's a nervous murmur going around with men younger than me (31) about the draft coming back. Dying in a field from a consumer-grade drone dropping a grenade on you is increasingly frightening.

silverquiet 2y ago
I can’t tell what a world war would actually be about these days. It’s easy to imagine a lot of regional squabbles as the Pax Americana unwinds itself, but I can’t see any large issue that would unite two global factions against one another. And it’s hard to imagine the US having the stomach for more foreign involvement to include actual “boots on the ground” after the disastrous lessons learned since Vietnam, but especially of the Bush Administration.
- JKCalhoun 2y ago
  I also thought talk of "WWIII" was putting too fine a point on it. Is anyone really worrying about all out nuclear warfare?
  - amonith 2y ago
    To be honest never-ending myriad of "local" conflicts and long-term economy downturn stresses me much more than nuclear war. That would be over pretty quick...
    - bryanlarsen 2y ago
      > That would be over pretty quick... That's not a safe assumption. A nuclear war is far more likely to be a limited local exchange than the all-out-war imagined during the cold war. So you're unlikely to be killed outright by the exchange. Instead you're likely to to have to deal with the nuclear radiation fallout, severe food insecurity and increased global tension.
  - bryanlarsen 2y ago
    I believe that nuclear war is going to kill a lot more people than climate change over the next one hundred years. We've had way too many close calls over the last 70 years, and nuclear weapons are in far too many unstable hands for them not to be used eventually. It might not happen this year or this decade, but it's almost inevitable they'll be used in the next hundred years, likely sooner rather than later. Perhaps it's unlikely to be "all out" nuclear warfare. Climate change is projected to kill a small number of millions of people. It wouldn't take much for a limited nuclear war to kill more than that.
    - shrimp_emoji 2y ago
      Nuclear war ain't shit. Wait until bioweapons are made and inevitably leak from a BSL-max lab. That's like if the nukes were invisible, without number, and diligently tracked every individual down. Unlike nukes, that's extinction time. Not if we become multiplanetary by then though.
      - ryandrake 2y ago
        > Wait until bioweapons are made and inevitably leak from a BSL-max lab. That's like if the nukes were invisible, without number, and diligently tracked every individual down. Plus, as we now know, the attacker might be able to rely on a sizable portion of the target population downplaying, denying, and deliberately spreading, and otherwise politicizing the bio agent. You don't get that with nukes. Once the bombs start dropping, nobody's going to have the time to spread conspiracy theories.
- limit499karma 2y ago
  [flagged]
- Izkata 2y ago
  > I can’t tell what a world war would actually be about these days. It’s easy to imagine a lot of regional squabbles as the Pax Americana unwinds itself Our current situation is very close to how WWI expanded from a regional squabble. Look to that one and ignore WWII to see how it might occur.
etrautmann 2y ago
These are intimately related. Climate causes all sorts of geopolitical stresses that add new concerns about conflict, access to resources, etc.

by boppo1 2y ago

silverquiet 2y ago

I can’t tell what a world war would actually be about these days. It’s easy to imagine a lot of regional squabbles as the Pax Americana unwinds itself, but I can’t see any large issue that would unite two global factions against one another. And it’s hard to imagine the US having the stomach for more foreign involvement to include actual “boots on the ground” after the disastrous lessons learned since Vietnam, but especially of the Bush Administration.

JKCalhoun 2y ago
I also thought talk of "WWIII" was putting too fine a point on it. Is anyone really worrying about all out nuclear warfare?
- amonith 2y ago
  To be honest never-ending myriad of "local" conflicts and long-term economy downturn stresses me much more than nuclear war. That would be over pretty quick...
  - bryanlarsen 2y ago
    > That would be over pretty quick... That's not a safe assumption. A nuclear war is far more likely to be a limited local exchange than the all-out-war imagined during the cold war. So you're unlikely to be killed outright by the exchange. Instead you're likely to to have to deal with the nuclear radiation fallout, severe food insecurity and increased global tension.
- bryanlarsen 2y ago
  I believe that nuclear war is going to kill a lot more people than climate change over the next one hundred years. We've had way too many close calls over the last 70 years, and nuclear weapons are in far too many unstable hands for them not to be used eventually. It might not happen this year or this decade, but it's almost inevitable they'll be used in the next hundred years, likely sooner rather than later. Perhaps it's unlikely to be "all out" nuclear warfare. Climate change is projected to kill a small number of millions of people. It wouldn't take much for a limited nuclear war to kill more than that.
  - shrimp_emoji 2y ago
    Nuclear war ain't shit. Wait until bioweapons are made and inevitably leak from a BSL-max lab. That's like if the nukes were invisible, without number, and diligently tracked every individual down. Unlike nukes, that's extinction time. Not if we become multiplanetary by then though.
    - ryandrake 2y ago
      > Wait until bioweapons are made and inevitably leak from a BSL-max lab. That's like if the nukes were invisible, without number, and diligently tracked every individual down. Plus, as we now know, the attacker might be able to rely on a sizable portion of the target population downplaying, denying, and deliberately spreading, and otherwise politicizing the bio agent. You don't get that with nukes. Once the bombs start dropping, nobody's going to have the time to spread conspiracy theories.
limit499karma 2y ago
[flagged]
Izkata 2y ago
> I can’t tell what a world war would actually be about these days. It’s easy to imagine a lot of regional squabbles as the Pax Americana unwinds itself Our current situation is very close to how WWI expanded from a regional squabble. Look to that one and ignore WWII to see how it might occur.

etrautmann 2y ago

These are intimately related. Climate causes all sorts of geopolitical stresses that add new concerns about conflict, access to resources, etc.