Never mind the headlines. We’ve never lived in such peaceful times.

[Mindful]

The world is not falling apart The trend lines reveal an increasingly peaceful period in history.

 

[Mindful]

> How can we get a less hyperbolic assessment of the state of the world? Certainly not from daily journalism. News is about things that happen, not things that don’t happen. We never see a reporter saying to the camera, “Here we are, live from a country where a war has not broken out”—or a city that has not been bombed, or a school that has not been shot up. As long as violence has not vanished from the world, there will always be enough incidents to fill the evening news. And since the human mind estimates probability by the ease with which it can recall examples, newsreaders will always perceive that they live in dangerous times. All the more so when billions of smartphones turn a fifth of the world’s population into crime reporters and war correspondents.

We also have to avoid being fooled by randomness. Cohen laments the “annexations, beheadings, [and] pestilence” of the past year, but surely this collection of calamities is a mere coincidence. Entropy, pathogens, and human folly are a backdrop to life, and it is statistically certain that the lurking disasters will not space themselves evenly in time but will frequently overlap. To read significance into these clusters is to succumb to primitive thinking, a world of evil eyes and cosmic conspiracies. <

 

[Tom Sweetnam]

The world is not falling apart The trend lines reveal an increasingly peaceful period in history.

Get off the LSD.

 

[Mindful]

The world is not falling apart The trend lines reveal an increasingly peaceful period in history.

Get off the LSD.

Stupid thing to say.

 

[Tom Sweetnam]

Here, here's an entry-level clue for you, Mindful: The Coming Anarchy - The Atlantic

 

[Mindful]

Here, here's an entry-level clue for you, Mindful: The Coming Anarchy - The Atlantic

I don't appreciate your attitude.

 

[Tom Sweetnam]

I might also recommend Richard Rhodes' Dark Sun. The only reason this planet isn't busy murdering itself at the scale previous history should mandate, is because of the hydrogen bomb.

 

[Tom Sweetnam]

Here, here's an entry-level clue for you, Mindful: The Coming Anarchy - The Atlantic

I don't appreciate your attitude.

Like I give a fuck what you don't like. I don't like fairy tales either, like your OP.

 

[Mindful]

Here, here's an entry-level clue for you, Mindful: The Coming Anarchy - The Atlantic

I don't appreciate your attitude.

Like I give a fuck what you don't like. I don't like fairy tales either, like your OP.

I don't give a fuck that you give a fuck.

 

[Tom Sweetnam]

Like I give a fuck that you don't give a fuck that I don't give a fuck that...that...oh fuck it.

 

[Mindful]

Like I give a fuck that you don't give a fuck that I don't give a fuck that...that...oh fuck it.

Of course you give a fuck. Otherwise you wouldn't be labouring the point.

Oh wait, is there a point?

It was only an article, you plonker. Not a declaration, written in stone. Something to be discussed. Not to jump up and down about.

 

[Tom Sweetnam]

Oh.

 

[Mindful]

Oh.

Are you really that Sweet?

 

[Mindlight]

The world is not falling apart The trend lines reveal an increasingly peaceful period in history.

I guess that might be true in an overall sense but there are certain areas where that is not the case. The Middle East for instance.

As those well known "pacifists" the Romans used to say: si vis pacem para bellum (if you want peace prepare for war). Given the scale of tragedy that the next proper war will bring it is definitely something to be avoided.

 

[Mindlight]

The world is not falling apart The trend lines reveal an increasingly peaceful period in history.

I guess that might be true in an overall sense but there are certain areas where that is not the case. The Middle East for instance.

As those well known "pacifists" the Romans used to say: si vis pacem para bellum (if you want peace prepare for war). Given the scale of tragedy that the next proper war will bring it is definitely something to be avoided.

 

[Pogo]

> How can we get a less hyperbolic assessment of the state of the world? Certainly not from daily journalism. News is about things that happen, not things that don’t happen. We never see a reporter saying to the camera, “Here we are, live from a country where a war has not broken out”—or a city that has not been bombed, or a school that has not been shot up. As long as violence has not vanished from the world, there will always be enough incidents to fill the evening news. And since the human mind estimates probability by the ease with which it can recall examples, newsreaders will always perceive that they live in dangerous times. All the more so when billions of smartphones turn a fifth of the world’s population into crime reporters and war correspondents.

We also have to avoid being fooled by randomness. Cohen laments the “annexations, beheadings, [and] pestilence” of the past year, but surely this collection of calamities is a mere coincidence. Entropy, pathogens, and human folly are a backdrop to life, and it is statistically certain that the lurking disasters will not space themselves evenly in time but will frequently overlap. To read significance into these clusters is to succumb to primitive thinking, a world of evil eyes and cosmic conspiracies. <

Very worthy point. And if there's not a fire, flood, shooting, war, pestilence, robbery, rape, famine, epidemic, multi-vehicle collision or nuns behaving badly over here, then by god we'll comb the earth until we find one so we can sell "new$". Because there's a sucker born every minute and there's gold in them there ills.

 

[Mindful]

Here, here's an entry-level clue for you, Mindful: The Coming Anarchy - The Atlantic

Try to be a bit more humble, and I'll read it.

You sound like a Pom.

 

[Pogo]

Speaking of which, here comes one now...

Get off the LSD.

I might also recommend Richard Rhodes' Dark Sun. The only reason this planet isn't busy murdering itself at the scale previous history should mandate, is because of the hydrogen bomb.