j_b

No, the flaw is to assume that we are anything as a species independently of our environmental and social surroundings. Humans are capable of violence and war but they are also capable of many other things. Human nature is what we make of it, not some predetermined inevitability.

You were far from being alone. Despite non-stop deceitful propaganda, people only rallied to support the Iraq war when they were told we were going to war (along with copious reminders of "you are either with us or against us", for good measure). It didn't take very long for war support to wane either even though most people were not being visibly affected by it. The truth is that throughout history most people are either against war and/or quickly rally to that idea when the effects of war become obvious.

Do you know what really sucks? People who claim that war is inevitable and justify the actions of warmongering sociopaths in the process.

It'd probably be more effective to value citizenry and community, and get rid of the psychopathic warmongers some people regularly elect to office.

But I thought your point was humans weren't a violent species. Or are you saying we're violent but not warlike? On average we are neither especially violent or warlike as shown by the overwhelming majority of humans who aren't that way. War and most violence aren't ineluctable as claimed by many, which was the main point I was making, but you probably should have gotten all of this from what I wrote in this thread.

War is collective violence which is the summation of individual acts of violence. Your neighbor murdering his wife isn't war.

Individual acts of collective violence is what is understood to be war. Most everything else can be dealt with with a police force or mediation of some type.

I didn't claim to understand them. I was pointing a fact tending to show that war isn't "ineluctable" as it surely would if it were part of human nature.

yeah yeah yeah, and there are also some purely vegetarian cultures but that doesn't mean man in general is mostly vegetarian. Humans aren't mostly vegetarian but they aren't mostly violent either.

Indeed, but the discussion wasn't about hippies.

There is a significant difference between eliminating the young that have very little change of making it and sacrificing adults to plunder the neighbors.

Robert Fisk has a very different take on this butchery

I don't really follow. Hunter-gatherers likely abandoned old people too but it doesn't make them warlike. Nobody here claimed that primitive folk didn't know violence but ambushing individuals to get revenge (for example) isn't war.

So, what happened to the Swedes? Torching Europe for 2 centuries, then 2 centuries with almost no wars? One would think that "man the warrior" wouldn't waste 2 centuries living in peace.

It's not about semantic (although killing your wife's lover doesn't amount to war) because only among few species does conflict routinely result in death.

It'd be nice if you got your reading comprehension up to speed.

Although it is the traditional view, Pinker's version is in fact quite controversial: Beyond War Douglas P. Fry, is a docent and professor of anthropology, teacher in the Faculty of Social and Caring Sciences at Åbo Akademi University in Finland and adjunct research scientist in the Bureau of Applied Research in Anthropology at the University of Arizona

Well, you picked a group of countries with the greatest and most recent colonial legacy that many have failed to deal with peaceably, and it also doesn’t help that we now twist their arms into participating to conflicts they would never start on their own. But, nonetheless, my point is that the overwhelming majority of people (and somewhat less of countries) are at peace most of the time, and even most of those engaged in wars would rather not be either because they are on the receiving end of aggression or because being cannon-fodder isn’t a very rewarding business. Not only is there little evidence that war was common before agriculture (or that it is common in the animal world) but war often results from democratic deficits when power hungry sociopaths take over the direction of nations and, at best, lie to incite violent aggression. In fact, as you noted, there could be now fewer conflicts as decision-making is on average more widely shared than at any moment in history since nomadism was the norm. I see little justification to claim the inevitability of war as if it were part of our dark nature.

Not quite. Arguing requires an argument.

Privatizers get kicked to the curb

where is your proof, then?

Yowser! 10-12' deep crown is a lot of snow.

Actually, hairless or not, most monkeys (by far) do not throw feces at one another. There are even quite a few countries that have not been at war for a long, long time. The norm isn't a state of warfare even if it is popular to claim otherwise.

What kind of people think that drowning government in a bathtub, so that it cannot perform its basic function, is good news? All the while they argue that the 1% shouldn't pay their fair share ...

Er.... Ron Paul IS the status quo. Useless posturing. Ron paul is indeed for the deregulation status quo that is responsible for taking the world economy over the cliff. One percenters arguing for austerity for the other 99%, while they cash in on the spoils, aren't very credible. There are fundamental problems with the economy but it has to do with the wild growth model, which isn't sustainable without the energy intensity afforded by cheap oil and despite all the illusion performed in the great casino. Doubling down on letting corporations run our lives is moronic.