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0 pointsdragontamer9y ago0 comments

I tend to be a bit more pragmatic.

The human race is composed of neither angels nor devils: but humans. Beings with flawed and incomplete morality. Its best if we judge ourselves by comparing against the actions of our fathers, otherwise we may lose ourselves in idealism.

The claim after all, is that the current time is the most prosperous and peaceful time of all of human existence. And as far as I can tell, actual history agrees with this fact.

Don't believe me? Go back to the root comment if you've forgotten the claim: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11610816

You may be worried about a few thousand innocent deaths here and there, but again, that number is much much MUCH much smaller than the historical norm. But in any case, your idealism is a good thing. It is only further proof that we as a race are beginning to forget the horrors of war, because peace has existed for so long.

(Of course, some humans still exist in war-torn areas. Syrian and Iraqi refugees. And I am peace-loving and idealistic enough that I believe we should open up our country to these people, despite the risks. )

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PavlovsCat9y ago

> Its best if we judge ourselves by comparing against the actions of our fathers, otherwise we may lose ourselves in idealism.

Honesty and decency existed thousands of years ago, too, "our fathers" aren't a monolith, just like the present isn't. But more importantly, I say including 10 different versions of jQuery on one page to color 10 letters makes it load needlessly slow, and you say that's still faster than usenet in the 80s -- if you know what I mean? It is both technically true and completely besides the point.

> The claim after all, is that the current time is the most prosperous and peaceful time of all of human existence.

Nope. The claim was that this is because of countries wanting to dominate each other. I say it's despite of that.

> You may be worried about a few thousand innocent deaths here and there, but again, that number is much much MUCH much smaller than the historical norm.

It's also a rather simplicistic metric. We consider murder bad because it doesn't allow the murdered people to live their lives, right? To develop freely as a person, and whatnot? Well, there's a problem:

> "it's not possible to be fully human if you are being surveilled 24/7"

[ http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20130818120421175 ]

The same goes for other things. People are getting fucked in so many ways with it's not really the opposite of murder, but its sibling. And open murder evokes criticism and resistance, while "pumping every home full of sleeping gas" (to paraphrase the lyrics to Bullet In The Head by RATM) works much better.

> I am peace-loving and idealistic enough that I believe we should open up our country to these people, despite the risks.

Call me when you're willing to get war criminals arrested and tried, and I mean American/Western ones. And let's talk about how peaceful the world has become after the wars/genocides over oil and water are over. You know, the ones we do nothing serious to avoid steering into, because we're too busy dominating each other, building little fortresses and kicking away the ladder? The gap between rich and poor is growing, not shrinking. You can't say by the standards of 1900, people today are better off. Well you can, but I can't take it seriously. By the standards of 2016 -- the ones that matter -- many people are worse off. As Stephen Hawking wrote:

> If machines produce everything we need, the outcome will depend on how things are distributed. Everyone can enjoy a life of luxurious leisure if the machine-produced wealth is shared, or most people can end up miserably poor if the machine-owners successfully lobby against wealth redistribution. So far, the trend seems to be toward the second option, with technology driving ever-increasing inequality.

( https://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/3nyn5i/science_ama... )

dragontamerOP9y ago

    Then the idiot who praises, with enthusiastic tone,
    All centuries but this, and every country but his own;

-- The Mikado (1885)

Go back just 150 years ago, and Slavery is legalized. 250 years ago, and slavery is widespread. IMO, its going to be rather difficult to be "fully human" when you are legally considered 3/5ths of a person.

Go back 250 years ago, and the entire concept of "privacy" and "security within your home" doesn't even exist (to free-men. Obviously not granted to slaves, who were raped and sold off by their owners. Don't forget that Thomas Jefferson was a slaver, despite being officially against it). The USA is one of the first countries in the world to formally recognize the right to privacy through the 4th Amendment.

Go back 1000 years ago, and you have people dying of the Plague, and divorce court being settled by TRIAL BY COMBAT, to the death! You aren't really a person unless you're from a noble house either.

http://www.ripleys.com/blog/trial-by-combat/

But yeah, go complain about privacy rights. I raise you SLAVERY. Modern civil rights for all people is a concept that is only 50 years old or so, since the 1960s when the concept began to solidify.

Again, ignore history at your peril. Today is the most peaceful, prosperous time of history. And Pax Britannica (the period of peace in the 1800s, the time period when "The Mikado" was written) is also relatively peaceful compared to hundreds of years before that time.

But Pax Americana stands head-and-shoulders better than Pax Britannica. We have women's sufferage / women's rights. Gays aren't literally put to death (even smart gays, like Allan Turing, would be able to live in peace today). Jim Crow laws don't exist anymore, and the Ku Klux Klan aren't lynching randoms, at least out in the open, like they used to.

And of course, we aren't killing tens-of-thousands of innocent civilians at a time (because killing everybody is much easier when conquering a nation than trying to rule).

------------

> Nope. The claim was that this is because of countries wanting to dominate each other. I say it's despite of that.

Imperialism is dead dude. Let it go and rejoice in the present.

On the other hand, if you're the kind of person that "The Mikado" is describing, perhaps you can't. Any century but this, any country but your own??

PavlovsCat9y ago

Yes, and? What makes you think I'm saying "everything gets worse all the time"? Are you saying those things are all because of "nations trying to dominate each other", or maybe simply because of humans thinking and inventing and reasoning and arguing and whatnot?

> But yeah, go complain about privacy rights. I raise you SLAVERY.

I love how you asked me to re-read the comment, and now continually talk about straw men yourself. That's quite rich.

> On the other hand, if you're the kind of person that "The Mikado" is describing, perhaps you can't. Any century but this, any country but your own??

Nope, and nothing I said would indicate so, either. With not one word did I say "things were better back then in X". And whether imperialism is dead or not (how that goes together with "Pax Americana") doesn't change that your responses address straw men. So I'll simply take it you are projecting when you implicitly muse whether I'm an idiot. Proof is in this string of comments, have a nice life.

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PavlovsCat9y ago

> Its best if we judge ourselves by comparing against the actions of our fathers, otherwise we may lose ourselves in idealism.

> The claim after all, is that the current time is the most prosperous and peaceful time of all of human existence.

Nope. The claim was that this is because of countries wanting to dominate each other. I say it's despite of that.

> You may be worried about a few thousand innocent deaths here and there, but again, that number is much much MUCH much smaller than the historical norm.

> "it's not possible to be fully human if you are being surveilled 24/7"

[ http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20130818120421175 ]

> I am peace-loving and idealistic enough that I believe we should open up our country to these people, despite the risks.

( https://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/3nyn5i/science_ama... )

dragontamerOP9y ago

    Then the idiot who praises, with enthusiastic tone,
    All centuries but this, and every country but his own;

-- The Mikado (1885)

Go back 1000 years ago, and you have people dying of the Plague, and divorce court being settled by TRIAL BY COMBAT, to the death! You aren't really a person unless you're from a noble house either.

http://www.ripleys.com/blog/trial-by-combat/

But yeah, go complain about privacy rights. I raise you SLAVERY. Modern civil rights for all people is a concept that is only 50 years old or so, since the 1960s when the concept began to solidify.

And of course, we aren't killing tens-of-thousands of innocent civilians at a time (because killing everybody is much easier when conquering a nation than trying to rule).

------------

> Nope. The claim was that this is because of countries wanting to dominate each other. I say it's despite of that.

Imperialism is dead dude. Let it go and rejoice in the present.

On the other hand, if you're the kind of person that "The Mikado" is describing, perhaps you can't. Any century but this, any country but your own??

PavlovsCat9y ago

> But yeah, go complain about privacy rights. I raise you SLAVERY.

I love how you asked me to re-read the comment, and now continually talk about straw men yourself. That's quite rich.

> On the other hand, if you're the kind of person that "The Mikado" is describing, perhaps you can't. Any century but this, any country but your own??

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