Of the ethicness of Killing Children and its dependence on context.

It has worked. In fact, it is working, right now, all the time. There are less wars right now than ever. Because everyone trades with everyone. You just don't hear about it because it's considered the normal state of affairs. Again, I call bullshit on your "humanity is doomed to kill each other" idea, because humans have never fought as little as nowadays.

And if they cut off trade with you I wonder where you'll get the resources to fight your war.

Also, I didn't say not to have weapons and being ready to fight. I meant avoiding fighting at all costs, and definitely avoiding to promote fighting among others. Being peaceful doesn't mean being a wimp, it means being extremely reluctant to use violence.

edited 11th Jan '11 7:42:19 AM by RawPower

^Invade your country and take your resources; Imperial Japan and it's conquest of Asia springs to mind. It's been done time and time again.

edited 11th Jan '11 7:43:26 AM by Kino

That takes a lot of time and effort. You need the personnel to take care of exploiting the resources, you need the roads and logistics to bring them to your country... With sabotage and non-cooperation, you'd need to rebuild the resource-extraction facilities from scratch. And that's for the occupied bits, don't get me started about the bits that fight back, or about terrorism, insurgency and guerrillas.

Also, nowadays the most important resources aren't material. They are the workforce and the intelligentsia.

edited 11th Jan '11 7:47:05 AM by RawPower

There's nothing ethical about anything that happens during wartime, thats never stopped anyone before, they just start whining about how it totally was afterwards. Or start bringing up I Did What I had To Do about why they had to murder civilians because they were in the wrong place.

^^ Insurgencies and guerrillas are vastly overrated by popular opinion these days. Partisan warfare (effectively civilian militias in the woods) in WW 2 was almost negligible in terms of contribution to the overall war. Sure they created a few annoyances, but it wasn't partisans who won at Kursk or Normandy, it was straight up regular armies.

Then you have the fact most insurgencies have LOST. The Viet Cong wiped themselves out against the US Army and Marines by the end of the Tet Offensive. The practical entirety of all combat in Vietnam post-Tet was against the NVA. Then you have Al Qaeda in Iraq losing not only their popular support amongst everybody but they couldn't convince anyone through any sort of military gains that they could stand a chance against the surge in US presence in 2007. Strike two for insurgencies. Then you have the Sri Lankan Civil War basically the Trope Codifier for every insurgent tactic of the last 30 years. The Tamil Tigers lost, the war ended last year in April with a government victory.

The Taliban are suffering the same problems as all other insurgencies that have lost before them. Dwindling manpower, an enemy too difficult to actually beat and a populace that's not willing to accept them into power. (Corrupt as Karzai may be, the Afghan people by and large don't want the Taliban back.)

So the point is, non-cooperation is a non-issue in occupied territories. Who's to say the militant nation in invading the place for resources doesn't just torch every town and city they come across? Slaughter their civilians wholesale? Spare me the moral outrage or the "they wouldn't do that" for whatever reason. It's happened before, it will happen again and again.

Yes but if you were facing a non-violent non-cooperative resistance, would you torch it? What if you were ordered to?

Depends on the strategic importance. Personally I would have flattened everything initially so that non-cooperation never surfaces. (Rubble doesn't make trouble, you prove you can wipe their livelihoods away in a short time, people fall in to whatever you say. The Germans can attest to this.)

In essence, if I'm invading somewhere for its resources, "hearts and minds" are the absolute last thing on my list of cares. If I want those resources I will do anything and everything it takes to get them.

^^If they're non-violent they wouldn't be an issue, just detain them and go about completing your objective; if they become hostile then they're likely to be killed.

edited 11th Jan '11 9:03:48 AM by Kino

Okay, that does it. I see when I'm dealing with The Unfettered... Well, there is no such thing as a universally compelling moral argument... Maybe next time I'll find new, more powerful ideas. If the other countries are willing to let you get away with this...

edited 11th Jan '11 9:16:23 AM by RawPower

Wow, I just love having my personality describes as a conceptual figure of speech; makes life so worthwhile.

Guess we can lock this thread now.

edited 11th Jan '11 9:15:42 AM by Kino

That's because morality is the most subjective thing in the universe. Doesn't matter whether it's killing Child Soldiers or invading somewhere for its resources and accomplishing your objectives, there's no such thing as a universal moral agreement owing to said subjectivity.

/Conclusion of Thread.

It's an aspect of a personality. It means you're willing to pull all the stops to get to an objective, no matter who has to die or suffer, no matter what principles you must break.

Such people exist, and I have failed to account for them properly in my plans.

But to say that these people existing is the same as this being human nature, to say that they getting away with their unscrupulous methods is inevitable, is wrong. And I'll prove it.

Morality is subjectively objective and subjunctively objective. Theoretically, there are minds in mind design space that will not be swayed by any argument no matter how strong. Such as rocks. Practically, undamaged human minds (I exclude psychopaths and the like) are very much alike, and can come to an agreement on minimums, for the mutual long-term interest.

In the scale of nations, the problem is people delegating to the government a number of moral decisions. Thanks to such efforts as Wikileaks, and, eventually, compelte transparency, it will be impossible for governments to pull what most of their populations would call blatant monstruostities in their names and to their faces. The trick would be, like in Nazi Germany, to persuade them the stuff you want to do isn't mosntruous. This is becoming more and more difficult to do as information circulates and social and commercial networks transcend the borders of nations. Globalization ultimately means war is doomed, and the military's work will be police work, with Use Of Force rules rather than Rules Of Engagement.

edited 11th Jan '11 9:25:41 AM by RawPower

...willing to pull all the stops to get to an objective, no matter who has to die or suffer, no matter what principles you must break.

By all means prove it.

Now I might be losing my memory in my old age but I'm pretty sure I didn't say that. I never said that those people exist, and I never said that "pulling out all the stops to get to an objective" is indicative of human nature.

People try to coexist the best they can, when that doesn't work, they try to talk it out, if that fails they resort to violence. It's as simple as that; whether you want to accept it or not is entirely up to you. This might come as a shock to you, but violence can actually solve problems.

edited 11th Jan '11 9:26:22 AM by Kino

I am sorry for amalgamating you with Tom. I thought you tacitly agreed to what he said. I apologise if I was wrong.

edited 11th Jan '11 9:28:30 AM by RawPower

No harm, no foul.

edited 11th Jan '11 9:27:53 AM by Kino

Well, yes, that's what the police are for, so that the ultimate threat of violence is there to stop those determined to break the rules, including the rule that you shouldn't use violence yourself...

Hmm, I feel you're onto something...

IS there a way to have the appropriate checks&balances for a World Government so that while its existence absolutely forbids violence between regions its rule isn't totalitarian or tyrannic but truly derives from the consent of the governed? Can it be made to last "forever"?

edited 11th Jan '11 9:32:17 AM by RawPower

Not that I can see at the moment; people hate other people telling them what to do; look at the UN. Short of threatening to kill anyone who steps out of line; I don't think it's feasible.

Raw, I'd like to think that we can melt down our swords and turn them into plowshares, but the basic fact remains that humans are fundamentally flawed by some or all of the seven deadly sins. Call it sin, call it flaws, call it whatever you like - unless you can remove those root causes, then you will have conflict. And some of those conflicts will turn into wars.

Said another way:

What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you? You desire but do not have, so you kill. You covet but you cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and fight.

You are wise by acknowlodging that it is stupid to get rid of the means to defend yourself, though.

Look, I explained. Nowadays sins don't express themselves through violence. Your girlfriend cheats on you, you don't kill her lover. Someone insults you, you don't stab him. Society Marches on. Such things are doomed... to end.

I wasn't suggesting that all slights need to be met with violence, though. Far from it.

Just that, as flawed human beings, we're kind of prone to it. You ever witnessed a bout of road rage before? People can get utterly stupid when they think some other person is merely tailgating them too close, or didn't use their signal, or cut them off, or any number of easily excusable small slights.

I think a lot of war might boil down to greed and pride, though. Theft on an international scale, or correcting a perceived theft.

Since this is less about child soldiers and more about war, I'll create a thread about war so we won't derail this thread.

Actually Raw, when Im slighted, I DO tend to desire to resort to violence first. I just dont because for one thing Id go to jail.

SS: So, imagine you're a hihg-level political figure now, and the nation on the other side fo the border does some stunt that slights you...

...Actually, I cant honestly answer that question. I doubt I'd be the same person if I was in power like that. In my present situation, I can do whatever the hell I want, and the only person it would affect would be me, I dont think I could reason the same way if I had actual responsibility for a country.

Yeah, I think this one has come to an end of its useful life. Take the War in general conversation to that thread.

Locking.