Richard Dawkins dies

[Forge.]

First, you claim that my argument is X, whereas X is a teaser, by Vox, for his book, TIA.
.

this

[d.reamonn]

I may also add Forth: The war argument, as presented in the PPP, is not Dawkins'.

[H20nly]

^ soldiers are motivated by hierarchy and repercussions.

Disagree. The regular army even in nazi Germany was motivated by the threat of Bolshevism and Poland's "aggression".
Essentially nationalism and the fear of atheist hordes.

911 - "they hate our freedoms" = nationalism.

I could go on.

soldiers are motivated by ignorance, hierarchy and repercussions.

fixed?

i see your point as far as the pre-war/early war pep rally is concerned, but at some level, or some time in the conflict, when these men (and handful of women?) realize that their fight has gone too far over the line of moral and ethical standards (killing innocents and children for example, rape, and other atrocities) if these men stay and fight the fight... it is not necessarily out of a sense of nationalism or "go team!" that they are staying to fight... it is out of fear IMO... fear that they or their families will experience repercussions if they change sides or simply quit fighting. if not fear, then bullheadish pride.

i'm not judging them in terms of calling them cowards, or implying that they should run... or anything of the sort, but there is only so much a good man can do before he realizes that his hands are stained and the powers that be are sitting in their castles playing chess with his life and the lives of his brothers in arms and countrymen.

[Machinesworking]

First, you claim that my argument is X, whereas X is a teaser, by Vox, for his book, TIA.

Right because you never used the book to back up your own argument...

Second, you claim that there's no logic to my shoe point—which is true, but as I only made that point to parody of your point regarding religion, then you are ultimately suggesting that there's no logic to your point. The fact that religion was present in discourse during some wars in no way means that religion was the cause of those wars, just as the fact that soldiers wore shoes is also neither here nor there. All the graph shows is that the vast majority of wars didn't hold religion as their explicit primary motive. If you want, on the other hand, to try to prove that wars would not have taken place without religion, then I'd love to see your arguments.

Religion isn't "present" in the discourse of wars, it's used as a motivator. That the actual motivator isn't religion is flatly apparent, it's always power of some sort, I didn't dispute that, what I've been disputing is the use of graphs to downplay the role religion has in motivating soldiers to fight. As if because power is the main goal, then any motivator is an unimportant sidekick. It can easily be argued that religion is a motivator for rulers of nations to go to war in the first place as well.

Third, there's nothing inherently ridiculous about the graphs. They represent data. Or are you suggesting that the data they represent are in some way incorrect or absurd?

I could make my own graph that would completely negate the ones in that Powerpoint, it's simple really, as the data collector you choose what you think is the deciding factor. Japan in WWII is a great example of this. A person wanting to prove that religion isn't the cause of war would ignore the whole 'emperor as living god' thing and concentrate on the military general class that actually started and was motivated to got to war. Which is the truth? depends on your alignment.
With that in mind it could be argued that every country in which religion is a deciding factor in the ruler getting into power in the first place is inherently a country in which war is motivated by or influenced by religion.

Graphs about this question make absolutely no sense, since as a culture we have rarely seen countries that didn't have religion tied into their governments. The only examples of non religious states we've had have all been dictatorial communisms, and of those we have the largest being China which is now practicing Soft Power. Whether or not China is a crappy place to live isn't part of this question. The fact that currently you could use the largest non religious country on the planet as an example of a country that practices less war than the god fearing USA for instance is.

TL;DR - Graphs can be manipulated, especially ones based on abstract political notions. So yes, completely meaningless in the larger picture.

[andydes]

The religion in war thing is an odd one. I'd struggle to put it as a high motivator for any of the colonial wars by European powers, the 2 world wars, Vietnam, etc.

However, since the end of the cold war, the religious angle seems to be getting more prominent. The Balkans, Middle East, North Africa. Obviously, there's the standard power struggle between groups for whatever's their beef with the other, but the rallying cry of bringing religion into it seems stronger than ever before.

Maybe no one believes what their government says anymore and they need other kinds of "leader" to tell them what arseholes the other side are?

I really don't know.

[Machinesworking]

Andydes, divine providence was a constant talking point of old Adolf's.
The Godless Communism of the "Jew run" Bolsheviks was a main reason behind preemptively striking the USSR.
Not to mention the endless Crusades, and all the wars fought against the Muslim hordes...

It's not a black and white situation for sure, but religion as a mitigating factor in the decision to go to war, and as a motivator is hard to ignore.
It certainly didn't start in recent times.

[H20nly]

The religion in war thing is an odd one. I'd struggle to put it as a high motivator for any of the colonial wars by European powers, the 2 world wars, Vietnam, etc.

most of these wars were the result of royal escapades... Vietnam was invaded by Capitalism... the new royalty.

[d.reamonn]

The religion in war thing is an odd one. I'd struggle to put it as a high motivator for any of the colonial wars by European powers, the 2 world wars, Vietnam, etc.

most of these wars were the result of royal escapades... Vietnam was invaded by Capitalism... the new royalty.

No mate, Vietman was Buddhists Vs. Irish Catholics. Without the religious element, no war would have taken place

[H20nly]

[andydes]

Ok, guys. Maybe I should just plead ignorance on this one.

I'm not too proud to say if I'm out of my depth. Can't claim to be an expert on everything.

Carry on.

[Forge.]

i see your point as far as the pre-war/early war pep rally is concerned, but at some level, or some time in the conflict, when these men (and handful of women?) realize that their fight has gone too far over the line of moral and ethical standards (killing innocents and children for example, rape, and other atrocities) if these men stay and fight the fight... it is not necessarily out of a sense of nationalism or "go team!" that they are staying to fight... it is out of fear IMO... fear that they or their families will experience repercussions if they change sides or simply quit fighting. if not fear, then bullheadish pride.

i'm not judging them in terms of calling them cowards, or implying that they should run... or anything of the sort, but there is only so much a good man can do before he realizes that his hands are stained and the powers that be are sitting in their castles playing chess with his life and the lives of his brothers in arms and countrymen.

absolutely

look at Bradley Manning. If you do anything about war crimes they throw the book at you. And cleverly spin it so that people think YOU are the traitor.

[d.reamonn]

i see your point as far as the pre-war/early war pep rally is concerned, but at some level, or some time in the conflict, when these men (and handful of women?) realize that their fight has gone too far over the line of moral and ethical standards (killing innocents and children for example, rape, and other atrocities) if these men stay and fight the fight... it is not necessarily out of a sense of nationalism or "go team!" that they are staying to fight... it is out of fear IMO... fear that they or their families will experience repercussions if they change sides or simply quit fighting. if not fear, then bullheadish pride.

i'm not judging them in terms of calling them cowards, or implying that they should run... or anything of the sort, but there is only so much a good man can do before he realizes that his hands are stained and the powers that be are sitting in their castles playing chess with his life and the lives of his brothers in arms and countrymen.

absolutely

look at Bradley Manning. If you do anything about war crimes they throw the book at you. And cleverly spin it so that people think YOU are the traitor.

I actually hold every solider accountable for his actions. War veterans are murderers. There are no wars without soldiers.

[rakim87]

i see your point as far as the pre-war/early war pep rally is concerned, but at some level, or some time in the conflict, when these men (and handful of women?) realize that their fight has gone too far over the line of moral and ethical standards (killing innocents and children for example, rape, and other atrocities) if these men stay and fight the fight... it is not necessarily out of a sense of nationalism or "go team!" that they are staying to fight... it is out of fear IMO... fear that they or their families will experience repercussions if they change sides or simply quit fighting. if not fear, then bullheadish pride.

i'm not judging them in terms of calling them cowards, or implying that they should run... or anything of the sort, but there is only so much a good man can do before he realizes that his hands are stained and the powers that be are sitting in their castles playing chess with his life and the lives of his brothers in arms and countrymen.

absolutely

look at Bradley Manning. If you do anything about war crimes they throw the book at you. And cleverly spin it so that people think YOU are the traitor.

I actually hold every solider accountable for his actions. War veterans are murderers. There are no wars without soldiers.

and there are no countries if we don't have self defense. granted there are consistently unnecessary wars but if your country or whatever country protecting you doesn't have an army and practice self defense do you really think there aren't people out there that would bomb the shit out of you over something dumb? that's why the more peaceful countries ended up protected by someone or being invaded.

[Forge.]

it's nice for us to do that in the comfort of our homes, but the point is, people like him who are actually in a position to do something about it are not likely to because they know what's awaiting them.

And to further make H20nly's point, he will only spend the rest of his life in solitary confinement, in the past he would have probably been shot. IN many other countries he still would be. And his family would probably be persecuted too.

[scott nathaniel]

I think y'all need a bit of this to temper yer all's zanism:
Love