Among humans.
I have finished reading The Territorial Imperative. Thanks arch for the recommendation.
The solution to war, if Ardrey is to be believed, is to ensure there is just enough natural hazards everywhere to keep us distracted from killing one another.
Every time we have a common problem facing the country, people forget their tribes, bigotry and hate for a moment, even if it is just a few hours and direct their energy to helping one another.
The million dollar question is how to cause this natural events. That I leave to others to come up with.
Random thoughts 
Do nothing about climate change? Problem already solved. 😉
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It is slow and not apparent to many.
Earthquakes or floods that keep armies busy is the kind I am looking at
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It is slow…but over time it will increase the likelihood of natural disasters. Just the shifting of climatic patterns alone stand to put drought in some places, and floods in other places, sea level rises of course will also cause flooding, and impacts of hurricanes and storms will be even greater in coastal areas. It is unlikely that earthquakes or volcanoes will happen at any greater rapidity than they already do. An eruption like yellowstone however would definitely be a game changer.
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The problem with droughts or flooding in isolated areas is it will put pressure on nations to defend what they have making war inevitable.
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Earthquakes and volcanoes for the most part are just as isolated though….I guess if you are looking for a global type disaster than yellowstone or an asteroid collision is more what you are after?
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You recall the Dec 2004 tsunami? Half of it but spread in different places keeping people busy from bombing each other
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Sure. Was India, Thailand, and Indonesia about to bomb each other at that time? But geologic hazards decrease in probability with an increase in intensity. Drought and flooding kills more people every year than any other hazard. But a hazard too great would leave areas so damaged they may be prey to invasion, out so desperate they become more warlike or become open to extremist governments. Perhaps having not read the book you refer to is my weakness, but it doesn’t appear obvious to me that large natural hazards are necessarily a path to peace in the long run.
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No, they were not and yjat isn’t my point.
My point is that natural hazards tend to unite populations and bring a cessation of hostilities even if just briefly.
Over time we have mastered our physical environment leaving us with time enough to kill each other.
Imagine a situation where we were always facing a natural hazard, and not just in isolated places but each place with its own kind, where will the time be for war?
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I see what you are saying. Increased leisure time is problematic in a number of ways, but it has also given us that time to solve those problems. In Steven Pinker’s book The Better Nature of our Angels that we have become less warlike with time despite our decreased difficulties in dealing with the natural world. As a percentage of population less people are dying from wars today than in our past. I am not saying Steven Pinker’s work is definitive by any means as I know there have been many who have debated his statistics but at the very least its not clear that constantly facing natural hazards would decrease chances of war. It seems that if you had a region that was plentiful in resources and supported your population you might act to defend it, but you’re more likely to be content. On the other hand if your area was dangerous, constantly lacked resources or the climate changed or population increase caused resources to dwindle you are more likely to try and acquire more resources, acquire new technologies, and develop ideologies to unite people to make that happen.
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Steve Pinker demolishes John Horgan’s view of war – http://wp.me/ppUXF-J6V
I guess you will like this if you haven’t read it yet.
Has Pinker shown why we seem to be at war less, though whether this is true is another question. Maybe international aggression has reduced but inter-tribal and other forms of aggression I think are still just as high.
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Great response by Pinker there!
I think it would be difficult to determine the violence level historically on an inter-tribal level. So perhaps you are correct that it may have not changed or is even higher. I suspect though that it has also reduced. When you look at the progression of morality over the past few thousand years, there is a general march towards I think more humane ideals and even if of course archaic ideals (like slavery) continue in some places there are less and less people who find this to be a justifiable practice. This is purely my feeling, but I believe that as we find more and more practices that reduce a persons humanity as being immoral, violence also decreases. I think on a longer time scale this is the case. Perhaps I’m wrong, but it is an interesting question.
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It is definitely an interesting question
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Ooo… asteroid. Not bad. But an extinction event really doesn’t do the trick. It would probably bring out the worst in us.
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Extinction event is not desirable.
That will not keep us busy enough
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Haha…the size of the asteroid is also inversely proportional to the likelihood of collision. A 2 km wide asteroid would only eliminate about a quarter of the population…I am sure there are so longer term problems as well. lol
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we need aggressive aliens as the “natural disaster” aka the ozymandias solution (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ozymandias_(comics))
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Nations might fight against nation thinking they have been manufactured in one place or the other. But it looks like a plan
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I vote for alien invasion.
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They might pose a serious challenge.
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… unless they feasted on creationists.
One must learn to take the good with the bad and spend an appropriate amount of time to deeply ponder any interference.
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Feasting on creationists would itself be sufficient to reduce conflict. The population will go down almost to a point where there is no need for aggression but cooperation
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“… unless they feasted on creationists.”
Oh, yes! We can only hope!
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I second alien invasion, Sorry tildeb I had not read your comment before making a similar observation below.
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If we all join together to build big walls around each other, all our problems will end. Can’t have war when each of us is isolated behind a big wall, AND, we’ll get the Mexican government to pay for it! Damn, I should run for President.
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You really should run for president.
Walls, however, have been shown to be ineffective.
They dig tunnels or fly planes and drones into populated areas
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I say, put a wall around every tunnel and over every drone, and make Mexico pay for it all. I sound more like a brilliant presidential candidate every time I say this. 🙂
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You have two of my votes. This, I can confirm, is a good solution
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… “unless they feasted on creationists”
My chuckle for the day . . . I needed one after UnkleE’s wisdom on Nate’s blog. . . 🙂
Inspired – if I could vote for ya I would, buddy.
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Thanks. Your wall will come with a free burrito cause of that. 🙂
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How you manage to engage with unkleE for that long is beyond me. I have read almost all the comments and now I have to go wash up
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He simply doesn’t give us, does he?
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I find him really annoying.
And with his standard lines; scholars agree or scientists say as if there is any one scientist who has given us a way of knowing an inspired text
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UnkleE uses a firmly entrenched confirmation bias – he’s been collecting cherry picked data for a long time now – repacked and marked up for resale to the newly encountered (often in the form of commentary to those he knows perfectly well do not share his beliefs) as if adduced from ‘the literature’.
The length of time needed to recheck source material he bulldozes towards anyone who seriously questions his ‘conclusions’ is not small and takes significant effort to go through them beyond the chosen bits.
UnkleE counts on this.
Any criticism that reveals the cherry picking he uses to confirm his bias is then met by another wall of cherry picked but often loosely related data, and the loop continues. The number of links he has amassed is impressive!
What UnkleE doesn’t do is extend his thinking to account for powerfully contrary data and this is the giveaway to his technique, which works to present a facade – for that is all it is – of respectability for his causal claims of Oogity Boogity!. He, like all theists, cannot link the effects he claims are evidence for his causal god with said God.
So much for producing evidence.
Without those links, all his ‘answers’, all his ‘explanations’, all his ‘evidence’ from all his carefully sifted ‘sourced material’ amount to nothing but an ever-lengthening number of knowledge-free claims. He is the rain dancer and nothing anyone can say will alter his belief that his dancing causes the rain because… all kinds of water, you see. An impressive list of water-related links.
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Oh yes, I think he has lived his life collecting links to throw at atheists. Who has time to check all of them, I don’t know. I know I can’t stand him
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What’s the name of Nate’s blog? I wanna check this conversation out.
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The Big Picture – http://wp.me/p2iMJ-wf
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This is the latest blog posting: https://findingtruth.info/2016/05/19/the-big-picture/ — but he “appears” on nearly everything Nate writes.
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Nate encourages his ramblings. I think that’s why he is always there.
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just read the first few comments there. My brain started to melt. Good Jeebus!
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Nate is just uber-polite; I need lessons from him in diplomacy. 🙂
(then again, I have many on-line mentors)
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I can’t be that polite to nonsense peddlers. I will allow them to have their say but that’s it
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HA! Mak beat me to it. 😉
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Thanks guys.
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Nan, he sees himself as an apologist and is proud of his ability to ‘defend the faith’. But when you really analyze the situation, why is it that christianity NEEDS apologists?? In my opinion – be that as it may – they are just extensions of early christians whose imaginations created answers to questions primitive humans had (before anyone knew anything about Science). They became adept at MSU (making shit up); they’re a loyal and strident ‘band of brothers’ who carry the torch for their imaginary friend.
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Haha Carmen!
Msu is a good one.
It needs apologists because its claims are not apparent or are contrary to available evidence
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I agree, Carmen! MSU … must remember that!
And also agree with you Mak. If “God” is so great, why must everything related to “his” book need to be explained … and discussed … and argued over? SMH
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“…why must everything related to “his” book need to be explained … and discussed … and argued over? ..” Easy answer here: because a lot of people’s ideas about “god” are wrong and need correcting. Who’s ideas on “god” are correct? Easy. Mine. $Amen$
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Of course I knew that! Your inspiration comes from the Divine 1 … and who can possibly argue with that? 😉
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And mine. The god I believe in is golden boot and it kicks ass
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I thought for a while that the unk had credibility because he made everything sound scientific. However my eyes were opened to the reality when he went to great lengths to defend the authenticity of the Shroud of Turin.
In regard to the Shroud of Turin I eventually found the smoking gun.The first recorded sight of the shroud was in the middle ages. But what is key is that we have an artist’s picture of it and description from that time. At that time the so-called blood was bright and clear.
Odd isn’t it that the blood does not fade for over a thousand years and then suddenly fades dramatically in a few hundred years. It is a slam dunk as a medieval forgery. So on this basis I was able to definitively determine that the unk’s research is not objective, but extremely selective.
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I think I recall that discussion on Nate’s blog.
How someone can think that piece of cloth is legit is beyond me
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I found the Kleenex of Christ the other day, complete with a holy booger in it. I’m gonna sell it on E bay and make millions.
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I don’t want a lot from the proceeds. I am a humble man. From the millions, a hundred grand will be sufficient for me
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I’ll send it your way via holy spirit express.
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I prefer pigeon express. Holy spirit express could get distracted when there are virgins
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Good point. Pigeon express it is.
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Carmen I have reached the point where usually I don’t even read what unkleE posts any more. By contrast I always read what you, Nan, Nate and Travis post.
I do admire Nate, though I doubt I would have his patience with some of the folk he attracts.
If I had to give one piece of advice to folk who post on blogs it is, keep your comments short, use short sentences and short paragraphs.
Seeing a long piece of block text causes my mind to rebel.
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I have the same issue with most of the comments there. They are just too long. Who reads comments 300 words long
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Peter, I think that’s one of his tactics – ‘wow’ them with text. 🙂 He also makes a pretext of conciliation . . . but does anything but. Yes, Nate is a gem.
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We had a big hail storm a few days ago. 😦 Our roof survived but the neighbors had damage. So I am going to be nice to them and not spread the gossip about them that I was planning to spread. SEE, it really does work!! 😉
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Haha.
Hope your neighbour is not praying to their god to damage your roof
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LOL
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From what I see in the movies an alien invasion is the best way to unify humanity. Natural disasters can bring out the self interest in some folk.
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Of course … it must be an alien invasion. I mean, the movies are all depictions of real life … right?
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That’s where I get my wisdom now days.
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“Amity = Enmity+Hazard”
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Increased hazard increased amity
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