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War - A necessary evil?

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BallisticMystic
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23 Aug 2008, 8:57 am

Anubis wrote:
Can war be the best cause of action and catalyst for change in some circumstances? Discuss. I will post my opinion later.


I think the best way to find your answer would be to look at the wars fought within yourself.

What was the warring about, what was gained, what was lost?


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23 Aug 2008, 9:03 am

corroonb wrote:
There is no such thing as "human nature". We all have a choice to do violence or not. Human nature is not an excuse for violent behaviour.


Human nature is real. It's why people do what they do.



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23 Aug 2008, 9:11 am

slowmutant wrote:
corroonb wrote:
There is no such thing as "human nature". We all have a choice to do violence or not. Human nature is not an excuse for violent behaviour.


Human nature is real. It's why people do what they do.


"Human nature" is a nonsensical idea. The concept contain two many contradictory ideas to be of any use.

I am a pacifist and I am human. Therefore it is not human nature to be violent. Unless I am not human or I am not a pacifist.



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23 Aug 2008, 9:19 am

Your views are not reflective of the general human population. How old are you anyway?


Have you ever lived away from home?



Last edited by slowmutant on 23 Aug 2008, 9:20 am, edited 1 time in total.

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23 Aug 2008, 9:20 am

corroonb wrote:
"Human nature" is a nonsensical idea. The concept contain two many contradictory ideas to be of any use.

I am a pacifist and I am human. Therefore it is not human nature to be violent. Unless I am not human or I am not a pacifist.

Human nature is not a nonsensical idea, and I do not see how such a notion inherently has too many contradictory ideas to be of use.

Let's see, so, the actions of one person define the general nature of all people? Nonsense! Human nature, is a description of tendencies, not of all human beings. You are a pacifist, and you are a human, this means that humans can be non-violent, it does not mean that human nature cannot be towards violence though.



corroonb
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23 Aug 2008, 9:25 am

slowmutant wrote:
Your views are not reflective of the general human population. How old are you anyway?


Have you ever lived away from home?


I am 23 years old and I have lived away from home for exactly 8 months in South Korea.

To say that humans have as part of their "nature" a tendency toward violence would be to suggest it is a genetic trait and not a behavioural one.

I believe violence is a cultural or behavioural trait and the existence of non-violent humans and cultures would seem to prove this.



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23 Aug 2008, 9:34 am

You say tomato, I say to-maht-toe.



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23 Aug 2008, 9:38 am

corroonb wrote:
To say that humans have as part of their "nature" a tendency toward violence would be to suggest it is a genetic trait and not a behavioural one.

I believe violence is a cultural or behavioural trait and the existence of non-violent humans and cultures would seem to prove this.

Well, I do not know how to exactly be genetically violent so much as genetically aggressive, and I think it isn't a hard argument to say that human beings are genetically aggressive.

I would not use such a minority to prove much, because in any population, there are going to be outliers.



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23 Aug 2008, 9:39 am

It is interesting thet a form of compulsion described as human nature seems irrevocable by someone who puts such strong claims on "free will".



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23 Aug 2008, 9:45 am

It helps to be human yourself. An adding-machine would have hard time here.



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23 Aug 2008, 9:47 am

I can also subtract and, in my time, I have multiplied. Division is what I am working on here.



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23 Aug 2008, 9:57 am

Sand wrote:
It is interesting thet a form of compulsion described as human nature seems irrevocable by someone who puts such strong claims on "free will".


Either people have free will or they don't have free will. This is a black and white concept. You could argue that "free will" doesn't exist at all.

People can only be coerced without violence if they allow themselves to be, even with violence some cannot be coerced against their will. Gandhi for example.



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23 Aug 2008, 10:02 am

Posting your thoughts on this website demonstrates your free will. There's no external coercion. You post on WrongPlanet because you want to.



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23 Aug 2008, 10:05 am

slowmutant wrote:
Posting your thoughts on this website demonstrates your free will. There's no external coercion. You post on WrongPlanet because you want to.


Not necessarily. If I was afraid of death, someone could force me to post here by putting a gun to my head. This is not the case but it is possible regardless of the odd motivation for such an act of coercion.



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23 Aug 2008, 10:08 am

corroonb wrote:
slowmutant wrote:
Posting your thoughts on this website demonstrates your free will. There's no external coercion. You post on WrongPlanet because you want to.


Not necessarily. If I was afraid of death, someone could force me to post here by putting a gun to my head. This is not the case but it is possible regardless of the odd motivation for such an act of coercion.


If you're typing with a gun to your head, your free will has obviously been compromised. You are being coerced to write. Do you understand the difference?



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23 Aug 2008, 10:08 am

But a while back you indicated that humans are dominated by "human nature" and therefore unable to exert free will.

Incidentally, if God does not kill, I assume He used the same logic as the gun crowd in the USA when all that water killed most of the people on Earth in the flood. God didn't kill, it was the water. They just never had enough free will to swim.