[drtz]

> The Onion couldn't come up with this. It's so embarrassing. And yet, as I type this, dozens of people are taking this premise seriously and debating it on its merits. Humans really are doomed.

Personally, I find discussion about hypothetical, albeit completely impractical, ways we could avoid killing each other a much better use of time than a lot of other topics, like discussing ways we could kill each other more efficiently.

[chongli]

A lot more people, as a percentage, died during medieval wars than do today in modern wars. Read about the crusades sometime. They would lay siege to cities and massacre the entire population. Not a single survivor.

They didn’t need advanced weaponry to kill tens of thousands of people. A few thousand soldiers would go through a city, house-by-house, and put every single man, woman, and child to the sword. They then looted what they wanted and burned the house to the ground.

Thousands more died during the siege, long before any soldiers reached them, due to disease and starvation from overcrowding and dwindling food supplies. It was absolutely horrific and it happened mainly because swords, spears, and bows were useless against city walls so long sieges were the rule.

The massacres that followed could be chalked up to deep resentment on the part of the attacking soldiers for the defenders holding out so long. I think another part of it is simply that the commanders of the day had less power over their soldiers, so looting and pillaging was part of the bargain to encourage them to fight.

[jccooper]

Looting was in large part the payment for soldiering. Whomever raised the army might pay a bit regularly for maintenance, but all the real money was in the spoils, and everyone involved knew it. Many is the army that failed to destroy a defeated foe because the victorious soldiers mostly wanted to loot the enemy camp.

[lapinot]

I'd be curious about data supporting this claim. Browsing through https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_anthropogenic_disaster... seems to suggest otherwise, but its also not relative to population.

[heja2009]

Erm, no, I don't think so. Can you give a source for that claim?

Medieval wars were in general shorter, more regional, used much smaller forces and affected the civilian population less than in later ages. Of course it is very difficult to give any numbers, but various infection diseases, childbirth and infant death were major causes of death. (E.g. women life expectancy overtook that of men only in the 19th century.) Also at least in the 13th and 14th century in Europe main reasons for a significant temporary population decline - during a time of general population growth - were black death and hunger, the latter being partially caused by limitations to agriculture technology and available land.

[hef19898]

Agree, but then humanity spent a considerble effort since the dawn of time exactly on that: developing ways to kill things faster and safer for oneself.

It is, sadly, part of our nature. And because of that I prefer hypotheticals that actually have some basis in reality.

By the way so, during the time of bow, arrow, sword, spear and shield, we still managed to kill hundreds of thousands of people.

[stareatgoats]

> part of our nature.

This comes up now and then. But it doesn't hold water, because if true then people would on average be killing people roughly at the same rate, regardless of epoch, geographical area or society. But nations and tribes that were constantly warring have over time become good, peaceful neighbors, while the opposite is the exception. In spite of the impression one might get from the daily news, person-on-person violence is at an historical low.

Why is this explanation still popular, despite the obvious falsity of it? Good question, not sure. Maybe for now suffice to say that it isn't true whenever it pops up. Eventually we might start scrutinizing the real reasons (or lack thereof) for going to war, and the mindless slaughter it necessarily entails.

[RecycledEle]

> developing ways to kill things faster and safer for oneself. It is, sadly, part of our nature.

If you really feel that way, please either (1) go vegan, or (2) start killing the animals you eat and wear with your bare hands.

[dalbasal]

case in point, I suppose.

Ok. Fine. I'm in. Let's discuss it.

Do you think we're better off using ai to decide the arms treaties, or should we hold off for quantum computing?