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Synthesis: Violence and the Possibility of Progress We've covered a lot of ground: Pinker's optimism, Taleb's statistical critique, Galtung's structural violence, Collins's micro-sociology, democratic peace, nuclear deterrence. Now let's pull the threads together and ask: what can we

The Long Peace and Nuclear Deterrence On October 27, 1962, Soviet submarine B-59 was trapped in the Caribbean, hunted by American destroyers dropping practice depth charges. The submarine's crew, out of contact with Moscow, didn't know whether war had started. The captain ordered nuclear torpedoes armed.

Democratic Peace Theory: Do Democracies Fight Each Other? In 1795, Immanuel Kant proposed that republican governments would naturally tend toward peace. Republics, he argued, require citizen consent for war—and citizens, who bear the costs of fighting, would rarely consent. Autocrats face no such check; they can declare war without

Randall Collins: The Micro-Sociology of Violence Here's a puzzle: humans are supposedly violent animals with long histories of warfare, murder, and brutality. But watch two angry people in an argument. Their faces are red, their fists are clenched, their words are vicious—and yet violence almost never happens.

Structural Violence: Johan Galtung's Challenge In 1969, Norwegian sociologist Johan Galtung asked a question that still reverberates through debates about violence and progress: If people die from preventable causes—poverty, lack of medical care, discriminatory policies—is that violence? His answer was yes. He called it "structural

The Fat Tails of Violence: Nassim Taleb's Critique Here's a statistics problem: In the years 1988-2000, the annual fatality rate from commercial aviation disasters averaged about 1,000 people globally. In 2001, a single attack killed 3,000 people using commercial aircraft. What's the

Steven Pinker and the Better Angels of Our Nature In 2011, Steven Pinker published a 700-page argument that humanity was becoming less violent. The Better Angels of Our Nature marshaled data from archaeology, criminology, history, and psychology to make a case that seemed counterintuitive to a world recovering from 9/