I'm saying that international intervention has had a string of  creating or fuelling extremist groups

Despite this claim being made constantly, I've seen very little evidence in favour of it. The number of Palestinian civilians killed in Israeli strikes, for example, is not correlated with Palestinian support for hostility against Israel. Drone strikes, too, have an incredibly strong deterrent effect against terrorist attacks.


See here:

The logic of blowback appeals to human intuitions: you’ve been hit, so why don’t you hit back? But there is no way that those human intuitions can be applied to modern day terrorism. I have already shown Palestinians (here), Pakistanis (here) and Iraqis (above) do not respond by blowing people up nor supporting it – so it clearly is an empirically false statement. But even the  logic of it is faulty for three reasons. Firstly, the bulk of these grievances are caused by the terrorist groups themselves.  I can’t be bothered to write it out again, so here’s what I’ve previously written:

According to a study by King’s College London looking at civilian deaths from 2003-2008 concludes that of the 92,000 civilians deaths recorded by Iraq Body Count, 12% were attributable to coalition forces. 74% were carried out by “unknown perpertrators” described as “are those who target civilians (i.e., no identifiable military target is present), while appearing indistinguishable from civilians.”... [In Afghanistan,] civilian deaths caused by pro-government forces decreased by 24% from 2009-2010, making them responsible for 15% of civilian casualties.

And yes, those numbers have barely changed and are still accurate in 2013. So why not attack the Taliban or Al Qaeda? Perhaps this is what the Sons of Iraq did when they turned to the U.S - against Al Qaeda? I don’t think so. As Loonwatch (without realising what this idea entails) helpfully reminds us: the support for attacks against civilians is roughly the same around the world (and if anything, lower in Muslim-majority countries). It seems being a victim of terrorism, or a nation which is the victim of terrorism has little to do with supporting or carrying out violence. In fact, there are many examples (that I haven’t already mentioned) of individuals feeling aggrieved and not becoming violent: families of homicide victims and support for the death penalty (see research here and here); the Tibetans whose rates of violence match their oppression (see a ridiculous attempt to make the opposing argument here); the black communities after the reconstruction period etc. etc. Even if we step back – away from terrorism – being anti-American is not related with foreign policy. In the seminal The Political Economy of Hatred, Glaeser (at p.46) rehteorically asks ‘why would 34% of French but only 27% of Vietnamese have an unfavorable opinion of the United States?’

Secondly, even if we just focused on the minority of Western-linked grievances, terrorism involves attacking innocent third parties. Even if you want to grant (which I don’t), that individuals become violent when they become aggrieved – why would you attack someone innocent? This is why the human intuition point should strongly be countered: you do not attack an innocent civilian (be it man, woman or child) because someone who you consider guilty attacked you. To be fair, there is a common response:  there is no other way for them to respond. This is commonly given in the context of Israel – they have nothing but rockets and suicide jackets and so they cannot target the military. Leaving aside for the moment that there may be ways of attacking military targets, this is still faulty. It is faulty for terrorist groups because they make it their modus operandi to target civilians. They have time to think about their best method and they choose terrorism. Why does this mean the argument is faulty? Because the empirical record is emphatic that terrorism does not work:

This graph is taken from a lecture by Peter Neumann (at 5:32) and is representative of the academic literature (Abrams (2006), Harmon (2011) and Neumann (2008)). It might be said that this is an academic, not emotional/real response – but that has already been shown to be a ridiculous argument by the empirical record: the overwhelming majority of people can feel aggrieved, and their emotional response is not one of terrorism. I noted how this is precisely what happened after Operation Cast Lead in 2008-9 – and, surprise surprise, humans continue to have morals after Operation Pillar of Defense in 2013.

Thirdly, the logic is flawed because it will leave us paralyzed from doing good. The Woolwich terrorist said that ‘I am fed up with people killing Muslims in Afghanistan’ (see the first element above). I have already spelt out the benefits of liberation of Afghanistan but I want to add two things. Why are these Islamist terrorist more aggrieved than the local population? As Bergen notes, ‘favorable views of the Taliban in polling across Afghanistan over the past several years are consistently no more than 10 percent.’ Second, the government we are working with to fight against these unpopular terrorists is a democratically elected government which has the support of its people (75% of whom give the central government a positive assessment). We needed to carry out the liberation of Afghanistan – not just for the eradication of Al Qaeda’s training ground but the liberation of the Afghan people. If (and as should be obvious by now, this is only an if), there is a response from those who seek to maintain these Talibanised states, then we should accept it and continue to fight against it.   

Quote from: M8A-ORD on January 02, 2016, 04:22:15 PM

I'm still hoping Romney joins the race after the primasries end

He won't.

Why? news i haven't come across?

I'm still hoping Romney joins the race after the primasries end

Here you go again, on and on about empiricism.

And here you are, yet to give me any reason why I shouldn't. The shocking thing about empiricism is that it's incredibly useful. . . It works. I see no reason to throw out a gigantic part of the basis for our epistemology simply because you think an entity you can provide no evidence for exists.

All this is is a new god to appeal to.

No, it isn't. There's nothing to appeal to because you've already admitted we are incapable of understanding it. Even if it does exist, there are zero consequences because our lack of understanding means we have no idea about its intentions, power, knowledge or morality other than what you superimpose on it.

Spoiler

Quote

Quote from: M8A-ORD on December 30, 2015, 02:25:36 PM

Tagged in case you're interested.

I've probably asked before.

But why do you believe? And I don't want any of that "It's about faith" or "I was raised that way" stuff. I mean a rational, maybe even empirical, reason.

Quote from: Mr. Psychologist on January 01, 2016, 02:43:14 PM

Thank you for the concern desty, but karjala isn't a bot.

Sorry to have bothered you and all, but are you sure?

Dude used to be on Bungle, he's not a bot.

Fireworks aren't a part of what makes us civilized.

Irrelevant; the point is that innocent people are trying to freely celebrate an event of global importance, and are being prevented from doing so by those who would kill us. Did people still celebrate? Yeah, but we're talking about the Parisian fireworks display: an iconic event of cultural significance. This is the first time it's been cancelled; it's substantial because it's essentially part of French--and even global, given their widespread appreciation--life around this time of year.

Anybody who thinks this isn't a problem isn't paying attention.

2016 has got off to a bad start. Among heightened security all around the world, including an extra 3,000 firearms officers along the Thames in London and 6,000 officers in Times Square (many of whom were undercover), it also became apparent that many iconic new year celebrations from around the world had been cancelled.

The Kremlin announced that the Red Square, the traditional location for Russian new year celebrations, would be closed. The government, however, is downplaying potential terrorism as the cause for this. The celebrations in Brussels were also cancelled after information was gathered suggesting an attack was being planned, leading to six arrests.

But the thing that angers me the most is Paris. After being attacked for exercising their freedom of expression at the beginning of last year, and after losing 130 innocent civilians in November, the iconic and beautiful fireworks display was cancelled for the first time ever. And 10,000 troops will be deployed to the streets of Paris. After being robbed of over a hundred lives over the course of 2015, 2016 has started with the French being robbed of their very way of life. An event of cultural celebration, solidarity and somber reflection on the events of the year gone--and one of the world's largest--simply didn't happen.

This from a people who marched in their millions in the face of the Charlie Hebdo attacks, who put flowers in the bullet-hole riven walls following November, and who roared "We are not afraid" in the face of terrorism. For 2015, this was the character of the French:



And yet the year has begun with a very sinister realisation: they are afraid. As are many others. Greater security measures are obviously needed to preserve our well-being against these theocratic fascists, but not at the expense of our values and our way of life. If more people have to die in order for us to go on living as we wish to live, then so be it.

without judging women based on your very specific experiences

Statistics are a thing.

This one also includes statistics for men.

Academic paper linked in the article.

First study also suggests that men do not suffer the same long-term marital consequences from promiscuity. I'm sceptical, though. My own experience with promiscuity suggests otherwise.

If you only make conclusions based off of your own experiences, you are doomed to be a prejudiced SOB.

Uh, I know. That's why I said I'm not going to base my conclusions about male promiscuity on my own experience. . .

What you call a "wager" is using common sense to infer that men aren't just better than women in this context.

I've said numerous time already that I think men have a bigger problem in terms of being deadbeats and useless parents. We were discussing the very narrow question of whether or not male promiscuity impacts their satisfaction in long-term relationship down the line, I was honest and said I don't know if that's the case. I'm not excusing male promiscuity, or saying women ought to be less promiscuous than men; I'm saying I don't know if a very specific consequence of promiscuity for women is the same for men.

 At the end of the day, I'm still holding both sexes to account for promiscuous behaviour.

Quote from: M8A-ORD on December 31, 2015, 11:22:19 AM

I'm going to a New Year party tonight, where I will consume large quantities of whiskey and lager. I will also smoke at least ten cigarettes.

Thoughts?

hmm

Spoiler

kys

Love you too.

Do you seriously not see how that, at the very least, SOUNDS incredibly sexist?

No, because you went on to ask me about promiscuity and men in relationships and I admitted honestly that I don't know. If I had to wager, I'd say the effect would be the same. . . But I only have my own experience to go on here, and I'm not going to pretend my experience is ampliative.

Men and women are very different.

Agreed, but promiscuity among men is still a problem. Even if it didn't cause the same long-term effects it does in women, promiscuity is still a symptom of something undesirable. At least from what I've seen, men tend to be deadbeats more often than women; they're shirking their responsibility and duty of their relationships and, in a lot of cases, their children.

cindy is, i'm just trying to get you to understand why your statements may have been construed that way

Oh, I understand, don't get me wrong. I just think she's fundamentally incorrect.

it's not a colossally-huge deal

Had you said that like three months ago I'd probably agree, and in the sense that it impacts my life it really isn't a big deal. But charges of "sexism" and "racism" have been so diluted by people liberally throwing around such accusations that they don't really mean anything any more.

Such accusations should be serious, and should only be made with a clear mandate.

Quote from: M8A-ORD on December 31, 2015, 09:38:33 AM

As if that's an excuse. If you're comfortable doing something irresponsible and probably damaging to the future well-being of both yourself and your relationships, you're acting in a moronic manner.

right, but the same sort of logic applies to both genders

you realize

. . .

Yeah.

I never said it didn't.