- This topic is empty.
- Posts
Terrifica,
could you just pick another century. I’ve asked this of 15 people. Everyone I ask it to seems to think this century is the worst to live in (meaning all others are better). So I ask them to just pick one centrum that they would prefer to have lived in–that would be safer, healthier, less violent, etc. I think only one person has ever answered me with a choice.
I think when I say violence everyone thinks war. But war kills very few people compared to homicide. And the past was similar. And even in the past with the greater homicide rates, this wasn’t everyday life. At a time when women could be legally beaten, and at a time when children were regularly beaten with sticks and at a time when you could beat your slave (captured prisoner whose family you killed), homicide was not the main violence people faced.
In answer to your question, violence has been declining for thousands of years. It continues today. It has continued for the last century, with the possible blip of the Second World War. People like looking at the headlines instead of the trend lines. But headlines are meant to sell and make money. So they use absolute numbers instead of rate of violence or rate of death. This sensation it’s it and creates a misperception.
You asked what my perception of it is. I also am very interested in why people have misperceptions about violence. A lot of it is the availability heuristic cognitive illusion.
David,
The first century when Jesus during Jesus’ mortality.
I would be dead by this age since I have kidney disease but nothing to hearing his words in person.
Since God did not choose that for me then it follows it was not what is best for his plan and I exist to serve him.
The thing is that we do have more than others had before us but never the less out actions are still of the animal nature of humanity.
Hi kerwin.
Ya, that’s the century people seem to pick and that’s the reason why. But we are talking about what living and life would be like, in the past, compared to now.
So, assuming you are among the half of children who make it past the age of 5, and assuming you are living the same life, with the same beliefs, how would that go? Would your life be more violent or less? Would it be more safe or less? Would life be easier or harder? (I know all your brain is likely doing is screaming, who cares, I get to meet Jesus) but I’m playing this game to compare life, world conditions, etc.
David,
Violence is declining globally. It has been for a few millennia.
That is an all statement and you cannot prove all statement unless you have the ability to accurately survey every situation. I do not believe that conclusion can be made by either inductive or deductive reasoning. About the best you can do is deductive reason which is fairly close to informed speculation. Archaeologists use it a lot.
The evidence seems to reveal that violence in has declined in the developed world. The undeveloped world is a different thing. In Middle and South America the violence has actually increased. In other places it is hard to tell as the data is not available.
David,
I am a mix of different people that may have not associated that early so technically it might have been impossible for me to exist as me.
But I really do not care about the health care of the time or anything else of that nature. One time is much the same as another with me being required to adapt to it. I would make a lousy soldier. I do not believe the people of earlier times were as violent ass we make them out to be as they probably would have died out considering other things that were killing them off.
It makes wonder whether the children who died in childhood were considered as part of the population on the years they were alive. If so then people were dropping dead like flies.
David,
ask @admin or @t8 about permissions to post images.
David
I think you right that people tend to perceive things with today’s mind ,and see the things the other centuries did not have ,like some say Jesus time was the best for they think that they would accepted Jesus teachings this is dreaming ,any century has his good and bad days ,we cannot mis what we don’t know ,but with what we know today and still struggle with what is the truth tells a lot from ourselves ,
when i look at today’s global government those that want to dominate this period and do the real killing ,morally/physically /food poisoning/water poisoning/religion killings/emigration killings/civil wars killings/and financial killings/garbage killings/and so on
but what kills the most of all i think is GREED
“when i look at today’s global government those that want to dominate this period and do the real killing ,morally/physically /food poisoning/water poisoning/religion killings/emigration killings/civil wars killings/and financial killings/garbage killings/and so on ”
what was governement like for almost all of human history?
The goal of governments seemed to be CONQUEST. Taking over other countries. For the 600 years before 1945, European counties started on average 2 new wars a year!!!! After 1945, of course zero. Today, I am not afraid that the US is going to invade Canada. And Spain isn’t afraid that France is going to invade Spain. This is highly unusual.
What was things like before government?
When governments formed the Kings didn’t want the people fighting and killing among themselves (if only so that tax revenue wouldn’t diminish). Government changed things. You no longer had to met out your own justice. It brought violence down.
“when i look at today’s global government those that want to dominate this period and do the real killing ,morally/physically /food poisoning/water poisoning/religion killings/emigration killings/civil wars killings/and financial killings/garbage killings/and so on ”
Humans found out a while ago that it’s more cost effective not to kill your trading partners. War is expensive It’s cheaper to trade.
While there may be some food poisoning and water poisoning today, the rate of hunger (undernourishment) is vastly down, as is poverty. Access to clean safe drinking water is up. (Remember how Europeans only drank beer for centuries? It’s because they couldn’t drink the water? This of course made them drunk a lot and the beaten up women/wives often said it was because of the alcohol. I’m not sure if you are talking about GMO’s but they have allowed much more people to eat food more cheaply. More people now die from obesity related causes than from hunger!!–something that has never happened before in history.
religion killing? Not new. But it used to be the Christians who were famous for it in the Middle Ages. Crusades, inquisition and what not. There have always been religious people killing others. Human sacrifice (of babies) used to be a pretty big thing pretty much everywhere. Now, not so much.
CIVIL WARS is the one and probably only form of violence that has had a slight uptick recently.
but it’s gone up as other forms of war deaths have gone down. Many believe that all war used to be genocidal and if that rate of war continued to the modern era, 2 billion would have been killed in ww1. Thankfully, genocides (like the ones in the bible) diminished greatly. It seems for almost all history, war was: conquest…kill the men, kill the babies, take the women as slaves and sex slaves. Today they target only the soldiers. Even 5 decades ago the phrase “carpet bombing” existed
so do you think that :the world powers will soon claim “Peace and security” for that is the main thing that most of the world seek ?
Hi terrifica
the peace and security scripture in Thessalonians was first mentioned to me 5 years ago about a week after I realized that violent crime was decreasing in North America. ((Really it went up for a couple decades and then has been plunging back down for a couple decades or so. But the long term trend of homicide is downward….globally.))
But this phenomena isn’t a few decades old. Homicide for example, or cruelty to woman and children. Or judicial torture. Human sacrifice, slavery, genocide…just cruelty as a whole, not burning cats alive for fun for centuries…cruelty has been going down for millennia. It’s not a recent phenomena. So the idea that we are in some interesting area of time where things had been steadily getting worse (no) and then recently they began to get better, doesn’t quite fit history for me.
But of course they need only SAY peace and security. So I don’t find this scripture related to what I’ve been looking at too much.
I am looking at what the established government doing to implement the NWO they have introduce the multiculturalism doctrine ,
then they make trouble to make the poor nations invade the ouest ,so to destroy the nationalist doctrine ,
they also want to integrate all religions into one ,kind of repetition of what Constantin 1 did in 325 ADbut we now see that many countries start to see the bad effect of those doctrines ,but is it to late ?
we will see later i guess
How does this compare with being drawn and quartered.
Less than a couple hundred years ago, 1000 lashings wasn’t uncommon in the British army, for insolence. They screamed during the first 300, but after that it was as if they were whipping dead flesh. Sometimes the person would pass out so have to go to the Infernery. Once recovered they would return to get the rarest of their lashes.
The “wheel” reduced people to strings of flesh and ribbons like a flailing puppet. Today we think of hanging and strangulation as horrible but back then it was called mercy.
David,
ask @admin or @t8 about permissions to post images.I have been trying to figure this out for a long time. The forum by default disables members from posting images because that leads to inevitable spam and porn for most forums. But this forum is highly regulated and I want people to have that ability. I will figure it out eventually. I did add in the toolbar but adding the images is a permission thing.
Some parts of the world have got better for sure, but I think you will find that vicious torture is more prevalent than you realise. The Middle East, China, Africa, perhaps Russia still torture people brutally. And the population of these places blows away the population of the whole world in ancient times. What was considered a big city back then would be a small city today. I read this about the population of the last 2000 years. I cannot verify accuracy.
Between the rise of farming and the height of Roman rule,population growth was sluggish; at less than a tenth of a percent per year, it crawled to about 300 million by A.D. 1. Then the total fell as plagues wiped out large swathes of people. (The “black death” in the 14th century wiped out at least 75 million.) As a result, by 1650 the world population had only increased to about 500 million. By 1800, though, thanks to improved agriculture and sanitation, it doubled to more than one billion.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/fact-or-fiction-living-outnumber-dead/
I had a friend who visited Africa and they commented that every tragedy you can imagine is there.
Hi t8
ive come across this argument many times of course.
It’s absolute numbers vs rate or percentage. In one sense you could say that more people in absolute terms dying or more suffering means things are worse.
But consider this: more people than ever are hiccuping. Does this mean the world has a hiccuping problem? We should expect more deaths given more people. Everyone has to die from something.
Or is the world a much much more charitable place just because there are more people to give and more people that so give?
I think we should compare the rate of hiccuping to see if it’s a bigger problem today than in the past. I would guess it isn’t. But using the absolute number thinking, hiccuping is becoming a bigger and bigger problem. This is bad thinking.
The Black Plague, killed a huge percentage of the world I would not like to be a person alive when 25% of the world died. I would much rather live now. Back then you, you had a huge chance of dying. Even if only 100 million were alive or whatever the number, each person was quite likely to face death So it was a bad time to be alive because YOU would have a good chance of dying. Not so today.
Would you say hiccuping is becoming a bigger and bigger problem?
Bill gates likely have more to charity in the last couple years than everyone did in the 1700’s combined. (Because of the expansion of he money supply, inflation).
Bit does this mean that the world is more charitable, kinder, more giving? No, it just means there is much much much more money to give. Same with violence.
I would rather live on an island of 1000 people with 10 murderers than an island of 20 people with 5 murders.
Saying that an island with 5 murderers is better because 5 is less than 10, seems wrong. It’s a much smaller percentage on the second island. Much safer. Despite the larger number.
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.
