[iso1631]

New Zealand is always the obvious "lifeboat". It's a long way from populated area so difficult to get there, and it's fairly easy to sink any ships that try. It's in the southern hemisphere so will be protected from the majority of nuclear war which would be in the northern hemisphere.

[TeMPOraL]

Unless someone with nukes decides to threaten NZ to open up the borders for their people, or else.

With global changes this big, we can't expect the usual MAD Mexican Standoff a couple big powers to keep everyone safe. It may be that all nuclear powers (or all that remained after a brief nuclear war) will decide together to politely ask NZ to open up or else.

[johnchristopher]

Or else what ? They half nuke the place they intend to escape to ?

[scott_w]

Have you ever seen a child smash a toy they tried to steal rather than give it back?

[johnchristopher]

Can't say that I have.

I say the people threatening with nukes here would turn to more subtle methods of invasion, that's their objectives. They won't destroy it because they can't have it. That'd be a waste of nukes.

Now is there someone threatening another country with nukes at the moment but not using them because he knows that'd be useless anyway and would it prove my point ?

[scott_w]

> Can't say that I have.

Then I recommend you spend more time around people. Grown men have been convicted of throwing acid in an ex-girlfriend's face because "if I can't have you, no-one can."

> Now is there someone threatening another country with nukes at the moment but not using them because he knows that'd be useless anyway and would it prove my point ?

It doesn't prove your point because no country today is facing imminent extinction. Rationality changes when desperation comes into play.

[johnchristopher]

> > Can't say that I have.

> Then I recommend you spend more time around people. Grown men have been convicted of throwing acid in an ex-girlfriend's face because "if I can't have you, no-one can."

You come up with a stupid analogy based on children behavior and now you invoke people throwing acid ?

This is nickelodeon level debate here.

> It doesn't prove your point because no country today is facing imminent extinction. Rationality changes when desperation comes into play.

You are making the extraordinary (and quite childish considering you started with an analogy based on children behavior) claim that a country would nuke another one to go and settle there, it's up to you to prove it. So far, in the real world, no one has used nukes like that.

I'd follow the argument but if a guy would throw acid and was in position to throw a nuke over a country they were denied access to it's most likely plausible they have the means and resources to get into this country in a more discrete and safe way (safe as in: he's in a country that wasn't nuked).

[anigbrowl]

They won't destroy it because they can't have it. That'd be a waste of nukes.

If your civilization is on the verge of extinction then you are not concerned about wasting nukes. You are way overestimating human rationality under extreme pressure.

[johnchristopher]

I think I'll be keeping my nukes to defend myself from the next bigger bully (which would allow me to keep my country) rather than waste it on the smaller one (which would give me no advantage and less nukes).

> You are way overestimating human rationality under extreme pressure.

Ironically, pretty sure the people with the power to launch nukes won't feel the same pressure as people suffering from climate change consequences. So.. keep the restless and angry gods content and they won't wage war and spread destruction.

[TeMPOraL]

Have you heard of brinkmanship?

A hypothetical country threatening NZ with nukes in this example would be presenting an argument: either let us in, or else we will nuke you - in hopes that NZ prefers being overcrowded but surviving, over being glassed. NZ will not take the deal - at first. The other country can insist more and more, until the situation is so tense that any random event could trigger launching the missiles.

And then, if NZ acquiesces and lets people from one country evacuate to their land, another nuclear country would ask for the same deal. Or they may even point half the nukes at the first country early on, to make sure that either they get the deal or no one else.

Thing with brinkmanship is that at no point anyone wants to actually use the nukes - but at every point it's locally optimal to up the threat, and there is no obvious stopping condition until someone trips over a cable, hits a launch console, and the nukes starts flying.

[swader999]

Or spit in its food so no one else grabs it.

[sharemywin]

child? that tactic still works as an adult. even with strangers in a restaurant, besides who wants to eat "inside" that stupid restaurant anyway.

[sidewndr46]

somewhat ironically, widespread nuclear war might actual pare back human population to a point where emissions dramatically declined.

[swader999]

Its the first place I'm sending my shelter vent seeking drones so don't bother.

[freedude]

much or all of it is under water...