[somenameforme]

History would disagree with you there pretty strongly. Norway (and Scandiland in general) was fought over for millennia, leading to an extremely rich, interesting, and bloody history - even well after the Viking era. As a somewhat random aside this [1] book is an extremely interesting read for anybody into history - the 'King's Mirror.' It's a book written around 1250 intended exclusively for the education of a Norwegian King. It takes the Plato-type style of a question and answer session between a learned man (father) and pupil (son).

It covers basically every aspect of life, but the most interesting thing about it that it was written near a millennia ago now, yet so many things in it feel so incredibly familiar. The Wiki page links to a bunch of different free translations. Here [2] is the one that I read.

[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Konungs_skuggsj%C3%A1#Editions...

[2] - https://archive.org/details/kingsmirrorspecu00konuuoft

[marginalia_nu]

> so many things in it feel so incredibly familiar

I get this reading a lot of old texts. "De natura deorum" in particular struck me as downright uncanny. I've seen this exact discussion play out time and time again in discussion boards in the early 2000s. The only thing that's a bit off is that the tone is civil and level-headed.

Like the thing is 2000 years old, how long have we been having these arguments?

[SoftTalker]

> it was written near a millennia ago now, yet so many things in it feel so incredibly familiar

It's sometimes forgotten that 13th century humans were the same as us.

[godelski]

It's often forgotten how much conflict there was in Europe (and most of the world) in the 18th and 19th centuries. How this was fairly "normal"

It's really forgotten how relatively peaceful our time is. I'm not complaining, in fact, I want to protect it. And that means we can't forget what was.

https://youtu.be/UY9P0QSxlnI?t=10m5s

[somenameforme]

I would not ignore the 20th century here. WW1 and WW2 may have not taken up that many years, but their death tolls and overall impact were tremendous. Millions were also killed in Vietnam and Korea as well. Then there's things most people in the West are not so familiar with like the Indonesian mass killings [1], Nigerian Civil War [2], Chinese Civil War [3], and so on with numerous other major events with millions to tens of millions killed.

I also think it's clear that the reason that we call the Cold War, the Cold War, and not WW3 is because of nuclear weapons. If anything the general trendline seems to be for conflicts of far greater violence, intensity, and instability over time, but this is currently being masked by nuclear weapons among developed nations. Although the current trend of nations picking ever more idiotic 'leaders' is suggestive that even mutually assured destruction will likely give way as a deterrent, sooner or later.

It's a great time to support life becoming multiplanetary!

[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indonesian_mass_killings_of_19...

[2] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nigerian_Civil_War

[3] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Civil_War

[JumpCrisscross]

Less the 19th century. The Congress of Vienna achieved a lasting peace after the Napoleonic wars.

[godelski]

Sure, but still quite a lot of conflict compared to now (my point about "relative"). Levels that I think people greatly underestimate. And those first 15 years were VERY bloody. (Napoleonic Wars was 1803-1815 for those that don't know and killed between 3.5m and 7m people)

But bloody European wars still include the Caucasian War, the First Carlist War (where 5% of the Spanish population died), Austro-Prussian, Franco-Prussian, the Third Carlist War, and Russo-Ottoman wars. Not to mention some very bloody revolutions: Greek, Hungarian, Italian, French (which cascaded), and so on.

I think it's also important to remember that Europe in 1800 had about 195 million people and rose to a bit over 400 million by the end of the century. Which should significantly influence how one thinks about the causality levels when considering today's >740 million.

Not to mention all the conflicts outside of Europe (many including European powers). The Dungan "Revolt" and Miao Rebellion were some of the bloodiest conflicts in human history. It was an especially bloody century for China.

I'm not sure I'd say that Congress of Vienna achieved lasting peace and I think we both know that either side of that argument can be argued. Especially on the distinction of how you consider peace (people killing one another or conflicts between nations?) and locality (conflicts between European powers on European soil or conflicts involving European powers outside Europe?). Either way, the body count is very high.

Independently, the Napoleonic Wars, (and outside Europe) Red Turban Rebellion, Mfecane, Miao Rebellion, Dungan Revolt, and Taping Rebellion have higher death tolls than all of the global conflicts since 2000[0]. These numbers aren't even normalized to population change[1]. So while maybe not as bloody (in Europe) as the 18th century, I'd still claim it was extremely bloody in the relative sense (which was my point)

[0] https://ourworldindata.org/war-and-peace?insight=conflict-de...

[1] Recognizing that world populations were 1bn in 1800, 1.2bn in 1850, 1.6bn in 1900, 6.1bn in 2000, and 8bn today. This represents a monumential shift and should significantly affect how one interprets casualty numbers.

https://www.worldometers.info/world-population/world-populat...

[p1esk]

2024 is not peaceful.

[godelski]

No one claimed 2024 was peaceful. Nor that any time is. The statement was

  ***relatively*** peaceful our time is

Relatively is an important qualifying word here. Qualifiers are important words that can dramatically change the meaning of sentences and can easily be missed. I think you have missed this specific case.

[p1esk]

2024 is not *relatively* peaceful.

[godelski]

2024 is not relatively peaceful for the 21st century is indeed accurate. But relatively peaceful in terms of (the explicitly stated context) of human history is unambiguously accurate. There are multiple wars in the 19th century that have death tolls greater than all global conflicts since 2000.

I'm not sure what you are trying to argue or if you're just trolling or being flippant. No one is trying to dismiss the wars in Ukraine or Israel/Palestine. No one is trying to even diminish the atrocities in these conflicts in any way. But you are in fact being dismissive of the tens of millions who passed away in just the 1800s and even more in the other centuries. We can compare things without diminishing things and not recognizing the successes and failures of the past will only lead to greater intensity in the future.

If you cannot recognize context nor qualifying words, we are done here. Engage in good faith or not at all.

[dieselgate]

Pretty crazy how that’s not even 1k years ago. Humans have been the same for like, at least dozens of thousands of years? Maybe even more?

[temp0826]

Homo sapiens (with the exact hardware that we carry today) emerged ~300k years ago. Wikipedia says-

"Humans began exhibiting behavioral modernity about 160,000–70,000 years ago, and possibly earlier."

[datameta]

I think modern hardware would be more like 200k, no? I believe 300k is robust/archaic Homo sapiens.

[ethbr1]

> It's sometimes forgotten that 13th century humans were the same as us.

Ceiling is probably closer than median.

One of the crowning achievements of the modern area has been to more broadly extend knowledge and prosperity (both globally and within countries).

We still have a looong way to go, but it's important not to forget what 'median education' looked like in the 1200s.