Samantha Atkins wrote:
>
> "Eliezer S. Yudkowsky" wrote:
> >
> > Can you imagine the righteous indignation if Afghanistan were to mount a
> > military attack on the US under similar circumstances? That is the
>
> It, or a similar band of hooligans ALREADY HAS! Or did you miss
> that?
I must have. The World Trade Center would be an act of war if committed
by any foreign organization, and if the game rules are to be amended to
allow war between non-governmental organizations, it was an act of war
when committed by bin Laden. But it is not comparable to the kind of
casualties that would be inflicted by a real war. It is not comparable to
what Iraqi civilians went through during Desert Storm. Note that I
*agree* that what Iraqi civilians went through was an acceptable price to
pay to establish that the world will not permit wars of conquest. My
point is that the United States has not suffered a tenth, even a
thousandth, of the pain we would undergo if we were attacked by an equal
or greater enemy.
What I don't like is the assumption that Iraqi or Afghan civilian
casualties are acceptable - undesirable, perhaps, but acceptable - while
American civilian casualties are unimaginable horrors.
I am not a pacifist. I'd like to be someday, but I don't believe that
pacifism is morally defensible while my civil liberties only exist because
police officers and military soldiers are willing to kill - not die, kill
- to defend them. If Afghanistan is breeding terrorists, then I think
it's acceptable to go in with a ground war and remove the Taliban from
power, even if civilians and involuntary draftees are killed. Not so much
because of the World Trade Center, but to delay the day when terrorists
acquire and use weapons of mass destruction. I don't think I could agree
with a retaliatory air strike unless it's followed by a ground war to
permanently remove the offending government from power. Rogue states are
destabilizing forces in the years leading up to the Singularity. Removing
them from existence and discouraging other states from going rogue is a
worthwhile endeavor. It's pointless to hurt the civilians of the country
whose government supported the terrorists that hurt our civilians.
If the upshot of the WTC attack is that the Iraqi and/or Afghani
governments are removed from power by military force, that really would
have an impact on history. It would establish international law, like the
original Desert Storm.
But if I think that 100,000 civilian Afghan casualties are an acceptable
price to pay to prevent the nuclear bombing of New York and Chicago, then
I must believe 100,000 civilian American casualties are an acceptable
price as well.
-- -- -- -- --
Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/
Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Fri Oct 12 2001 - 14:40:46 MDT