A brief history of the peace symbol
edition.cnn.com
edition.cnn.com
The 'Smiling Sun' logo took a different 'intellectual property rights' path to the CND logo. The creators sought copyright protection so that nobody co-opted the idea in nefarious, money making ways that violated the principles behind the logo.
From a fashion marketing perspective a CND logo is easy, it can be slapped on the cheesiest of hippy style fancy dress outfits and sold for the wearer to vaguely go along with it, 'in character' rather than living and breathing the principles and ideas behind the logo.
But the Smiling Sun logo hasn't entered mass consumer culture at that level, in part due to the copyright protection. If you had the logo in your window then quite clearly you really do believe in the cause, it is not a mere decorative element that projects a certain cool vibe.
More details of the Smiling Sun logo and how the licensing works can be found on their website. There are lessons to be learned from the fortunes of their logo in contrast to the CND logo for those writing free and open source software:
According to [1] the meaning of the upward symbol without the circle is:
"Name: unknown (the rune poems are contradictory). Phoneme: Z. Meaning: protection from enemies, defense of that which one loves."
On Wikipedia, the entry is "Algiz" (z-rune) ᛉ (U+16C9) [2] used in Proto-Germanic and Old English (Anglo Saxon) where it means "elk" or "moose". Old Norse has a version which goes the other way akin to ᛦ where it means "yew" (taxus baccata, a conifer). See Wikipedia for more info.
EDIT: Its been abused by the SS in WWII [3]
EDIT: Another source on Algiz rune [4].
[1] https://norse-mythology.org/runes/the-meanings-of-the-runes/
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algiz
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Runic_insignia_of_the_Schutzst...
I'm a pacifist, so obviously I'm for the idea of a nuke free world. But I don't understand how it could be achievable. I mean, is it that hard to build a nuke? The required knowledge has spread globally by now. As a side effect of general progress in science and engineering it will be cheaper, not more expensive, to build nukes. Do people share my pessimism about this?
I wonder what constructive, believable steps the world could take towards world peace if we accept that some day, any somewhat-functional state can build a nuke if they really really want to. I'm sure that there's ways, maybe even other than mutually assured destruction, to make actually using such nukes uninteresting to even the most insane dictator.
(I am just putting forth a hypothesis for why once we go to zero nukes, it might be possible to stay at zero nukes using existing tech)
We are already in such a world, what prevents proliferation are not technical reasons, but the strong international pressure - both by nuclear and non-nuclear states. It's not unfathomable to conceive a world where such pressure (and the threat of conventional attacks) could be strong enough to prevent any proliferation, where the international community would closely watch over any such activity and immediately stomp on any small scale dictator looking for an easy edge.
What's harder to imagine is a way to get from here to there. Before engaging in any multilateral talks and treaties, I believe the mere hint of renouncing nukes would be political suicide inside US.
Nukes are expensive to build even if you know how, and expensive to maintain. That puts a bit of a stop on small countries. But those costs will obviously get smaller with time, as this is what technology generally does - makes difficult things easier, expensive things cheaper.
Regardless, things are going to get more dangerous with time, really, simply because from where we stand now, all interesting technologies we can conceive are either directly or indirectly powerful enough to be dangerous. Here are few thoughts.
- Power storage. Destructive capability is tied to power density. Which is the same thing we're trying to improve, as our world needs more energy and more portable energy. The difference between a battery and a grenade now is how rapidly it releases accumulated energy.
- Interplanetary travel. As they say, any drive technology that's powerful enough to be interesting - that is, giving us weeks/months of travel time within the Solar System - is also a weapon of mass destruction. With our current understanding of physics, we'll need to be able to handle in day-to-day usage amounts of energy comparable to nuclear weapons. And that's not even touching the kinetic energy (relative to Earth) stored in asteroids flying around the Sun, that could be unleashed on this world with just a slight nudge at the right time.
- Nanotechnology and biotechnology. They're one in the limit (life itself is nothing but advanced nanotech we didn't create, and don't know how to control yet). They offer unprecedented capabilities all across the board, from healthcare through manufacturing to quality-of-life, and of course, military. If we crack that, we'll be pretty much on fast track to godhood. And yet even today we can see the potential for disasters - from genetically engineered plagues, through precise genetic attacks, gene drives, plastic-eating bacteria, to the well-known grey goo scenario.
- Superhuman AI - if we actually get a self-improving mind working, that's most likely game over for humanity.
I'm not trying to scare people away from science and technology. Hell, I'm looking forward to all things on the above list - I'm just not sure if, as a civilization, we're mature enough not to inflict great suffering on ourselves with such capabilities.
(From the tone of the article, I was worried that the symbol originally meant something quite different from what it has come to mean today. But no. Same ballpark.)
Of course, in a peaceful world, who needs nukes. But is this world peaceful yet?
That's the worst case scenario for me. Compared to (!) that, this is how I feel about climate change and nuclear war:
https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/poem/there-will-come-soft-rai...
There's also voluntary extinction (vhemt.org), of course, but that's not really a "cause".
There is zero commitment from the major nuclear powers for an eventual complete denuclearization, the only thing they agree about is that they should be the only ones having nuclear weapons. As long as this hypocritical game goes on, the world will gain more, not less, nuclear states.
And we'll keep hearing this tune: "The world is too dangerous to aim for complete denuclearization, look, country X just became nuclear illegally by breaking [bullshit nuclear treaty we designed to keep our geopolitical edge]".
The nuclear powers agreed as part of the 1970 treaty on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons, particularly article 6, that they would pursue a complete nuclear disarmament. Of course, they have not fulfilled their obligations over the past half century and non-nuclear powers have complained about this, and the International Court of Justice agreed with them in 1996. A UN resolution in 1999 condemned the US for restarting a nuclear race - only the US, Israel, Albania and Micronesia voted against it. Bush withdrew from the ABM treaty in 2002. The US has been in a nuclear arms race since then.
Even personally I feel saver knowing other countries are able to defend them self, making it less likely to end up as collateral damage for the US democratisation process.
I say this as an Israeli who has genuine concern for my children's well being. Iran has legitimate nuclear ambitions. The chain leading up to those ambitions is difficult for some people to admit, and the direction that those ambitions are pushing Iran may very well harm my family. But I don't blame the Iranians themselves for the position that they are in.
CND et al never campaigned for the Soviets to disarm, for them it was always about clearing the way for a Soviet expansion westwards.
I beg your pardon?
I'm not going to bother granting you a response, you seem to have a political axe to grind and I don't do political flame wars.
(I am not pro nuclear weapons, but that's because I don't want Trump to have the power to accidentally the whole world because he couldn't keep his short, fat fingers from a big red button he couldn't read the label for. I do not, however, believe their removal would positively affect world peace at the current time.)
Therein lies the problem with nuclear weapons: they will never be used to win a world war by a calculating Hitler-like figure, but they can be used to kill most people on earth by an irrational Osama-like leader.
And since democracy and most other political systems frequently promote irrational figures in positions of authority, nuclear weapons (or rather, large nuclear stockpiles) pose a fundamental new problem for humanity, with no precedent in the history of war: catastrophic negative externalities for political insanity. The consequences of wars are no longer limited to the belligerent parties, but exported thought the world to peaceful and neutral nations. It's therefore rational for anybody to seek world denuclearization.
As a side comment, a good example or irrational behavior is the US treatment of Iran - a country that agreed not to proliferate only to be currently jerked around - versus the overtures made to North Korea after it obtained nuclear weapons. The political value of nuclear weapons becomes clear - although the reasons why US is pursuing this strategy of pushing states to proliferation is much less clear, and have to do with irrational internal US politics.
Yes, but the reason that this does affect the existing threat to peace is that an "irrational Osama-like leader" will wage war and slaughter regardless. Nuclear weapons massively increased the collateral damage, but it was not what disrupted the peace in the first place.
Unless you consider "living in a cozy first world country while ignoring all war and famine" to be "peace". If that's the case, then yes, the collateral of nuclear war would suddenly be forcing you to be part of the world.
But again, I do not like these toys either. I just find the statement that they by themselves affect peace to be wrong.
I am pretty sure neither Trump nor any previous presidents were never given that power. That briefcase is just a necessary prop used to build his image of most powerful human being around, but either it doesn't work or, if it does, before the red button pressed signal turns into an attack order it goes through some deep technical error checking and human approval list. That is the same reason there are two pilots on airliners (especially after Germanwings flight 9525): humans can go nuts, even best trained ones although rarely, but if they do with a nuclear button at hand the outcome can be catastrophic. That's more likely the risk in much smaller countries when they develop the technology necessary to build atomic weaponry, which - though I'm against them on principle - is probably the reason why a very small number of nukes can be still useful as a deterrent. But on a world size scale, today IMO atomic war should be the least of our concerns.
However, the existence of nuclear weapons does greatly increase the risk of nuclear war compared to if they didn't. The people that have them also just so happens to be the ones whose judgement and rationality I trust the least.
You're not considering second and third order consequences.
When two nations can unilaterally destroy the earth, they are greatly incentivized to use diplomacy over warfare.
WW2 started on a nuke-free Earth, and indeed finished with the use of nuclear weaponry.
The knowledge of how to build nuclear weapons wont go away, so the next World War, with no-one having nuclear weapons would probably take 4 years less time to escalate to the use of nuclear weapons (rather than MAD, it would be a furious race to build and use nukes first).
I never really believed that, but I also never bothered to figure out it's actual signification. Thanks for posting this.
No, that's silly. Witches don't have "rituals to fight Christians," excepting the fringe sort of bigots that can be found in every religion. This is a stereotype that derives from medieval Christian ideology as informed by modern right-wing Evangelical paranoia, whereby all so-called "pagan" religions are assumed to be explicitly Satanic.
Maybe take a minute on Google and try to find out what practitioners of other religions believe about themselves, rather than what their enemies believe about them.
Unless you know each and every witch personally, how can you know what rituals they engage in?
What I would be interested in is to find out about Wiccan/Neo-Pagan believes regarding the peace symbols.
> Maybe take a minute on Google and try to find out what practitioners of other religions believe about themselves, rather than what their enemies believe about them.
You seem to imply I am a "modern right-wing Evangelical"?
Maybe you could spare me your aggressions against these and stop being condescending towards me and instead help me out with the subject matter at hand? You seem to be knowledgeable about these things (maybe).
>What I would be interested in is to find out about Wiccan/Neo-Pagan believes regarding the peace symbols
So, do you or don't you want know what neopagans think? On one side, you disregard all anecdotes. The other side, you want to know said anecdotes.
I'm beginning to think this an insincere request. I know very few whom would answer that kind of question.
Tl;Dr. Go look up occult books on symbolism. There's a lot of them. Perhaps that would be more up your alley.
I'd really like to know IF these anti-christianity rituals I've heard of are OLDER than the peace sign as anti-nuclear power symbol or not. IF they even exist.
I do not find neither Wiccans nor Evangelicals overly trustworthy on that account.
(I was hoping for a good link or two. Usually you get some good ones in the HN discussions, if you open your mouth.)
What I have heard is that Witches who would turn over to that faith from Christianity would have to undergo a ritual denouncing their former faith. Part of that ritual (or a subgroup of them, I guess), would be a transformation of a (Christian) cross in a circle into a peace sign, by turning the cross upside down and then breaking the cross beams such as to form the peace sign.
If this really happens, I would like to know deeper Wiccan meanings about it. Is it related to "peace"? How old are these customs? etc
Historically, Gardner was looking at creating a naturalistic Thelema. A lot of whoopie witches glomed onto that and turned it into crystal toting fairies kind of religion.
I know of the Gnostic Mass from Thelema, but again, theres nothing like what you're describing. Similar, with the Golden Dawn, or Theosophy, or Enochian magic - There's nothing like what you describe.
You do say "witches" which I will assume European magical tradition. My first reaction is that what you say is akin to "telephone game" and stories so convoluted that its just a horror story.
I can ask some of my sources whom know more, but this doesn't sound like a credible story.
I can see that a dealing with a now unwelcome Christian past is a theme in Wicca, because it is a Western movement. Therefor most practitioners would have a Western past in one way or another.
If it is not too costly for you and you can find something out, I would be thankful. Maybe even only a comparison with other existing Wiccan rituals to deal with the past.
Plenty of people turn from Christianity to paganism, it's actually a popular way for edgy Christian kids to rebel, particularly in the American south where there's a particular stigma against "devil stuff." I know a few such people, and I've never heard of anyone having to do any rituals to "renounce" their faith, nor have I ever heard of the "peace sign as broken cross" being used as a symbol in any ritual.
But then, as you doubt sources from Wiccans, so I don't know what else to tell you. These religions aren't hiding anything, there's an entire section of pagan and neopagan books at any bookstore, you can do research online, or probably find some pagans near you and talk to them. They'll tell you the same thing I'm telling you.
In fact, I'll help you out... start here: http://witchvox.com/
That aside, I disagree with your statement that these religions don't hide anything. Christians, Freemasons, Wiccans and others all have their secrets, their mysterion. Nothing wrong with that, if you ask me.
Wicca and Paganaism was never about "anti-christian". The christians would have you believe that anything not theirs is 'of the devil'. That's brainless propaganda intent to denigrate other religions. If anything, christians took significant content from the old practices and incorporated it into their own practice.
Fast forward 2000 years into the 1960's. Anton Szander LaVey created a anti-christian religion which follows the christian bible, but makes opposite choices. Edgy and all that. And yes, the ritual you describe is found here.
(I didn't see this comment before I replied to your other one.)
>Unless you know each and every witch personally, how can you know what rituals they engage in?
"I've heard that Witches use the peace sign in their rituals to fight Christians" seems to imply that such a ritual would be a common occurrence, which is what I was addressing.
>You seem to imply I am a "modern right-wing Evangelical"?
No, I just thought you picked something up from them. To be perfectly honest, I assumed it was something created to disparage the anti-war/hippie movement (linking the peace symbol, and by extension, the peace movement, to something unwholesome by implying the symbol has a secret anti-Christian meaning) and just got transferred to beliefs about Wiccans/witches somehow.
But apparently it is a Satanist ritual, so my (partial) mistake.
>Maybe you could spare me your aggressions against these and stop being condescending towards me and instead help me out with the subject matter at hand?
I didn't mean to be aggressive... but this was literally something you could solve with a Google search.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken#In_religion_and_mythol...
All I can say, to challenge this proactive lying and deceitfulness, is to demand proof of a historical claim or STFU.
Various Christian church segments, including ones related to protestantism, were pro-peace/anti-war/anti-violence such as the Quakers in the USA [1] See also the Wikipedia entry peace churches [2].
I happen to know the peace movement in The Netherlands (with Nijmegen being an important center) was entwined with the hippie movement, and consisted of religious Christians. Not solely though.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peace_movement#Historic_peace_...
If it helps any, imagine the middle part to be a Corvair B-36 Peacemaker.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convair_B-36_Peacemaker
A history of the logo ought to note that numerous variations were made, some with the B-36, and many more with the B-52.