Hacker News Reader

Comment by tomp | Hacker News Reader

[flagged]

I'm also of the opinion that MAD has been the largest single greatest cause of peace in the past 80 years, but I disagree that this award is bad. The reason we haven't seen a single use of nuclear weapons since then, not even relatively small ones, is because of the nuclear taboo that organizations like this have engendered

It is, as so often the case, a classic prisoner's dilemma problem [0]: "no nukes" is pretty clearly superior to "any nukes at all", but "they have nukes but we don't" is game over, so... nukes for all (major world powers)!

It's awful, but that's the prisoner's dilemma for you. I have a hard time respecting any anti-nuclear activist who doesn't at least acknowledge this facet of things, even if "no one has nukes and no one can easily get them" really would be best for the world.

[0]: if anyone hasn't seen it before, the interactive https://ncase.me/trust/ on the iterated prisoner's dilemma is excellent

If the past 8 years have shown us anything, it's that we are capable of electing incredibly stupid people who likely would get us into war if being blown back into the stone age weren't a possibility. I like nuclear weapons for that reason. It scares tyrants into complacency on the larger scale.

No, I disagree.

There hasn't been a hot war between nuclear powered states, ever.

This is pretty obviously superior compared with the previous "no nukes" era, that had plenty of hot wars...

Define "hot war". There have been plenty of fighting in border regions of India and Pakistan in recent years, and both have nukes. India since 1974 and Pakistan since 1998.

There have been plenty of wars being fought. And even proxy wars between nuclear powers!

But those don’t affect you.

And I’m sure you are 100% convinced that if we could snap our fingers and give all sovereign states nukes then all fighting would stop. So what’s the point.

And if you’re wrong? Then we only risk the permanent destruction of advanced human organization. No biggie.

I would contend that it's really interconnectedness (aka globalization) and the general march of technology (especially long-distance weapons) that have contributed to the (very) relative peace of the post-WWII age, but I will readily admit that your point of view is very reasonable and there is a genuine discussion to be had here.

Chinese troops and Soviet planes were there in Korea.

God, spare the world from nerds and their game theories. There have been enough nuclear trigger close calls already.

> spare the world from ... game theories

I don't think this point of view is at all defensible. The "game theory" I am referencing is the most basic thing, the very foundation of that discipline, and if you don't think it is applicable, I posit the following scenario:

Consider the Cold War-era state of affairs (because we seem to be heading back that way, at least a little bit), with the following variations:

A. Nuclear weapons do not exist.

B. USA has nuclear weapons. Russia does not.

C. Russia has nuclear weapons. USA does not.

D. Both USA and Russia have nuclear weapons.

Suppose you're an American. (WLOG, so adjust appropriately.) Now rank those four possible scenarios in order of your personal preference.

Personally, I'd rank C dead last. If you don't... why?

I kind of agree, but we have way too many bombs just floating around.

How many nukes does a country need to have readied in order for mutually assured destruction to be relevant? I feel like 100 would be enough to deter any aggression, and if two countries unload their full arsenal at each other would not end life on earth.

Russia and US have closer to 10,000 between them which could pretty much end humanity on any day.

How did you come up with the number 100?

Nuclear weapons have not prevented major world powers from engaging in proxy wars. As we can see today in the Middle East, proxy wars can make things dangerous and more likely to lead to an unwanted escalation.

Mutually assured destruction works best when the number of involved parties is limited. If every state were to have a warhead of its own, many risks would increase: those of miscalculation, nuclear proliferation to non-state actors, etc.

That's not applicable to the mullahs in Iran. If they have they'd use it on Day 1.

Just don't use nuclear weapons

What if a fanatical leader has them? Castro said he would have nuked the US if he could and didn't care if Cuba gets destroyed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CtUfBc4qQMg

Reply on news.ycombinator.com