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Culture War Roundup for the week of June 23, 2025

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Bad analogy.

Caplan points out that they aren't somber about civilian deaths, but instead often cheer it on/laugh about it.

An explanation why that happens isn't a dispute if it is happening.

Nope, you and Caplan are both just wrong about what the "reasonable hawk" looks like. You are the ones missing a mood, namely "competing when the stakes really, really matter". Actively hemming and hawing over the acceptable costs of a desired, good outcome is retarded and maladaptive. The overwhelming majority of human beings, even highly intelligent ones, are not psychologically capable of the the level of sociopathic, rationalist autism required to attempt his "reasonable hawk" nonsense - and even one of those 0.0001% decouplers would rapidly find themselves dehumanizing the enemy because it's just wildly more efficient in terms of mental load.

Worrying about the feelings of a lethal, intractable enemy is the sort of luxury you spare for things you outclass on the same level that we outclass wolves and bears. And even then, the people who actually live in areas with wolves and bears are less sympathetic about it than urban fools.