This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.
Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.
We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:
-
Shaming.
-
Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.
-
Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.
-
Recruiting for a cause.
-
Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.
In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:
-
Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.
-
Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.
-
Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.
-
Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.
On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
I think it implies a setback much longer than the eight months between the 2025 and 2026 bombings. If it only took eight months between the nuclear program being obliterated and the Iranians needing to be bombed before they get nuclear ICBMs it sounds like the first bombing didn't work very well, it sounds like a minor setback to Iran at most. Maybe that makes the war a good idea! But it raises the question of what the 2025 attack actually did and how the 2026 one will be different.
I could buy that a regional-power state actor could produce a nuclear weapon from scratch in a few years, if they had the appropriate uranium raw materials available. That would mean that even serious damage to the program would result in a relatively short setback.
Remember that the original nuclear bomb was developed in less than 5 years, and that was like 100 years ago and they didn't even know it was possible.
Building a gun-type bomb (similar to the one used at Hiroshima) out of a critical mass of weapons-grade uranium is so easy that the Manhattan Project didn't bother testing it - although apparently the Norks managed to dud one anyway.
The nth-country experiment in 1964 implied that it isn't that difficult to build a Nagasaki-style plutonium bomb if you have the plutonium.
As long as Iran still has their stockpile of buried 60%-enriched uranium, they are 1-2 years away from a bomb as soon as they have working centrifuges. Similarly, the fact that they accumulated the stockpile in the first place indicates that they had the technical capability to go to weapons grade and build a bomb well before 2025, but chose not to for reasons which are not clear, but I suspect has something to do with the amount of rope their patrons in Moscow and Beijing were willing to give them.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link