The verbal battle I had a few weeks back with Tony, were predicated on the concept that Stephen Pinker argues for, that in developed, westernized societies, violence has decreased. 
> > 
> > This is certainly a contrary hypothesis to what history has told me, and Tony has reiterated many of my own arguments several times. 
> > 
> > This thread will be a recording of Pinker's arguments as I understand them, and all are free to comment.
> > 
> > The book I'm reading is "The Better Angels of our Nature."
> 
> We are more civilized and kill more efficiently. Does Pinker keep annotated body counts as percentages of population available to be eliminated? Kill ratios? Tell us more. Sounds like liberal hashish dreams. 9,000 Syrians so far and the modern western world sits on it hands. Why was Libya so different? Madam Clinton under Obama and.....nothing!-He's constructing his argument very carefully, but so far the base is this:-1. It isn't based on a strictly historical timeline, from 10,000 years ago to present. It's based around the concept of societies building features to deliberately lessen violence. -So... I think he's more or less going to trace the history of nonviolent thought and discuss how its fits and starts have played out through history. Presently he's talking alot about the nature of the state, the concept of Leviathan. I think his central argument might be that societies that hold pluralism as an ideal will force themselves to be nonviolent, but again, I'm only in chapter two!-In terms of rates he directly disputes that you can just count the dead from "year 10000 BC" to the present (as one important historian has done, forgot his name). Presently he's discussing hunter-gatherer warfare.

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\"Why is it, Master, that ascetics fight with ascetics?\"

\"It is, brahmin, because of attachment to views, adherence to views, fixation on views, addiction to views, obsession with views, holding firmly to views that ascetics fight with ascetics.\"