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Worth noting that there's a long-standing theory (I forget whose it is) regarding the decline of warfare in the 20th century. The theory is that war has become unprofitable. In the Roman era, armies came back with gold, jewels, materials, control of mines, slaves, control of land.

The theory is that the profitability of war has ended due to changes in relative value. It being much, much harder to coerce intellectual labor than it is to coerce physical labor; and harder to coerce skilled physical labor than brute physical labor; harder to coerce physical labor than to seize physical items; and harder to seize delicate scientific tools than to seize raw materials. I would extend it to say that it is harder for misogynists to control women for the purposes of "spreading their seed" now that birth control is almost impossible to suppress and abortion pills are available. When the most valuable thing in the country is the expertise of a scientist, it's impossible to seize it in war; the scientist can, and will, fail to cooperate.

So when the things which are considered valuable become harder to *loot*, war becomes less profitable. And when it becomes less profitable it declines.

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Re Yglesias: Quite surprising. And a little hard to believe. I would tend to assume (or do I mean "hope"?) that the CDC's use of data internally is a little more sophisticated.

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Have you read and absorbed all this? I am retired and don't have a fraction of the time to absorb these links. Nor any use for the knowledge. Thanks anyway.

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