You listing 3 inventions that came from peaceful times is simply inviting an adversarial response.

[1] Penicillin - it was not until 1939 when Dr. Howard Florey’s research was able to prove the effectiveness of penicillin without a shadow of a doubt and with the aid of Andrew J. Moyer he developed the most powerful antibacterial substance in the world.

Invented during conflict -

>> Hydrogen Peroxide (forerunner to fuel-cell & synthetic fuel technology >> Synthetic Rubber >> Air Traffic Control >> Superglue >> Tampons / Tampax / Sanitary Pads (WW1 Cellulose Bandage) >> Jerry Can >> Pressurised Cabin >> Radio Navigation >> Cryptography / Cryptanalysis >> Radar >> Synthetic Oil >> V-2 Rocket (forerunner to the R7 & Mercury) >> Jet Engine >> Nuclear Power >> Paper Money (greenbacks) >> Canned Food >> Sewing Machine >> Standardized Clothing Sizes >> Telegraph Network

I could go, as I am sure could you. The point is that you assumption that the net effect of conflict is simply a loss does not stand up to rigorous academic thinking. The variables are too complex.

Also, your comment about $20 / raining money as an analogy is absurd. The majority of the workers on Camp Bastion are unskilled and were earning less than $1 a day in subsistence agriculture prior to the arrival of military forces. Regardless of the war aims etc the median income has risen as an effect of troops being located with the populace. The ffect of war on a western or advanced market economy might be different but for Afghanistan it increased the amount of capital in the country.

You still weren't able to show how medical inventions needed war for anything but acceleration, or how peaceful inventions don't outnumber those made for war. Paper money was invented in China, canned food was invented because of 12k, not because the french military happened to offer them, and the jury is kinda still out on nuclear power since we have no real way of dealing with the garbage it produces yet. But okay.

I think if you focus closely and selectively enough, you can always find benefits. The NSDAP was very useful and positive for a select few Germans at the time, and I am sure the results of medical experiments made in Japanese concentration camps were useful, too. Who knows, there are probably even inventions made by a racist for racist purposes. But whoever can make that calculation with a straight face, I don't want to meet them in a dark alley.

"present any compelling evidence that military conflict is detrimental to society"

What an extraordinary thing to say, something that could only be said by someone who's had the privilege to be very far away from the destruction of war. No sane person is going to stand in the bombed out building looking at the corpses saying, "I don't see any evidence that this is detrimental".

Actually I am a veteran of Iraq and Afghanistan - returning from Helmand Province most recently in 2012.

I never said I don't see detrimental effects of war. The original question was Does War destroy more wealth than it creates?

Also, I know of many situations where a sane person may stand in a bombed out building surrounded by corpses and find none if it detrimental. Standing inside the final bunker that housed the last vestiges of the Nazi's for instance.

It is also absolutely ludicrous to think that war is only characterised by munitions destroying buildings resulting in the death of the inhabitants.

For instance - here is the United States Navy USNS Comfort (T-AH-20).

In accordance with the Geneva Conventions, USNS Comfort and her crew do not carry any offensive weapons. Firing upon the Comfort would be considered a war crime as the ship only carries weapons for self-defense.

The Comfort has provided medical aid to literally millions of people around the globe regardless of colour, creed or caste however it remains firmly within the employ the US Navy and is funded by the same pot used for fighting conflicts.

Your understanding of war is childlike at best with no discernment.

Furthermore the question was centered purely on the issue of wealth creation - a purely economic question distinct from ethical or moral concerns.

> And you have still failed to present any compelling evidence that military conflict is detrimental to society.

You mean apart from thousands or millions dead, cities destroyed, children orphaned, starvation, depredation and death?

I don't think I understand your moral system, but I'm going to take a stab that you're thinking in a utilitarian way. Well all the dollars and inventions and stuff you're talking about? Their purpose is to make people happy.

But the economic bead game you're talking about starts looking pretty irrelevant when you compare the relative happiness that some people get from having more beads with the sheer cost of war in human misery and destruction.

Are you arguing that the thousands and millions of dead would not have died without warfare? Are they immortal apart from military conflict?

I am a veteran of both Iraq and Afghanistan and have been considerably closer to war than, arguably, 99% of the collective posting on Hacker News. My point was not a moral position and most of you seem incapable of grasping the nettle of the original discussion thread.

The gist was the sum total economic impact. Moral, ethical and sentimental values do not matter and, like in most economical discussion, they are to be discarded.

At no point have I stated I agree with war (I do in certain circumstances) - the original question was does war create more wealth than it destroys?

Your emotional appeal about dead children is nothing to do with the original question. Without war however, we would still live under Feudal yokes or Patriarchal societies. War was required in many cases to establish the liberal democracy most of us exist in.

When you talk about moving the beads from one side to the other you look only at beads such as money, dead bodies, widespread crime and the gory side of conflict.

How about those conflicts that resulted in freeing slaves, securing indepdendence and democracy? What about the civil wars fought to ensure that men and women are treated fairly under the law and not at the whim of a Royal Family? Do you make any allowance for the benefits (however callous) to the reduction of the human population?

I expect the storm of downvotes but I attribute them to HN respondents being unable to separate the rational academic question from the emotional impact of warfare.

> Are you arguing that the thousands and millions of dead would not have died without warfare? Are they immortal apart from military conflict?

Are you arguing inventions are made out of greed and chauvinism more often than out of curiosity? Are you arguing they wouldn't have been made anyway, at some point?

> Without war however, we would still live under Feudal yokes or Patriarchal societies. War was required in many cases to establish the liberal democracy most of us exist in.

Same question.

Also, when you talk about "freeing slaves", you are missing that to capture a slave could be considered an act of violence, and therefore war in the widest sense.

Capturing a slave cannot be considered war in any sense.

War is an organized and often prolonged conflict that is carried out by states or non-state actors. It is generally characterised by extreme violence, social disruption and economic destruction. War should be understood as an actual, intentional and widespread armed conflict between political communities, and therefore is defined as a form of political violence or intervention.

Why is war greed and chauvinistic? It did not feel chauvnistic when I was delivering medical aid to children who would have died without military forces being present to administer it.

Aspects of war may be greedy and characterised by chauvinistic values but not the entirety of war which you seem incapable of discussing rationally.

This thread has reached it's conclusion the minute you refused to engage with legitimate questions. Your response reads like a genuine tantrum by a child.

I certainly do not think that the evolution of democratic societies could have occurred without acts of war to take freedom from those that would deny it.

I have answered your question. Now answer mine or at least answer the original aim of the thread with compelling evidence.

Does war destroy more wealth than it creates?

> Your emotional appeal about dead children is nothing to do with the original question.

No, I just think we have very different definitions of wealth.

In economics, wealth in a commonly applied accounting sense is the net worth of a person, household, or nation, that is, the value of all assets owned net of all liabilities owed at a point in time. For national wealth as measured in the national accounts, the net liabilities are those owed to the rest of the world. The term may also be used more broadly as referring to the productive capacity of a society or as a contrast to poverty.

I think you have lost track of why we fight, or what anything means. Please contact me at TerryRogers1983@gmail.com.