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The reason I ask is because to me it would seem like the whole thing is based on perspective. If all the big countries are at peace together and everybody there feels balanced, there's still groups in other countries that will be pissed because they aren't getting what they feel is their fair share of it.

IMO somebody's always gonna have the bigger slice. That's just the way it is.

Yeah, thats pretty much true. Life isn't fair. My theory is that countries will only attack each other for three reasons:
1) They feel that they have something to gain, such as natural resources, religious reasons, ect.
2) Their alliance attacked a certain country, and their alliance is worth more to them than the loss of a war.
3) To balance the power of the world. If one country is growing really strong, e.g, France in the Napoleonic Era. They know that if they dont all gang up on the superpower, they will be the next one to be targeted.


Basically it all comes down to self interest. The country that can manipulate its neighbors with greatest success become the most powerful. All "reasons" for war are just for the countries image. In the end, its just a power struggle.

Realistic, yes but im an all things are possible kinda guy. Equal power doesn't mean everyone has to agree with each other and be for the same cause it only means that Power in the world is divide up enough that it creates a system of checks and balances to keep other nations from doing things they shouldn't. I'd say the Cold war was an example of Equal power. Not the most peaceful example but you had 2 nations so powerful that they wouldn't let one nation trounce all over the world and not do anything about it. They wouldn't let the other gain the upper hand militarily or economically so they both pushed forward.

Balanced power creates an environment where nobody is superior but since they're not on the same page they all try to be better than the other resulting huge leaps forward in technology and society. With the balance of power so off track its resulting in stagnation and decay as the small group with power attempts to keep the rest of the world from attaining it resulting in the large amounts of 3rd world nations and the instability we see today which is becoming a larger and larger problem....

Its ok for someone not to have the biggest slice of the pie that will always happen but its not ok for someone to have 80% of the pie and trying gobble up the rest of the 20%...where does that leave the rest of the world. Balance is necessary.

You guys should play civilization 4 BtS. I pwned the persians then does bastards from Mali and China declare war on me, SoB 2 front war, Mali in the south China in the north, their formmidable but my tank eats all! (first to hit industrial era).

Reason I atked persia: I need oil to build tanks, Persia is the closest and weakest civ with oil ~ I atk persia. Next I needed more gold so I go for Mali, mali has an alliance with china

@Xemnas, but I don't want to let them become stronger or reach my level ~ if they do I have to spend more on tech research which leads to disputes and wars and... its not in my best interest to let any other country pass me as the leading economic and military power, and yes this does tie in with the discussion

See how I see it is, if it is not in your countries best interest to do something or stop doing something then why not? Problem with that is sometimes acting in your best interest can do the opposite, and as Xemnas nicely pointed out, can leads to decay.

Working in your own best interest will have one of two effect.
1]By working in your own self-interest you inadvertently help everyone which in the end aids your empire or country. Such as allowing free market capitalism.
2]By working in your own self-interest you hurt those around you, and kill competition. No competition and stable environment means no change, no change means no evolution, the opposite of evolution (or change) would be stagnation or no change, by definition stagnation is decay and decay would be to deteriorate. Which means in this instance acting in your own self interest can hurt you and others, such as burning fossil fuels. The US has no initiative to stop, unless every other country stopped simultaneously we won't.

EDIT:

See as long as there is competition for a finite amount of resources then a natural balance wil occur, when you try to force that balance you get fed in the A.

I agree with your whole post except the last paragraph. I'd say that someone having 80% of the "pie" is just a result of that country playing its cards right so to speak.

The Evolution of countries (my theory):

10,000 BC to 4,000 BC - Roaming Clan era, not much settling down
4,000 BC to 3,000 BC - Start of civilizations, people begin to settle down more , small clans group together to form bigger clans
3,000 BC - 1,000 BC - Countries form, Rise of the Roman Empire (first superpower)
1,000 BC - 500 AD - Roman era, semi-global peace
500 AD - 1200 AD - Dark/Medieval ages
1200 AD - 1700 - World Powers start to emerge, take shape and build empires
1700s - Present - Rise of the English, American, Chinese, Russian empires


Basically theres 5 distinct periods:
A = Chaos
B = Small Countries, concerned with internal issues
C = An empire, one country finally takes over most of the rest
D = World Peace/Prosperity
E = Global Conflict, could be anything from natural to artificial disasters

Right now, we are in the B phase, transferring to the C phase. If we could reach D and stay there forever, we would have world peace. This has only been reached once actually, in the Roman Era.

Edit: I play Civ 4 all the time. Its really tough on the harder difficulties.

Rome was not the first SuperPower....I know Egypt came long b4 it and there was something b4 hat...thats my only response for now i'll edit this later when i care more.

EDIT: i also noticed you only included the history of the rest of the world after the 1700's restricting us to a very narrow view of how Europe evolved. Keep in mind the rest of the world didn't evolve the way Europe did...in most cases not even close...

Emnas, I think some people are using "balance of power" in a little bit of an incorrect way. Balance of power doesn't mean that NO ONE is superior. Basically, the term means that there is a balance between the superpowers of the world. Unipolar systems are not balanced because there is a single hegemon. Bipolar systems, like we saw during the Cold War with the US and USSR were balanced (and some people preferred that time to now) and are argued that are most peaceful. After the collapse, many feared taht with the US being the sole superpower, and with the new threats of subnational, non-traditional threats, we would experience a great increase in hostility and potential violence. I still think this could be the case. We are arguing about states fighting states, etc. But I think we should all keep in mind the other actors at play here

I said that with my edit. One Superpower to Balance the other. Just in different lingo \o/ and yes tbh the cold war despite the many hot spots was quite "peaceful" relative to this 21st century. Not to mention the advances in science and culture that occurred during the early 20th century right through the cold war trumped what we got going on.

that natural balance i refer to would be:
Superpower A having a staring contest with Superpower B because anything beyond that would result in devastation for both countries.

EDIT:
Controlled Environment + Evenly Distributed Resources (No Competition) = Deterioration.
Random Variables + Finite Resources = Evolution (AKA) Change.

Random Variables + Finite Resources with a decrease in the number of aggressive males = Relative Peace. There was a nice study on it, and with Peace we have no reason to fight for survival which results in a naturally stable environment where scientific and military advances are made because we have nothing else to occupy us. (e.g.) The end of large scale warfare. \o/ I have to find the article where I read this.

i cant remember the last time that this happened, and i doubt it will ever equalize

surivival of the fittest.... kill all the weaklings, mentally retarded, handicapped people, etc

wow....

hahaha yeah..WOW

1. Didnt they restrict the usage/development of nuclear weapons?
2. War is illegal? Who the hell is gonna enforce that law?
3. Maybe.

Lemme school you young cats real quick. The U.S needed a way to go invade the middle east. Why? Because we payed them to make a pipeline for oil that they never made. So we needed a justable reason to go get the money back. Why not crash 2 planes into the tallest buildings in the U.S( Or atleast along the tallest? But Bush got greedy and said "hey lets not only take our money back, lets get some oil from these bastards" and thats why we are still there ^.^

Do you mind citing your source?

lol People always forget the WMD issue when they want to support their conspiracy theory on the 9/11 attacks. We're fighting "terror" because of 9/11 not Iraq. We're in Iraq because of the supposed WMD's that we all know don't even exist. Regardless, Saddam was taken and hanged for his years of dictatorship and torture of his country.