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ciphergoth comments on New Year's Predictions Thread - Less Wrong
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For $50, trust-based is OK with me.
How about this wording? "10 or more people will be killed on US soil during 2010 as the result of a deliberate attack by a party with a political goal, not overtly the act of any state". And if we hit an edge case where we disagree on whether this has been met, we'll do a poll here on LW and accept the results of the poll. Sound good?
I'd like to change the wording slightly to "on US soil, or on a flight to or from the US" if that's alright with you (even though I think an attack on an aircraft is less likely than an attack not involving aircraft). A poll here sounds like a fair way to resolve any dispute. I expect to still be reading/posting here fairly regularly in a year but I'm also happy to provide my email address if you want.
Do you think this was a terrorist attack? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Hood_shooting
The term "terrorism" is usually taken to mean an attack on civilians, though as a legal matter, this is far from settled. This definition would exclude the Fort Hood shooting, where the targets were soldiers. In any case, the bet is over non-state, politically motivated killing, which is broader and would include Fort Hood, I think.
FWIW: The targets at Fort Hood were soldiers, but predictably-disarmed soldiers. In the area Hasan attacked, the soldiers he shot at aren't allowed to carry weapons or even have them within easy reach. So it's more analogous to shooting up a bar frequented by soldiers that takes your weapons at the door.
Plus, his attack was intended to spread terror, not to achieve a military objective (any weakness he inflicted on the army capability itself was probably a secondary goal).
I was going to ask whether people would classify the recent attack on the IRS building in Texas as terrorism. It wouldn't qualify for the bet either way because there was only 1 casualty but I'm curious if people think it would count as terrorism?
Bob Murphy's post, excerpting Glen Greenwald, summarizes my position very well. In short:
1) What Stack did meets the reasonable definition of terrorism: "deliberate use of violence against noncombatants to achieve political or social goals by inducing terror [in the opposing population]".
2) Most of what the government is classifying as terrorism, isn't. Fighting an invading army, no matter how unjust your cause may be, is not terrorism. Whetever injustice you may be committing does not additionally count as terrorism. Yet the label is being applied to insurgents.
3) It's in the government's interest, in taking over the terrorism label, that Stack not be called a terrorist, because he seems too (otherwise) normal. People want to think of terrorists as being "different"; a middle-aged, high-earning programmer ain't the image they have in mind, and if they did have that in mind, they'd be more resistant to make concessions in the name of fighting terrorism.
Excellent question! If such an attack happens this year, I'd say it wasn't a terrorist attack, but if mattnewport felt that it was I'd pay out without making a poll.
I'd lean towards saying it was a terrorist attack but I'm sufficiently uncertain about how to classify it that I'd be happy to let a community poll settle the question.
Could you email me so I have your address too? paul at ciphergoth.org. Thanks!
Had limited Internet access over the New Year, I've sent you an email.
I think I won this one - have emailed the address you sent me. Thanks!
EDIT: paid in full - many thanks!
Fine with me. My email is paul at ciphergoth.org. How exciting!
Re: "10 or more people will be killed on US soil during 2010 as the result of a deliberate attack by a party with a political goal, not overtly the act of any state".
How come "Pakistan" got dropped? A contributing reason for the claim being unlikely was that it was extremely specific.
From the wording, it seemed that the 50% was for any attack, not just one with Pakistan involved. I think I'm on to a pretty good bet even without it. It's not as unlikely as a US state seceding, but I didn't want to wait ten years :-)
The US State seceding is something that many of my friends sit around contemplating. We have had speculations about whether it will be a state like Mississippi, or South Carolina (Red), or if it will be a state like California or Oregon (Blue).
The Red States are pretty easy to understand why they might wish to secede from the heathen atheistic socialist nazi USA... But, the motivations for a Blue State are a bit more complex.
For instance, in California, I have noticed a lot of people complaining about how much money this state pays into Social Security, yet only gets back about 10% of that money. If we were able to get back all of it, instead of supporting states like South Carolina or Mississippi, we would be able to go a long way toward solving many of our own social ills. Not to mention that many in CA chafe under having to belong to the same union as states such as those I have mentioned, and thus have issues with being able to even pursue social solutions that might pay off big (Stem Cell research, Legalization & regulation of narcotics, work and skills training for inmates - and socialization skills for the same, infrastructure work to which the USA is slow to commit, and so on).
All of these are also issues that Red States like to brag about being able to focus on if they were to secede. The only problem with most Red States is, just like in the Civil War, they have little to no economy of their own. Texas (Maybe Florida) is really the exception. Also, should a Red State secede, most of the best and brightest would flee the state (Academics usually don't like working under ideological bonds, for instance).
It will be interesting to see what would happen should a state try to secede. I think it could be the best thing that could happen to our country if things continue to become divisive.
Oh, I see - sorry!
I looked into who was going to win such a bet.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_assassinations_and_acts_of_terrorism_against_Americans
...looks like a reasonable resource on the topic.
I'm not sure that the acts of a single person with no associations with anyone else are really the sort of thing I had in mind, but it's too late to refine the bet now, so we'll see whether people think such a thing counts if we need to.
"10 or more people [...] as the result of a deliberate attack" seems to suggest that 10 assassinations in 2010 would probably not qualify - unless it was proved that they were all linked. My summary of the link is that there have been few terrorist attacks against Americans on American soil recently.
Agreed.