For general context, the opinion piece was published April 2014. Bezos owned The WaPo at the time and had since 2013. Author is Stanford historian and archaeologist Ian Morris.

I looked at the premise of his book that this article seems to connect with, and it basically boils down to “History shows that societies becomes a lot more peaceful and productive after periods of war.”

Wow, who’d’ve thought that things get better for the people who survive a war? It’s a good thing we can apply survivorship bias to the whole of human history with such confidence like that.

Is that compared to the war itself, or the time before it? I have a doubt. We were all told that we were in a historic era of peace before things kicked off this month, so the bar is set pretty high. Plus, even after the dust settles, the entire Northern hemisphere will likely still be up to its collective asses in fascists with way too much power to turn around and do it again.