Response: Evaluating parameters of terrorism
Well, I have put a lot of work into a reply in email, from a group inviting me to submit my idea for dealing with terrorism to the next President. I wrote and tweeked and added to my reply all day, making it as concise as possible. while covering the basic points.
But when logging onto post my idea, it said it was limited to a maximum of 500 characters. My concise writing contained 7,963 characters ... way WAY too many to fit the post space, as shown below:
"As one of the functions of the government is to provide for the common defense, leadership wisdom in the direction of such activity is very advisable specially in view of having such a formidable armed force capability at hand. Knowledge of all the essential factors on all the levels is surely required to perform this function. Surely it is wise that even when "the fat is in the fire" that one acts in such a way as to improve the situation, not grossly risk making it worse as a result of one's reflexive responses. The following are key factors which seem apparent to me right now.
Probably most people here in the US have a stylized picture of what a terrorist is, such as maybe a black bearded man with soulless eyes and a belt full of explosives heading for a crowd or driving a plane into a building.
However, surely if effective defense measures are to be applied, the subject needs to be accurately evaluated instead of reacting to stylized impressions like those. Much less entertaining than would be through simply reacting to valence, our inner fearful stuff; but potentially being far more efficient in sustaining a productive peaceful sustainable world.
Making an effort to evaluate the phenomenon, I would start at the definition of terror: that is, being very frightened. Thus a terrorist is someone who does something to severely frighten people. Now, fright has to do with one's imagined effects of something; it helps make the decision of fight or flight, deep survival fallbacks.
Lots of people deliberately strive to create fear in other people, such as the common schoolyard bully. Even before that, the pattern might be seen in the pre-schooler "bad boy" who misbehaves because getting punished is better than getting ignored. Street gangs led by a bully magnify the fearful impact on those in the way of the bully. A "terrorist" strives to cause fear in others so as to herd them into some different direction than they were headed.
Where the dividing lines are, between definitions of "insurgents", "guerillas", and "terrorists," are not clear to me, are they the same? And speaking of terror, one can be terrified by the sight of a spider, so does that make the busy spider a terrorist as it wanders past in search of a tiny bug for a meal? So probably "terrorism" as explored here, requires intent to cause fear in others so as to modify their behavior in some way.
The term "terrorist" seemed to arise in conjunction with small groups of militia gunning down a bunch of unaware civilians, so as to scare their people away from somewhere. It also applied to similar warriors who were "suicide bombers" thus also automatically eliminating themselves from capture and interrogation after ruining the lives of a bunch of unsuspecting people. For what purpose? Too much trouble and too painful to do just because they are bored with things. They might be "getting even" with something representing that which was bringing terrible stress to the terrorist's lives and loved ones. That is, revengefully deliberately doing damage to cause terror in a particular segment of people, in response to being terrified and/or furious at somebody. But more likely it is done to change the behavior of others through fear, like in "get out of our territory."
So, to deal with terrorism, it seems likely that various parameters need to be evaluated, including "purpose of doing the specific terrorist act" (not just to blow a bunch of people up, but instead to get a larger group of people to be frightened away from somewhere or from doing something in particular.) Identifying the attributes of the parameter thus in this case would involve identifying what is the intended place, activity or resource to be frightened away from.
From such data sets then seeking what other options the "terrorists" would have had to achieve their goals, and evaluating why the other options were not followed instead of doing terrorism, would be useful in future modifications to situations to enable would-be terrorists to utilize less harmful ways of filling their needs. The needs would thus need to b identified.
And another principle is to utilize the parameters and analysis to valuate the ranges of behavior regardless from where they originate and are carried out. This means that if and when done in one's own turf but people belonging there, it needs to be included in the overall picture. Leaving well-meaning "righteous" internal saboteurs out of the picture will result in skewed analysis and thus dysfunctional efforts to stop terrorism, perhaps even make it worse if attacking an external site in response, thus inadvertently becoming terrorists of a sort ourselves.
Some of the most careful evaluation and data gathering needs to be done to detect cases where the first party masquerades as a third party when assaulting a second party, intending to have the second and third parties assault each other in response, leaving the instigating first party with little resulting damage while bringing on easy large scale damage to the second and third parties, while themselves sustaining no further damage as a result of the action.
On the other hand, specific groups which seem to be sponsoring the "terrorism" abuses, are most likely a diverse group. Relatively few members will likely be the instigators and perpetrators of the abuse of terrorism. Some members are likely to be quite the opposite, even extremely valuable benefactors in some way to humanity, at least potentially. So if a handful of a specific group conducts terrorism, that does not mean all the others are doing it too or could even stop it from happening, and might not even know it is going on.
Of course, if there is a group formed for the express purpose of conducting some form of terrorism against specific targets, that is different. Even then, to deal with it surely it is prudent to determine what is the cause, be it political power struggle, business territory rivalry, showing off for the girls, or even parasites eating away at the brain, it is probably far more efficient overall to deal with the cause than to directly lock horns with it to deal with the terrorism with essentially similar kinds of damaging activity.
And to maintain respect of the greater world, if one chooses to deal with it with weaponry, using comparable weaponry and on a similar scale is what is instinctive with "fairness" in contests. If one is so weak as to have to fight fire with fire, then that needs to be done on a similar scale; dropping a bomb on an ant that got into one's picnic sandwich is generally considered inappropriate. One gets away with doing such things only if one also has the biggest fists, the most nukes, the nastiest rhetoric, then that will prevent challenges; but it is also remembered as a lack of appropriate justice and an inappropriate use of strength, suggesting lack of wisdom in use of strength; a high price of loss of esteem results.
Another parameter needs to be in this evaluation system, that of degree of "monsterizing" of the adversary. Monsterizing the opponent involves controlling the imagination of the active operators, such as are done to soldiers in the process of converting them from peaceful necessarily non-violent town folks into people who intend to kill and destroy; they are not imagining themselves dealing with other townfolk-like humans, they are wreaking havoc on monsters that are trying to wreak havoc on you and yours.
Surely we humans are smart enough to stay alert and deal with life in far better ways than that. To do so, it is essential that we not ourselves be tripped and fall into the "fight-or-flight" attention-grabbing fear/anger mode, where the brain downshifts into a brutal mode in which messes will be made.
Someone makes a mess, is that a righteous excuse to make a mess too? There really are better and much more fun ways to live life. Seeking those ways would be a mark of a good leader, I would think."
My next squeezing it was to 3,100 characters:
"Surely if effective defense measures are to be applied, the subject needs to be accurately evaluated instead of reacting to stylized impressions. Much less entertaining, but potentially being far more efficient in sustaining a productive peaceful sustainable world.
Making an effort to evaluate the phenomenon, I would start at the definition of terror: that is, being very frightened. Thus a terrorist is someone who does something to severely frighten people. Now, fright has to do with one's imagined effects of something; it helps make the decision of fight or flight, deep survival fallbacks.
Lots of people deliberately strive to create fear in other people, such as the common schoolyard bully. Even before that, the pattern might be seen in the pre-schooler "bad boy" who misbehaves because getting punished is better than getting ignored. A "terrorist" strives to cause fear in others so as to herd them into some different direction than they were headed.
To deal with terrorism, it seems likely that various parameters need to be evaluated, including "purpose of doing the specific terrorist act" (not just to blow a bunch of people up, but instead to get a larger group of people to be frightened away from somewhere or from doing something in particular. Identifying the attributes of the parameter thus in this case would involve identifying what is the intended place, activity or resource to be frightened away from.
From such data sets then seeking what other options the "terrorists" would have had to achieve their goals, and evaluating why the other options were not followed instead of doing terrorism, would be useful in future modifications to situations to enable would-be terrorists to utilize less harmful ways of filling their needs. The needs would thus need to be identified.
And another principle is to utilize the parameters and analysis to valuate the ranges of behavior regardless from where they originate and are carried out. This means that if and when done in one's own turf but people belonging there, it needs to be included in the overall picture. Leaving well-meaning "righteous" internal saboteurs out of the picture will result in skewed analysis and thus dysfunctional efforts to stop terrorism, perhaps even make it worse if attacking an external site in response, thus inadvertently becoming terrorists of a sort ourselves.
Some of the most careful evaluation and data gathering needs to be done to detect cases where the first party masquerades as a third party when assaulting a second party, intending to have the second and third parties assault each other in response, leaving the instigating first party with little resulting damage while bringing on easy large scale damage to the second and third parties.
Another parameter needs to be in this evaluation system, that of degree of "monsterizing" of the adversary. Monsterizing the opponent involves controlling the imagination of the active operators.
Someone makes a mess, is that righteous excuse to make mess too? There really are better and much more fun ways to live life. Seeking those ways would be a mark of a good leader, I would think."
My 500 words acceptable to the post space, finally were:
"Some of the most careful evaluation and data gathering needs to be done to detect cases where the first party masquerades as a third party when assaulting a second party, intending to have the second and third parties assault each other in response, leaving the instigating first party with little resulting damage while bringing on easy large scale damage to the second and third parties.
Another parameter needs to be in this evaluation system, that of degree of "monsterizing" of the adversary."
So I wonder now, if the next President has only 500 characters of thinking space in which to think about dealing with "terrorism", what can be the results?
But when logging onto post my idea, it said it was limited to a maximum of 500 characters. My concise writing contained 7,963 characters ... way WAY too many to fit the post space, as shown below:
"As one of the functions of the government is to provide for the common defense, leadership wisdom in the direction of such activity is very advisable specially in view of having such a formidable armed force capability at hand. Knowledge of all the essential factors on all the levels is surely required to perform this function. Surely it is wise that even when "the fat is in the fire" that one acts in such a way as to improve the situation, not grossly risk making it worse as a result of one's reflexive responses. The following are key factors which seem apparent to me right now.
Probably most people here in the US have a stylized picture of what a terrorist is, such as maybe a black bearded man with soulless eyes and a belt full of explosives heading for a crowd or driving a plane into a building.
However, surely if effective defense measures are to be applied, the subject needs to be accurately evaluated instead of reacting to stylized impressions like those. Much less entertaining than would be through simply reacting to valence, our inner fearful stuff; but potentially being far more efficient in sustaining a productive peaceful sustainable world.
Making an effort to evaluate the phenomenon, I would start at the definition of terror: that is, being very frightened. Thus a terrorist is someone who does something to severely frighten people. Now, fright has to do with one's imagined effects of something; it helps make the decision of fight or flight, deep survival fallbacks.
Lots of people deliberately strive to create fear in other people, such as the common schoolyard bully. Even before that, the pattern might be seen in the pre-schooler "bad boy" who misbehaves because getting punished is better than getting ignored. Street gangs led by a bully magnify the fearful impact on those in the way of the bully. A "terrorist" strives to cause fear in others so as to herd them into some different direction than they were headed.
Where the dividing lines are, between definitions of "insurgents", "guerillas", and "terrorists," are not clear to me, are they the same? And speaking of terror, one can be terrified by the sight of a spider, so does that make the busy spider a terrorist as it wanders past in search of a tiny bug for a meal? So probably "terrorism" as explored here, requires intent to cause fear in others so as to modify their behavior in some way.
The term "terrorist" seemed to arise in conjunction with small groups of militia gunning down a bunch of unaware civilians, so as to scare their people away from somewhere. It also applied to similar warriors who were "suicide bombers" thus also automatically eliminating themselves from capture and interrogation after ruining the lives of a bunch of unsuspecting people. For what purpose? Too much trouble and too painful to do just because they are bored with things. They might be "getting even" with something representing that which was bringing terrible stress to the terrorist's lives and loved ones. That is, revengefully deliberately doing damage to cause terror in a particular segment of people, in response to being terrified and/or furious at somebody. But more likely it is done to change the behavior of others through fear, like in "get out of our territory."
So, to deal with terrorism, it seems likely that various parameters need to be evaluated, including "purpose of doing the specific terrorist act" (not just to blow a bunch of people up, but instead to get a larger group of people to be frightened away from somewhere or from doing something in particular.) Identifying the attributes of the parameter thus in this case would involve identifying what is the intended place, activity or resource to be frightened away from.
From such data sets then seeking what other options the "terrorists" would have had to achieve their goals, and evaluating why the other options were not followed instead of doing terrorism, would be useful in future modifications to situations to enable would-be terrorists to utilize less harmful ways of filling their needs. The needs would thus need to b identified.
And another principle is to utilize the parameters and analysis to valuate the ranges of behavior regardless from where they originate and are carried out. This means that if and when done in one's own turf but people belonging there, it needs to be included in the overall picture. Leaving well-meaning "righteous" internal saboteurs out of the picture will result in skewed analysis and thus dysfunctional efforts to stop terrorism, perhaps even make it worse if attacking an external site in response, thus inadvertently becoming terrorists of a sort ourselves.
Some of the most careful evaluation and data gathering needs to be done to detect cases where the first party masquerades as a third party when assaulting a second party, intending to have the second and third parties assault each other in response, leaving the instigating first party with little resulting damage while bringing on easy large scale damage to the second and third parties, while themselves sustaining no further damage as a result of the action.
On the other hand, specific groups which seem to be sponsoring the "terrorism" abuses, are most likely a diverse group. Relatively few members will likely be the instigators and perpetrators of the abuse of terrorism. Some members are likely to be quite the opposite, even extremely valuable benefactors in some way to humanity, at least potentially. So if a handful of a specific group conducts terrorism, that does not mean all the others are doing it too or could even stop it from happening, and might not even know it is going on.
Of course, if there is a group formed for the express purpose of conducting some form of terrorism against specific targets, that is different. Even then, to deal with it surely it is prudent to determine what is the cause, be it political power struggle, business territory rivalry, showing off for the girls, or even parasites eating away at the brain, it is probably far more efficient overall to deal with the cause than to directly lock horns with it to deal with the terrorism with essentially similar kinds of damaging activity.
And to maintain respect of the greater world, if one chooses to deal with it with weaponry, using comparable weaponry and on a similar scale is what is instinctive with "fairness" in contests. If one is so weak as to have to fight fire with fire, then that needs to be done on a similar scale; dropping a bomb on an ant that got into one's picnic sandwich is generally considered inappropriate. One gets away with doing such things only if one also has the biggest fists, the most nukes, the nastiest rhetoric, then that will prevent challenges; but it is also remembered as a lack of appropriate justice and an inappropriate use of strength, suggesting lack of wisdom in use of strength; a high price of loss of esteem results.
Another parameter needs to be in this evaluation system, that of degree of "monsterizing" of the adversary. Monsterizing the opponent involves controlling the imagination of the active operators, such as are done to soldiers in the process of converting them from peaceful necessarily non-violent town folks into people who intend to kill and destroy; they are not imagining themselves dealing with other townfolk-like humans, they are wreaking havoc on monsters that are trying to wreak havoc on you and yours.
Surely we humans are smart enough to stay alert and deal with life in far better ways than that. To do so, it is essential that we not ourselves be tripped and fall into the "fight-or-flight" attention-grabbing fear/anger mode, where the brain downshifts into a brutal mode in which messes will be made.
Someone makes a mess, is that a righteous excuse to make a mess too? There really are better and much more fun ways to live life. Seeking those ways would be a mark of a good leader, I would think."
My next squeezing it was to 3,100 characters:
"Surely if effective defense measures are to be applied, the subject needs to be accurately evaluated instead of reacting to stylized impressions. Much less entertaining, but potentially being far more efficient in sustaining a productive peaceful sustainable world.
Making an effort to evaluate the phenomenon, I would start at the definition of terror: that is, being very frightened. Thus a terrorist is someone who does something to severely frighten people. Now, fright has to do with one's imagined effects of something; it helps make the decision of fight or flight, deep survival fallbacks.
Lots of people deliberately strive to create fear in other people, such as the common schoolyard bully. Even before that, the pattern might be seen in the pre-schooler "bad boy" who misbehaves because getting punished is better than getting ignored. A "terrorist" strives to cause fear in others so as to herd them into some different direction than they were headed.
To deal with terrorism, it seems likely that various parameters need to be evaluated, including "purpose of doing the specific terrorist act" (not just to blow a bunch of people up, but instead to get a larger group of people to be frightened away from somewhere or from doing something in particular. Identifying the attributes of the parameter thus in this case would involve identifying what is the intended place, activity or resource to be frightened away from.
From such data sets then seeking what other options the "terrorists" would have had to achieve their goals, and evaluating why the other options were not followed instead of doing terrorism, would be useful in future modifications to situations to enable would-be terrorists to utilize less harmful ways of filling their needs. The needs would thus need to be identified.
And another principle is to utilize the parameters and analysis to valuate the ranges of behavior regardless from where they originate and are carried out. This means that if and when done in one's own turf but people belonging there, it needs to be included in the overall picture. Leaving well-meaning "righteous" internal saboteurs out of the picture will result in skewed analysis and thus dysfunctional efforts to stop terrorism, perhaps even make it worse if attacking an external site in response, thus inadvertently becoming terrorists of a sort ourselves.
Some of the most careful evaluation and data gathering needs to be done to detect cases where the first party masquerades as a third party when assaulting a second party, intending to have the second and third parties assault each other in response, leaving the instigating first party with little resulting damage while bringing on easy large scale damage to the second and third parties.
Another parameter needs to be in this evaluation system, that of degree of "monsterizing" of the adversary. Monsterizing the opponent involves controlling the imagination of the active operators.
Someone makes a mess, is that righteous excuse to make mess too? There really are better and much more fun ways to live life. Seeking those ways would be a mark of a good leader, I would think."
My 500 words acceptable to the post space, finally were:
"Some of the most careful evaluation and data gathering needs to be done to detect cases where the first party masquerades as a third party when assaulting a second party, intending to have the second and third parties assault each other in response, leaving the instigating first party with little resulting damage while bringing on easy large scale damage to the second and third parties.
Another parameter needs to be in this evaluation system, that of degree of "monsterizing" of the adversary."
So I wonder now, if the next President has only 500 characters of thinking space in which to think about dealing with "terrorism", what can be the results?
posted by Unknown at
19:59
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