Supposing WW3 happened sometime in the near future, what can we do to prepare ourselves?

Alas, I don't have the half hour free to watch the video (perhaps later), but I'm guessing it pertains to people making the same mistakes.

With that in mind I can't foresee any way in which WW3 could happen in my, or even my kid's, lifetimes without a seismic change in the world order. The current Russian regime is so toxic that it's difficult to see it getting any worse, but is criminal rather than anything else so have no ideological compulsion to expand (although they'll take opportunistic bits of places like Crimea). China really has no incentive to change things and maintaining stability is practically cultural (they'll posture over Taiwan, etc - but that's almost ritualistic now).

From the political standpoint, another Trumpian presidency could do it, seismically removing the USA from the world stage as a free democratic state through isolationism or realignment with other autocratic regimes. At that point WW3 would be possible as multiple autocratic power blocks realign.

But there is a hell of a long way to go through before that, and having to survive a possible USA political breakdown with the ensuing worldwide economic and social turmoil is by far a more pertinent and realistic threat.

And the biggest threat of all will be the ramifications of climate change which WILL happen, despite the deniers.

WW3 strikes me as being well down the list of things to prepare for, well behind the threats of climate change, increasing political authoritarianism and economic turmoil because of those.

Bear in mind that from 1905 WW1 was utterly predictable and the eventual combatants were all preparing from that point on. Likewise the astute could see WWII coming from 1933 and even the thickest plank could see it as inevitable by 1938. Neither of the wars were a surprise to anyone when they actually happened (in the UK the plans for issuing of gasmasks, evacuation of children from cities and the issuing of ration cards were all put in place in the years 1936-38 and were rolled out virtually the day after Poland was invaded).

No such situation exists now in regard to another World War. But don't fret, there are plenty of other threats to be worried about!

World war three coming soon, however its existence as a credible reality is shielded by the clouds of technical and social innovation that at the same time guarantee its rising. What it will consist of is a sort of Stuxnet war and human like AI will be the central plank of innovation - a legacy like the A-bomb which will stretch forwards like a shadow in history, also on a lighter more predictable note occasional nukes and some pretty heavy battles that will help clarify its form and place in history. Redundant technologies will come crashing down, old powers like communist china or the petro-chemical driven wealth centres of the gulf gone. Some reversion to religious statehood in the economical and political changed landscape of the west will lead to nuking religious sites...as nasim taleb said it takes a lot of energy to maintain disbelief...and that will not be available as the global economy sinks to a 1930s level of output and robots with brains vastly superior to humans brainwash what remains of the human race with what ever chew-bone of ideological and religious hogwash they prefer to throw at their pets (us).

There will be no WWIII. The reality of MAD (mutual assured destruction) created by the vast arsenals of intercontinental ballistic missiles, each equipped with multiple nuclear explosives has ironically prevented it from happening for decades, and will continue to do so. That is not to say there will be no wars.

There is, and always will also be struggle for world domination, and it will involve proxy wars and the threat of all-out wars. China is busy building a fleet of aircraft carriers and turning small islands in the South China Sea into forward air bases. Neither can be regarded as defensive measures. China is getting its ducks in a row, ready for expansion, by military means if necessary. In the not too distant future it will have gained the upper hand over the US and Russia, both militarily and economically.

I'm going to need to go and collect me some assertions to assert before I can partake in the thread, and a lobotomy before I can match aufbahrung's free association.

Spearthrower wrote:I'm going to need to go and collect me some assertions to assert before I can partake in the thread, and a lobotomy before I can match aufbahrung's free association.

Think of him as the 20th century Nostradamus. Whatever urge you might have to match aufbahrung's free association will evaporate.

At rationalia I used to liken him to the Oracle of Delphi, which is pretty much the same thing.

I've explained the war will be real. It will be global and involve a fair number of nukes. Enough to cause a nuclear winter of indeterminate duration even. Games theory is all very well but requires rational actors that cannot be guaranteed. Luck not mathematical theorizing saved our bacon in the 20th C and we saw with Trump there is no divine science that will save the human. Or poor choice of ideas/leaders to follow (or to place the matches in the wrong hands at the fireworks factory). It is a matter of time now before the new cold war goes hot. Have no doubt, this is no game. The season is a death sentence for many.

aufbahrung wrote:It is a matter of time now before the new cold war goes hot.

It's failed to become a hot war for seven decades. Got anything more specific than in "a matter of time"? "Any day now" won't cut it.

Before the Interweb there was at least some semblance of order to the first cold war conflict. Now anyone with a smartphone can blast a hole in the social fabrix of societies, see this time again. Trump getting elected is the perfect example of the social rot I'm on about. But he isn't the illness, merely a symptom of truth decay etc...and I don't know the precise timing, all I know is the close calls of the 20th C. are very likely to repeat, only with social media hazed idiots deciding whether or not to do the button pressings and pursue the unthinkable. I say it is a matter of time.

Hermit wrote:At rationalia I used to liken him to the Oracle of Delphi, which is pretty much the same thing.

High on fumes.

If WWIII was going to happen it would have happened in 2020, that and the giant meteor.