The English philosopher Thomas Hobbes was a remarkable man that among many other things
is famous for once saying that life could be, “nasty, brutish, and short.”
Hobbes believed that the natural state of man was not a noble savage that only became
violent and corrupt after being influenced by society.
He believed our natural state was violent, and we required moral government to lead us
on a better path.
This is he what called a “Leviathan”, which was fully explained in his 1651 book
titled with that name.
Hobbes also wrote that there were three main reasons for war: competition, glory, and distrust.
We want other’s resources, we want power, and we know others do too, so we attack them
with preemptive strikes.
We do the damage before they can.
That’s what we’ll talk about today, in this episode of the infographics show, The
terrible history of ‘Hobbesian traps’.
Before we give you some examples of Hobbesian Traps let’s first explain what we are talking
about.
As we said, Hobbes believed that a big reason for conflict was fear of others.
That fear might be overstated, understated, or it might not even have much of a foundation
at all.
You might see it in school even, when one person attacks another for no other reason
that he thought that person would attack him first.
That might have happened, but it might not have happened as well.
The violence could have occurred simply because one faction was paranoid.
But when you are competing for resources, and a strike against you when you’re not
ready could ruin you, the drive to hit first might be very strong.
This is talked about in game theory.
You might think about cooperating with the other side, be it a country or a person, but
then you believe the other might think you show weakness and attack you.
So, you don’t try and cooperate and both of you harbor this mutual distrust.
We would think the best thing to do would be to talk about it, but according to Hobbes
part of human nature is not trusting each other.
It’s kind of animalistic.
As you can guess, these traps of distrust we fall into have caused untold misery and
bloodshed throughout history.
Game theory goes a step further and talks about “loss aversion”, which basically
means both sides suffer out of fear of losing.
We might end up in a state of conflict because of distrust, but then carry on fighting because
of the fear of losing.
It can end up in a lose-lose situation, with perhaps one side winning what is called a
“Pyrrhic victory”.
That’s winning with so much loss that you could hardly call it a win.
We have seen this in wars, but it can relate to all walks of life.
You’ve probably had this kind of painful win in your own life.
We can give you a very simple example of a distrust conflict and a lose-lose situation.
Maybe you and your brother are playing with something valuable in your house and it breaks.
Your parents come home and are very angry.
They want to know who did it.
You both say nothing, but the holidays are coming, and you certainly don’t want to
be grounded.
Fear gets the better of you, you’re in a trap of distrust, and so you tell your parents
he did it before he could say you did it.
Conflict has broken out.
He then starts telling your parents other bad things you did, smoking, cheating at school,
fighting, and so you tell them all the bad things he did.
The consequence is both of you get in lots of trouble and both of you get grounded.
You resent each other and that feeling might fester for a time to come.
Maybe they believe he broke the valuable item, but you both still lost in a way.
You get the Pyrrhic victory.
And all this because you both couldn’t cooperate.
You might have gotten into some trouble, maybe not, but you certainly could have prevented
a big mess.
These conflicts happen large scale, and sometimes mean huge monetary losses and often human
casualties.
Let’s now talk about some real-life Hobbesian Traps.
Guns We’ll start with something quite typical
that we are sure has happened myriad times and will keep happening.
It’s the situation when someone is faced with a person breaking into their house.
Both the occupant of the house and the burglar are armed, and what happens is a stand-off.
What so often happens next is one fires first, and that can sometimes end with both parties
getting shot.
Was there a better way?
If both people died or were seriously injured, you might say there was.
We might also talk about what is sometimes called a Mexican stand-off.
This usually means three of more people pointing guns at each other.
If one fires, the others will, which might result in all parties being killed.
It’s a great narrative device in movies.
Maybe one of the most well-known stand-offs is in the movie “Reservoir Dogs.”
This involved guys pointing guns in each other’s face.
You might recall the line, “Joe you shoot that man, you die next.
Repeat: You shoot that man, you die next.”
They could not cooperate, and things didn’t go very well for these guys that couldn’t
resolve their conflict and fear.
Number 5.
Cold War One Hobbesian Trap that is often used as an
example was that of the Cold War between the USSR and the United States.
This was economically costly for both countries, though more financially disastrous for the
USSR.
People suffered as a result of the cost of the Cold War, and for a long time it seemed
endless.
The shadow of nuclear war was cast over both side’s citizens.
There was internal turmoil, proxy wars in other countries, and witch hunts for supposed
dissidents.
Some writers and historians believe is was inevitable while others argue that it was
preventable.
Thankfully there was not a preemptive strike in this case as it could have caused mutually
assured destruction.
Number 4.
The Trap is Undone We might look at the closest we came to those
weapons being fired during the Cold War, during what is called the Cuban Missile Crisis.
After the USA’s Bay of Pigs Invasion in 1961 the Soviets put ballistic missiles in
Cuba.
The USA demanded the Soviets remove them and take them home.
We had a stand-off.
Thankfully, both sides understood what predicament they were in.
Psychologist and multi-talented science writer Steven Pinker wrote in the New York Times:
“Each understood they were in a Hobbesian trap.
Kennedy had just read Barbara Tuchman's ‘Guns of August’ and saw how the leaders of great
nations could sleepwalk into a pointless and awful war.
Khrushchev, thinking like a game theorist, wrote to Kennedy.”
Pinker said, “By identifying the trap, they could set the shared goal of escaping it.
In the teeth of opposition from many of their advisers, both made concessions that may have
literally saved the world.”
Number 3.
Fear of the poor Others have written about the state of the
countries of Honduras and Guatemala.
One writer says, “The fact that there are so many private guards in Guatemala shows
that a large part of its resources goes towards this unproductive business.”
The people in both countries, that have money anyway, are protecting themselves against
the poor, who they fear will attack out of desperation and perhaps envy.
It has happened in many countries.
This is of course counter-productive, it’s not how a good society should function.
As the divide widens more fear is fomented.
More police are hired, often corrupt police that are less than kind to the poor, and you
have a country in a state of chaos.
Private security is also hired because of the broken police force, and so the state
isn’t involved in trying to make matters better.
You have no trustworthy Leviathan mediating between the sides and trying to improve things.
You just have a growing distrust of each side, which can result in violence.
That might mean mayhem for poor people, and they might turn to crime in desperation.
The consequence is areas where people dare not go, tourism is affected, the economy suffers,
and people with money barricade themselves behind large walls.
That’s no fun for anyone.
A worse result is the desperate might turn to a leader who promises reform, but perhaps
in a brutal manner.
Number 2.
Trade We might also look at Hobbesian Trade wars.
In 2018, the New York Times gave the example of the trade war between the USA and China.
Many people say this is all about power, or as Hobbes would say, glory.
But there have been many losers so far in both countries, a reason why many businesses
don’t want this trade war.
The Guardian writes that even though the U.S. is instigating the trade war, it will end
up being the biggest loser.
Remember the term “loss aversion?”
Forbes wrote that this trade war sure is risky.
“In time, we may see the winners from globalization fight ferociously to avoid becoming the losers
in a trade war,” said the writer in the Times.
It’s a Hobbesian Trap of trade because it’s a matter of “Your move next” and there’s
a whole load of fear involved.
Number 1.
The Tribe Tribes might not have great difference in
terms of money, but they still have to use certain resources that might be in demand.
Sometimes, certainly in the past, they might have raided each other’s villages.
Some tribes that don’t communicate well might live in constant fear of the other raiding
their village, plundering their resources and perhaps even killing people.
Pinker writes, “You might have this temptation even if you otherwise wouldn’t hurt a fly,
as long as you are not willing to lie down and be killed.
The tragedy is that your competitor has every reason to crank through the same calculation,
even if he is the kind of person who wouldn’t hurt a fly.”
This is one of the reasons some hunter-gatherer societies had very high rates of murder relative
to their populations.
What’s worst, is that tribal members might sometimes fully realize that if they don’t
exterminate every last person of another tribe there could be retaliation in the future.
Even if there is outright extermination, another tribe may come along, and the cycle of violence
continues.
Cooperation is key, but the sad irony as we said at the start is that sometimes that is
seen as weakness, or the tribe won’t try cooperating as it will think the other tribe
will perceive it as weakness.
That’s why Hobbes said we need a larger force, a Leviathan, to keep us from murdering
each other.
Some people now think we need such a Leviathan for the world and with it humane and mutually
productive and beneficial social global contracts.
Have you ever been in a Hobbesian Trap?
Can you give us more examples?
What about the examples we have given, what do you think about them?
Tell us in the comments.
Also, be sure to check out our other video USA vs The World.
Thanks for watching, and as always, don’t forget to like, share and subscribe.
See you next time.