Why? Any other thing we have invented has generally reduced war by increasing resources available to all, at least since industrialization. There are a few exception, but they were generally intended to be weapons, it seems hard to imagine an aging based weapon.
I don't know the reason or if the GP was quoting someone, but it may be the idea that by reversing aging we can expect the world population to grow even faster, resulting in massive conflicts over resources.
It appears that way, but remember that the 20th century is also the most populous century. As a fraction of the total population killed, the 20th century is (probably) the most peaceful.
Add onto that on many levels both wars were enhanced by scarcity... Germany want more in both, the assassination of the Archduke was encouraged on by a poor economy, Hitler couldn't have rose to power without a major economic crisis, there were so many failings in production and trade that might have prevented or mitigate either war.
Not aging and not dying will certainly be an economic boon. People can work longer, experts can more deeply master their fields and there will be less loss in passing knowledge down to successors. So economic production will rise and almost certainly faster than it does with aging and death.
Then the emotional factors in war and death... If people stop dying and live to see one war, they just might carry those lessons for the rest of lives.
I suspect that virtual immortality will cause less a problem with overpopulation and more a problem of deep resource inequity by those with significantly more time to acquire it.
The problem isn't an "aging based weapon" - it's the repercussions of what happens population that doesn't have a natural death rate. This introduces resource scarcity the likes of which we've never seen.
By that logic because we have extended life expectancy with hygiene, education, medicine and global transport that we should be producing less resources per person.
Well that clearly isn't the case... Something subtle must be wrong with your clearly intuitive observation. I think the cost of educating and raising the next generation to the point where they are productive and having them to relearn the lessons of those that died early is simply more costly than what it takes to support an aging population.
Yes, but the production is not evenly distributed among every person. Really, the people who are actually farming are getting much more productive, but because they are better able to manage resources. However, there is probably a limit on the absolute yield per acre, as an example. It may yet be double what we do now(which is double what we did in 1970), but most farmers I've talked to think that they probably won't hit the FDA's target of doubling yield/acre by 2050. Managing soil chemistry is too problematic. It is simply hard to add back enough mass to the ground as we extract in food/year.
> Reducing aging will likely reduce the resources available to all, by reducing the rate of population decline relative to the growth.
Doubtful. It will also dramatically reduce the birthrate. After all, what's the rush to have kids when you have hundreds of fertile years ahead of you?
