The Global economy would tailspin and the existential risk situation would get a lot worse as a result.
I think you badly overestimate how important Africa is. Even assuming resources cannot be extracted while also bombing the place, Africa isn’t that important.
Now, if Africa disappeared or was suddenly destroyed, I would expect the global financial markets to drop considerably; but they are so skittish they drop at the fall of a hat. The long-term economic impact wouldn’t be so bad outside of commodities like Coltan. Certainly not so bad as some grey goo getting loose.
(I’d count things like AIDS as further debits to Africa, but obviously that’s a sunk cost as far as this suggestion is concerned.)
I’m willing to continue participating in this discussion but it is pretty difficult without you specifying more exactly what the proposal is. To begin with, where exactly are you bombing? Are Egypt and Morocco included? South Africa? Are you paving the continent with H-Bombs or targeting infrastructure with conventional weapons? What kind of population is left after the attack? What kind of industries will be left behind? Will there be restrictions against doing business on the continent to keep them from redeveloping? Will refugees be allowed to emigrate?
Some considerations: if you attack majority Muslim countries you’re instantly creating billions of terrorists, especially if you target Egypt and leave it open to Israeli expansion. If you use nukes there are huge environmental implications for the Middle East, India and if you leave it, Northern Africa. The fallout would be bad enough that these countries may well declare war. Meanwhile, the use of nuclear weapons would be seriously objected to by large majorities in the Western world and would radicalize large segments of the West particularly since, at least in the US, the attack would be seen as having racist motivations- in the eyes of a lot of people this would basically be genocide. Even with minimum possible radicalization you’re still going to have to do something with all the African immigrants and children of African immigrants (include, you know, a former President of the United States). Also, China is going to be pissed at what you did to their future satellite states. Whoever does the bombing probably gets trade sanctions placed on them by the rest of the world.
Using conventional weapons and doing less damage probably decreases the chances of broader international conflict in the short term and lessens radicalization in the West. But bombing economies back to the stone age doesn’t make the people who live there cavemen. You’ve still got a huge population furious at the West with nothing to lose- and those people can set bombs off about as well as anyone else. Meanwhile, you’ve created a power vacuum in one of the most resource rich areas on Earth which is fine until Great powers start competing over it. You start the colonization process all over again, this time with weapons that can destroy the world. Plus a buttload of resources sunk into the resulting conflict and rebuilding Africa’s infrastructure so those resources can be extracted. Of course, this isn’t something Africans are likely to forget so as soon as the continent is redeveloped you’re dealing with terrorism again. I suppose you can prohibit doing business on the continent but then you’ve just created a black market again...
Not to mention, in general, you’re just shaking up the status quo which means some countries will see this as an opportunity to increase their share of international power while status quo powers won’t realize they no longer hold all the cards—its these kind of knowledge asymmetries that lead to international conflicts historically. From an abstract perspective you’re just seriously destabilizing the system and rarely does anything good come from that.
I bet that Gwern simply flinched from modeling any of this, sensing that, with that level of absurdity exposed, such an intellectual provocation would simply lose the “intellectual” part in LW’s eyes.
I think you badly overestimate how important Africa is. Even assuming resources cannot be extracted while also bombing the place, Africa isn’t that important.
The continental GDP is just 2.7 trillion. Several percent of that is foreign aid (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Africa) and their exports to the rest of the world are small enough that their balance of payments (with the rest of the world) is negative by billions (http://www.africaneconomicoutlook.org/en/data-statistics/).
Now, if Africa disappeared or was suddenly destroyed, I would expect the global financial markets to drop considerably; but they are so skittish they drop at the fall of a hat. The long-term economic impact wouldn’t be so bad outside of commodities like Coltan. Certainly not so bad as some grey goo getting loose.
(I’d count things like AIDS as further debits to Africa, but obviously that’s a sunk cost as far as this suggestion is concerned.)
I’m willing to continue participating in this discussion but it is pretty difficult without you specifying more exactly what the proposal is. To begin with, where exactly are you bombing? Are Egypt and Morocco included? South Africa? Are you paving the continent with H-Bombs or targeting infrastructure with conventional weapons? What kind of population is left after the attack? What kind of industries will be left behind? Will there be restrictions against doing business on the continent to keep them from redeveloping? Will refugees be allowed to emigrate?
Some considerations: if you attack majority Muslim countries you’re instantly creating billions of terrorists, especially if you target Egypt and leave it open to Israeli expansion. If you use nukes there are huge environmental implications for the Middle East, India and if you leave it, Northern Africa. The fallout would be bad enough that these countries may well declare war. Meanwhile, the use of nuclear weapons would be seriously objected to by large majorities in the Western world and would radicalize large segments of the West particularly since, at least in the US, the attack would be seen as having racist motivations- in the eyes of a lot of people this would basically be genocide. Even with minimum possible radicalization you’re still going to have to do something with all the African immigrants and children of African immigrants (include, you know, a former President of the United States). Also, China is going to be pissed at what you did to their future satellite states. Whoever does the bombing probably gets trade sanctions placed on them by the rest of the world.
Using conventional weapons and doing less damage probably decreases the chances of broader international conflict in the short term and lessens radicalization in the West. But bombing economies back to the stone age doesn’t make the people who live there cavemen. You’ve still got a huge population furious at the West with nothing to lose- and those people can set bombs off about as well as anyone else. Meanwhile, you’ve created a power vacuum in one of the most resource rich areas on Earth which is fine until Great powers start competing over it. You start the colonization process all over again, this time with weapons that can destroy the world. Plus a buttload of resources sunk into the resulting conflict and rebuilding Africa’s infrastructure so those resources can be extracted. Of course, this isn’t something Africans are likely to forget so as soon as the continent is redeveloped you’re dealing with terrorism again. I suppose you can prohibit doing business on the continent but then you’ve just created a black market again...
Not to mention, in general, you’re just shaking up the status quo which means some countries will see this as an opportunity to increase their share of international power while status quo powers won’t realize they no longer hold all the cards—its these kind of knowledge asymmetries that lead to international conflicts historically. From an abstract perspective you’re just seriously destabilizing the system and rarely does anything good come from that.
I bet that Gwern simply flinched from modeling any of this, sensing that, with that level of absurdity exposed, such an intellectual provocation would simply lose the “intellectual” part in LW’s eyes.