It depends on what one assumes the motives for war are. If they are economic then I think a case can be made everyone ends up worse off. But if power is at stake, then war can indeed leave the nominal victor better off (from the perspective of motive).
By the way, attempts to characterize human psychological based on what life was like in the Savanna (or whatever environment humans are supposed to be designed by Darwinian forces for) need serious qualification, at best. Speaking metaphorically, evolution is an accident; where “successful”, a fortuitous coincidence.In some cases an organism ends up with a set of traits that work out for it in a given environment and it lives long enough to reproduce (even if living in a great deal of pain). Obviously the given environment will impose certain limits, and these limits may lead to certain “modifications” if not extinction. But the assumption the organism is well designed (well adapted, if one prefers secular terminology) for environment X therefore automatically poorly (or less well) designed for environment Y, where X precedes Y, is misleading. Logically, we may be better adapted for our present environment than any previous one we’ve inhabited (and one can come up with imaginary environments that are far superior than any we’ve experienced)--it’s question we can only answer by looking at X and Y and the organism’s traits very carefully, and then perhaps only with a great deal of uncertainty. No one talks about the hand being well adapted to the Savanna and ill adapted the modern city yet analogous arguments re: psychology crop up constantly—esp. re: politics and economics, where extreme irrational prejudices operate.
It depends on what one assumes the motives for war are. If they are economic then I think a case can be made everyone ends up worse off. But if power is at stake, then war can indeed leave the nominal victor better off (from the perspective of motive).
By the way, attempts to characterize human psychological based on what life was like in the Savanna (or whatever environment humans are supposed to be designed by Darwinian forces for) need serious qualification, at best. Speaking metaphorically, evolution is an accident; where “successful”, a fortuitous coincidence.In some cases an organism ends up with a set of traits that work out for it in a given environment and it lives long enough to reproduce (even if living in a great deal of pain). Obviously the given environment will impose certain limits, and these limits may lead to certain “modifications” if not extinction. But the assumption the organism is well designed (well adapted, if one prefers secular terminology) for environment X therefore automatically poorly (or less well) designed for environment Y, where X precedes Y, is misleading. Logically, we may be better adapted for our present environment than any previous one we’ve inhabited (and one can come up with imaginary environments that are far superior than any we’ve experienced)--it’s question we can only answer by looking at X and Y and the organism’s traits very carefully, and then perhaps only with a great deal of uncertainty. No one talks about the hand being well adapted to the Savanna and ill adapted the modern city yet analogous arguments re: psychology crop up constantly—esp. re: politics and economics, where extreme irrational prejudices operate.
One more case to consider—if a country is invaded, it may be less badly off after successful resistance than if it surrendered.