Suicide attacks are an extreme end of a spectrum, which also includes ‘brave young warriors posturing against the tribal enemy to show how fierce they are, and make them back down’ and ‘going off to war’. Young men are, in many respects and to a certain degree, a disposable resource—you don’t /need/ that many men to keep your in-group’s population high (especially if your culture explicitly allows for polygyny), and your overall in-group can gain certain benefits from spending that resource. Should those young men believe in an afterlife, they would be more willing to be spent, thus potentially increasing their in-group’s overall success.
You’re assuming that actual people’s behavior and rational playing of the Prisoner’s Dilemma correlate in a meaningful fashion. A popular assumption around here.
Your assumption may well not have a problem with young fanatical muslims becoming suicide attackers. It does have a problem with old fanatical muslims not doing so.
You’re assuming that actual people’s behavior and rational playing of the Prisoner’s Dilemma correlate in a meaningful fashion. A popular assumption around here.
I don’t actually see that very often—mostly what I see is “if your ‘rational’ explanation doesn’t correlate with what you’d actually do/think is right, then your ‘rational’ explanation is flawed.”
If you were right, most muslim suicide bombers would be seniors.
I think people become less rational and more predictable as their fluid intelligence goes down with age.
Suicide attacks are an extreme end of a spectrum, which also includes ‘brave young warriors posturing against the tribal enemy to show how fierce they are, and make them back down’ and ‘going off to war’. Young men are, in many respects and to a certain degree, a disposable resource—you don’t /need/ that many men to keep your in-group’s population high (especially if your culture explicitly allows for polygyny), and your overall in-group can gain certain benefits from spending that resource. Should those young men believe in an afterlife, they would be more willing to be spent, thus potentially increasing their in-group’s overall success.
You’re assuming that actual people’s behavior and rational playing of the Prisoner’s Dilemma correlate in a meaningful fashion. A popular assumption around here.
Your assumption may well not have a problem with young fanatical muslims becoming suicide attackers. It does have a problem with old fanatical muslims not doing so.
Gwern has a few interesting posts on this topic on his website: Terrorism is Not About Terror, Terrorism is Not Effective
I don’t actually see that very often—mostly what I see is “if your ‘rational’ explanation doesn’t correlate with what you’d actually do/think is right, then your ‘rational’ explanation is flawed.”