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Statistical Analysis Raises Civil War Death Count By 20%
Hugh Pickens writes "For more than a century, it has been accepted that about 620,000 Americans died in the the bloodiest, most devastating conflict in American history. But now, BBC reports that historian J. David Hacker has used sophisticated statistical software to determine the war's death toll and found that civil war dead may have been undercounted by as many as 130,000. Hacker began by taking digitized samples from the decennial census counts taken from 1850-1880. Using statistical package SPSS, Hacker counted the number of native-born white men of military age in 1860 and determined how many of that group were still alive in 1870 and compared that survival rate with the survival rates of the men of the same ages from 1850-1860, and from 1870-1880 — the 10-year census periods before and after the Civil War. The calculations yielded the number of 'excess' deaths of military-age men between 1860-1870 — the number who died in the war or in the five subsequent years from causes related to the war. Hacker's findings, published in the December 2011 issue of Civil War History, have been endorsed by some of the leading historians of the conflict. 'The difference between the two estimates is large enough to change the way we look at the war,' writes Hacker. 'The war touched more lives and communities more deeply than we thought, and thus shaped the course of the ensuing decades of American history in ways we have not yet fully grasped. True, the war was terrible in either case. But just how terrible, and just how extensive its consequences, can only be known when we have a better count of the Civil War dead.'"
I'd like to see the same analysis applied to WW2 and Vietnam, especially the excess fatalities for 5 years after the wars. I am pretty sure the real costs of wars are systematically concealed by governments.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
And for the record yes, I have a history degree (for which I wrote a major paper on the historiography of the Civil War) and have even worked in a Civil War museum, so I know what I'm talking about.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
I can see the headlines now: "Hacker increases war casualties by 130 000"
Knowing how many died tells you a lot but when a society is so affected by war that you don't actually know how many died, that also tells you a lot.
Bob.
Yeah, that's one of the arguments I've found particularly odd, because it's not like others are putting words in the Confederates' mouths. The states each wrote declarations explaining why they seceded, which we can read to gain some insight into their stated reasons for leaving the union.
For example, in the "Declaration of the Immediate Causes Which Induce and Justify the Secession of South Carolina from the Federal Union", South Carolina's government makes it clear that their secession is pretty much entirely motivated by a desire to protect slavery from possibly being abolished.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Some things are worth "being hellbent on".
Like eliminating slavery.
only if you are naive and believe such a simplistic bullshit. WMD in Iraq anyone? Omg nukes in Iran? Terrorists and pedophiles coming for your first born? It's all propaganda.
Slavery was already on its way out, because slaves have low productivity and trained and motivated workers provided more profits despite wage cost.
I guess it's easy for average Murrican to dismiss criticism of the Civil War as a fringe talk after decades of brainwashing and all those profits reaped thanks to the position of global hegemony. Everybody likes to be the best and the forced unity made that possible.
Look at former Soviet union. Bitchslapped baltic states and crushed internal opposition, victor in WW2 and top2 position from then on for few decades to come. It was a horrible country yet many citizens have the nostalgia for the global superpower times. I guess for your average peon it was well worth it to sacrifice millions for greater good. FFF that.
The progress in social matters is slowed down when the political game is played at the top levels. If social issues were handled more locally (eg at the state level) the progressive regions would be long done with gay marriages with child adoption, marijuana and shit, and at the same time people in Backwardsville would be able to enjoy their closemindedness. Yes, it would suck for people with 'problems' born in the wrong part of the country, but with 50 states you would have an option to move to likeminded area.
One-size-fits-all solutions forced by the government require every interest group from every corner of the country to weigh in in order not to lose and that leads to gridlock, wartime rhetoric and deep divides across the society. That slows down the progress and makes people feel opressed by 'them' whoever that might be.
Oversimplifying does nobody any good.
The right they were notionally fighting for was the right to secede.
They wanted to secede for reasons pertaining to slavery, but not because the North was going to abolish slavery (at that point, they didn't have the numbers in Congress to do so); it was because new territories were being permitted to self-determine whether to be slave or free -- whereas the South wanted a forced one-for-one, to keep free states from getting the upper hand in Congress. In reality, this is obviously an anti-states'-rights position. (Naturally, it says something about the flimsiness of one's justifications when the only way to have people not oppose you is to forcibly impose your supposedly reasonable system on them from the beginning...)
So, when you look at the whole picture, instead of your one-sentence simplification, the South wasn't principally motivated by a States' Rights ideal, and it's as unreasonable to hold their taint against States' Rights (including the right to secede), as to hold, say, Nixon against Democracy. In both cases, people with evil motives seized whatever justification was convenient to promote their evil ends.
Oversimplifying does nobody any good.
That's not entirely true.
rewriting history since 2109
*cough* Dredd Scott
*cough* Fugitive Slave Act
This being said, the South seceded BEFORE any of the state's rights were infringed, and they attacked Fort Sumter where, objectively, there were plenty diplomatic solutions available before firing a single cannonball. And anyway, it was not intended at that stage to abolish slavery; this only came as a way to wage total war two years later.
Good lord, I see we have a Lost Cause adherent here. Try reading the records from the seccession conventions of any of the Southern states. How about Alexander Stevens' Cornerstone Speech? State's rights was a myth made up by ex-Confederates AFTER the war was over. Men like Jubal Early, P.G.T. Beauregard, Alexander Stevens and Jefferson Davis made it their duty after the war to totally obscure slavery's role what the confederacy stood for. Literally, hundreds of historians have destroyed the foolish notion of the war for state's rights. http://www.amazon.com/What-This-Cruel-War-Over/dp/0307277321/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1334149324&sr=1-1 http://www.amazon.com/Race-Reunion-Civil-American-Memory/dp/0674008197/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1334149363&sr=1-1 http://www.amazon.com/Causes-Won-Lost-Forgotten-Hollywood/dp/0807832065/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1334149385&sr=1-1 http://www.amazon.com/Myth-Lost-Cause-Civil-History/dp/0253222664/ref=pd_sim_b_1 Any of these books will enlighten you.
Well, you are entitled to your opinion. But as the analysis did its best to allow for immigration and emigration, and did comparisons with other periods, your argument needs a bit more beef than "dislike". In my own field of interest, naval history, things like manning levels, pay rates, construction, weights of shot, water capacity, access to navigational equipment and the like turn out to be far better predictors of outcomes than the "Great Man" ideas of historians of the past. The outcome of the Battle of Britain was almost entirely determined by engineering factors - radar, and the fact that the British fighters were developed a little later than the German ones and so benefited from better engineering. The massacres in Rwanda and El Salvador can be better understood by analysing population density, land use and economic power than by speculation over tribal or political conflict. Proper statistical analysis of history - not numeric analysis, whatever that is - is not only illuminating in itself but could eventually give models with predictive power.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
I think it was Jay Gould (and if not I apologise to his shade) who observed that the usual distinction between "hard" and "soft" science is completely backward. Physics advanced faster than chemistry, and chemistry faster than biology, because in fact it is physics that is "not-hard", and especially the social sciences and economics that are very hard indeed. We had a model of dynamics that was "good enough" by 1700AD, but the causes of infectious diseases wouldn't be understood for roughly another 150 years. (We've just seen what happens when a load of bankers think physicists are capable of writing financial models).
However, as the originators of CERN would probably agree, because something is difficult is not a reason not to try it.
In my own experience, most of the people who object to statistical modeling do so because the results confound cherished beliefs. For instance, the arts graduates who run the British Home Office despise statistics because so many studies have shown that their approaches to crime don't work, and don't want to know about medical and psychological studies of the effects of various drugs because the results do not suit the agenda of the Daily Mail and the drinks companies. During WW2, the High Command of the RAF had a statistical wing that was demonstrating that (a) carpet bombing was a failure and (b) air crews did not become safer with experience. So what did they do? Ignored them, of course. But that is all the more reason why they should be done, and done as rigorously as possible.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."