Sir, British physicist Lewis F. Richardson, who helped pioneer the mathematical study of international conflict, especially the outbreak of the first world war, observed some 70 years ago that war occurs because men do not stop to think – a proposition that triangulates neatly with Spinoza’s claim nearly 300 years earlier that violence occurs when passion overwhelms reason. That people do not stop to think during periods of threat has also been inferred from experiments where neuroscientists have observed that the limbic (emotional) brain overwhelms and overtakes the neocortical (thinking) when the organism is under stress.
英国物理学家刘易斯•F•理查森(Lewis F. Richardson)开辟了用数学方法研究国际冲突的先河，尤其是一战的爆发。他在70多年前提出，爆发战争是因为人类不会停下来思考——这一观点紧密呼应了近300年前斯宾诺莎(Spinoza)的观点：情感压倒理智就有可能引发暴力。人们在受到威胁期间不会停下来思考的观点也可以从实验中推断出来：神经科学家发现，当机体承受压力时，大脑边缘区域（主管情感）会压倒和控制新皮层区域（主管思考）。