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Carolyn Nordstrom calls it “the tomorrow of violence.”

Quoting a survivor of war, who says, “the life of war is a damaged (estragado) life,” Nordstrom begins to reflect on the complicated and ubiquitous ways violence, particularly war, affects societies. How has exposure to war ­– even in such places as in the United States where for many war has been more indirectly felt – shaped culture, politics, and personal and shared development?

This short reflection is motivated by my vague uneasiness about some twists of the ways in which people – “ordinary” people as well as those with academic background and aspirations – sometimes talk about (and praise) rationality.