LINK: An example of the Pink Flamingo, the obvious-yet-overlooked cousin of the Black Swan

For the good reason that it's very difficult to do something about it.

The Snowden / Manning leaks (from what I've heard) suggest this issue is the third or forth priority of US intelligence organizations. One presumes that the US intelligence organizations do not consider it in their interests to advertise this fact.

Why are they ignoring this?

Because it's been basically stable for so long it's easy to believe it won't blow up.

Why are they ignoring this?

Nobody can get a promotion by focusing his attention on the topic?

If things escalate to the point where nuclear weapons get used, that probably implies enough of a breakdown of order that it doesn't matter what any treaty says.

Could you specify whether you want answers as percentage probability, probabilities, odds, or expected number of launches? My answer was intended as a percentage

If people want to lock in their predictions they can do so on Prediction Book here.

Ugh, I screwed up the mean by entering "1" as a probability where I meant 1%. Now I know why Yvain has all those funny "are you reading the directions?" questions on his LW surveys.

I failed to notice the "the" and entered my estimate for the probability of nuclear weapons being used in some state conflict, not necessarily between India and Pakistan.

Would't it be more accurate to use a geometric mean here, instead of an arithmic one?

An arithmic mean really obscures low predictions.

I count deployments for power-demonstration like in the cold war too (it is more difficult what counts as a conflict though)..

Isn't this an "elephant in the living room"?

No, an elephant in the living room is an elephant that is in the living room.

A pink flamingo just brings you notice that an elephant will be delivered to your living room shortly :-D

nukes can destroy enemy army without turning whole country into a blasted radioctive wasteland like scaremongers say

That's pretty obvious to anyone with a couple of functioning brain cells. The whole idea of tactical nuclear weapons is limited strikes against military targets. During the Cold War, the NATO doctrine explicitly relied on tactical nukes to stop Russian armored thrusts into Western Europe.

non-proliferation is a lost cause

Non-proliferation isn't based on some third-world politicians being afraid of a nuclear holocaust. It's based on the empirical fact that if you try to develop nukes, Uncle Sam will be very very mean to you.

In my opinion the opposite is likely to happen if there is an actual war of this kind between India and Pakistan: once Pakistan uses nukes, India will be mostly ok as a whole, as you imply, but India will turn Pakistan into such a "blasted radioactive wasteland" in comparison, which will make anyone else terrified of such a war with the US. Apparently the Indian defense minister in 2003 said something like this publicly, saying something like "After we respond, there will be no more Pakistan."