The Basic Problem of Democracy (1919) • Hacker News Board

Re: The Basic Problem of Democracy (1919)

#151

Post by drjesusphd » Sat, Dec 28, 2019, 5:00 PM UTC

shaki-dora wrote: post #96

erichocean wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That reminds me of a truism I heard about protesting: The purpose of protesting is to demonstrate the need for violence to the fence-sitters. If protesting results in change non-violently, so much the better. But the purpose is to demonstrate that violence is absolutely necessary.

I really don't understand how protests became conflated with violence (mostly in the US, as far as I can tell). Protests are a basic right in every democracy. The vast majority of protests (as in: >99%) is peaceful. Protests are among the basic set of methods and institutions that form the public sphere where democracy actually happens. They are no better or worse than newspapers, public libraries, TED talks, Trump r…

And what protest movement since has had significant success?

(I include Vietnam War protests as meeting the threshold).

Re: The Basic Problem of Democracy (1919)

#152

Post by ben_w » Sat, Dec 28, 2019, 5:05 PM UTC

nl wrote: post #105

ben_w wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For this it needs to offer a credible and legitimate path towards political changes. This, but it also needs to be trusted. The losers need to feel that they lost, not just be told they have by the winners. This is why American democracy was stable after GWB’s initial election. Also, one of the reasons the UK voted to not change its voting mechanism in a recent referendum was that STV was portrayed as too “complica…

This is why American democracy was stable after GWB’s initial election. I don't understand this comment. I agree American democracy was stable after GWB (George W Bush)'s election (although I'm unclear if you mean the end of the vote counting or the judicial process here?). But I don't think the Gore camp felt they had legitimately lost at all. recent referendum was that STV was portrayed - what is STV? while FPTP ha…

> But I don't think the Gore camp felt they had legitimately lost at all.

My memory may be false or incomplete, but I thought Gore ultimately said he’d lost and that Bush has won?

Re: The Basic Problem of Democracy (1919)

#153

Post by amilein7minutes » Sat, Dec 28, 2019, 5:19 PM UTC

What strikes about the theory Lippmann develops in this piece back in 1919, is that the entire argument remains coherent and powerful just as is, a hundred years later in 2019. In the meantime, various implementations of democracy across the world (differing in the way the elections are held, the distribution of power between the legislature, executive and the judiciary and the elections of those etc) have all pretty much encountered the same faultlines emerging.

By that I mean that the majority votes based on a confused jumble of propaganda and misinformation and this voting pattern has not produced the best outcome for 1) the protection of the minorities and 2) solving problems that impact every individual, that also require collective effort, such as climate change and poverty.

While Lippmann blames the impossibility of gleaning facts from the "inconceivable confusion" that is presented to the common person -- and this problem has only become much worse in 2019, given the ease of access to opinions in the internet age -- is it possible that fake news to undermine democracy is an inevitable feature? In other words, is it possible that even if everyone was presented with crystal clear facts, they would not become rational agents? That the opinion of the masses will still converge to something based on external variables rather than facts?

The article gives the impression that once the problem of misinformation is eliminated, the democratic model will truly achieve liberty, as Lippmann defines it, but it does not seem rational to subscribe to this belief, simply because there is no historical precedent (fake news and propaganda are as old as democracy itself and the information age has merely provided infrastructural strength for its spread) and if we were being factual/Bayesian, there is no reason to believe in the redemption of democracy in the absence of misinformation.

Re: The Basic Problem of Democracy (1919)

#154

Post by licebmi__at__ » Sat, Dec 28, 2019, 5:41 PM UTC

Digit-Al wrote: post #99

peterwwillis wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And this is basically Machiavellian political theory. Acting in an immoral or unethical way is not necessarily a bad thing if it is warranted to bring about a good thing.

The end justifies the means? The problem is that 'everyone is the hero in their own story'. Everyone who spreads falsehoods in service to some cause is convinced that they are doing the right thing and are trying to "bring about a good thing". Is there any advantage in winning the war if by doing so you lose your soul?

>The end justifies the means? Well, yes.

For all the popularity of the phrase "the end never justifies the means", I have never met someone who actually believes it. Just to begin with, almost everyone agrees with state sanctioned violence as means to maintain a social order, even if they find the action itself horrible.

I found the phrase itself more commonly used as a way to dismiss certain ends on the grounds of PC than an actual moral objection.

Re: The Basic Problem of Democracy (1919)

#155

Post by majos » Sat, Dec 28, 2019, 6:00 PM UTC

sovietcattle wrote: post #129

Iv wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have. I think they are bollocks. Have you read and understood them and are ready to defend steps and axioms of this thesis or are you just enamored with his conclusions? Specifically, I think this is nonsensical: "Second, it must be noted that argumentation does not consist of free-floating propositions but is a form of action requiring the employment of scarce means; and that the means which a person demonstrates…

"I think this is nonsensical" ... "Actually I have a hard time charitably following his reasoning". Let me help you a bit by over-simplyfing the logic: - If I state an argument to you, it can either be true, false or indeterminate. No matter what argument you make to me in that regard, you'd end up agreeing with that argument, which means that specific argument is "a priori". Moreover, you can only reach a conclusion…

Still confused. The argument goes: we can only assess the truth of statements through computing, computing requires control over some resources (e.g., you can’t have somebody come in and flip some bits randomly, or else your computation might be flawed), thus any use of logic requires control of resources because they are finite, hence private property?

Doesn’t the first step conflate verification of truth with truth?

Re: The Basic Problem of Democracy (1919)

#156

Post by koheripbal » Sat, Dec 28, 2019, 6:08 PM UTC

TheCoelacanth wrote: post #139

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of the middle class in the US is one serious health issue away from bankruptcy - and doing far less well than in many European countries. The real trick is keeping the middle class in the US convinced that its situation and prospects are much better than they really are. When that trick stops working, so will democracy.

Those European countries are also democracies, though. In many cases, they are more democratic, because they don't have undemocratic features like the Senate.

The Senate is not meant to be representation by population - it is representation by geography. A different slice of the country that isn't undemocratic.

Since both houses of congress need to agree on a bill, both of those different slices need to agree to pass a law.

Re: The Basic Problem of Democracy (1919)

#157

Post by dragonwriter » Sat, Dec 28, 2019, 6:15 PM UTC

koheripbal wrote: post #156

TheCoelacanth wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those European countries are also democracies, though. In many cases, they are more democratic, because they don't have undemocratic features like the Senate.

The Senate is not meant to be representation by population - it is representation by geography. A different slice of the country that isn't undemocratic. Since both houses of congress need to agree on a bill, both of those different slices need to agree to pass a law.

> The Senate is not meant to be representation by population

Yes, it is deliberately anti-democratic.

> it is representation by geography.

By political subdivisions, actually.

> A different slice of the country that isn't undemocratic.

It is absolutely and deliberately antidemocratic by initial design.

Re: The Basic Problem of Democracy (1919)

#158

Post by shantly » Sat, Dec 28, 2019, 6:18 PM UTC

Iv wrote: post #122

nl wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is nonsensical I think you are being very polite in your assessment.

I think you are very perceptive :-)

From what I can tell, having followed several mises.org links over the years, castles-built-on-sand reasoning is kinda their whole thing. They rely on the reader missing some obvious objection, or some unjustified leap or connection between two things, early in their “logical” argument to make it all work. It’s dumb writing in smart writing’s clothing.

Re: The Basic Problem of Democracy (1919)

#159

Post by peterwwillis » Sat, Dec 28, 2019, 6:20 PM UTC

0x445442 wrote: post #135

nl wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The end justifies the means? This is - of course - a very rough synopsis of Machiavelli's treatise - even if he never actually said that. But the other way of looking at his work was that he was the first person to develop a code of ethics that led to the idea of "doing the greatest good to the greatest number of people" I highly recommend the series from the blog of the this Renaicance scholar and specialist in Mach…

> "doing the greatest good to the greatest number of people" Determining this, even with the information available today, seems like folly; like a never ending circle of statistical manipulations and justifications to support preconceived notions. Action on just about any social issue of note can be argued one way or another to be satisfying this guideline.

It's true that you could use twisted logic to change the outcome of what the greatest good is, but they don't stand up to reasoning. Anyone can say anything to defend their position. Many have just said "It's God's will".

Does that mean you can't actually know what the greatest good is? We can probably get very close to knowing it, and the little details shouldn't matter. But most of our "social issues" are squabbles over these details, and the good never gets done, or becomes reduced.

Re: The Basic Problem of Democracy (1919)

#160

Post by Vinnl » Sat, Dec 28, 2019, 6:48 PM UTC

Iv wrote: post #5

I'll restate something that's often misunderstood about democracy. The use of elections is not to find the "best" leader (for any definition of "best" that you have) but to prevent civil unrest. It offers an alternative to pushing for opinions violently in order to be heard. For this it needs to offer a credible and legitimate path towards political changes.

This realisation almost made me somewhat pessimistic about the fate of democracy.

Leaders always have to do the bidding of their citizens to some extent - if they cross the line too far, the citizens might overthrow them violently. They have incentive to respect democracy, because that will allow them to avoid physical violence when the citizens want to get rid of them.

The flip side of that would be that this means that there's an equilibrium to be found, i.e. the point where citizens are not dissatisfied enough (but as close as possible to it) to revolt, or are not powerful enough to. In other words, we're getting less and less democratic in search of that equilibrium.