Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Modern Malaise

ava.substack.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 144 posts

Re: Modern Malaise

#41

Post by deltathreetwo »

epgui wrote: post #40
deltathreetwo wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is always the case. Another fallacy that can only be the result of your flawed intuition. All human capability has limits. You have limited strength and limited intelligence. There is no amount of intelligence or physical strength in a single human that can allow one man to build a feat of technology such as a Boeing 747. It can't even be done by one human in 10 lifetimes. This fundamental impossibility in your wo…

Even if everything you just said was true, it completely misses the point and is irrelevant to my comment.

Doesn't matter. It's true and what you said how it's "always the case" is categorically false. The falsehood of your comment is the only thing that is relevant here.

Re: Modern Malaise

#42

Post by notsapiensatall »

ggm wrote: post #22

Hard not to see parallels with the end of the Roman empire. We know we could do better, we can't be bothered trying very hard and we'd rather moan about the good old days. All it needs is the more motivated (not very) barbarian hoarde to decide they'll do the social reconstruction we won't. Edit: I actually place great faith on coming generations. The kids are alright.

This is a popular trope, but could you say exactly when the Roman empire ended?

If we are in a Rome scenario, the good news is that we probably won't live long enough to see the real collapse.

Re: Modern Malaise

#43

Post by ad404b8a372f2b9 »

epgui wrote: post #23
cercatrova wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why should the difference not be so stark? That's how the power law works, most people follow only a few accounts.

Because inequality beyond a certain excess makes a system unstable, and given the chance, even wealthy people would rather be wealthy in a stable world than an unstable world. There is not only one power distribution, there is a whole set of them.

I don't think it's stark. That's how the entertainment business naturally works. Footballers, youtubers, actors, etc...

Onlyfans has a very low barrier to entry and being better than a 100 other people isn't all that hard, assuming you have the body for it and the marketing chops.

I don't understand why you'd want a company doing the government's job, that's what taxes are for.

Re: Modern Malaise

#44

Post by [deleted] »

epgui wrote: post #23
cercatrova wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why should the difference not be so stark? That's how the power law works, most people follow only a few accounts.

Because inequality beyond a certain excess makes a system unstable, and given the chance, even wealthy people would rather be wealthy in a stable world than an unstable world. There is not only one power distribution, there is a whole set of them.

[deleted]

Re: Modern Malaise

#45

Post by ggm »

notsapiensatall wrote: post #42
ggm wrote: post #22

Hard not to see parallels with the end of the Roman empire. We know we could do better, we can't be bothered trying very hard and we'd rather moan about the good old days. All it needs is the more motivated (not very) barbarian hoarde to decide they'll do the social reconstruction we won't. Edit: I actually place great faith on coming generations. The kids are alright.

This is a popular trope, but could you say exactly when the Roman empire ended? If we are in a Rome scenario, the good news is that we probably won't live long enough to see the real collapse.

The reason I liked it was precisely because how long it took. Also, the barbarian hoarde was pretty un barbarian, it instituted the emergent states through the dissolution of the holy Roman empire. Really, Gibbons was sort of wrong. The invaders became "us" in almost every sense. Sucked to be Roman, but then.. it didn't.

Very few of the "lost arts" were truly lost. I could have gone to the democratising effect of the rise of Islam, where much "lost knowledge" was recovered in due course but that's a whole other story (depreferencing inheritance over functional ability)

The key point for our functional decay as a society might be the ubiquitous rise of cynicism combined with increasing joins over gerontocracy and kleptocracy.

https://acoup.blog/2022/01/14/collections-rome-decline-and-f... is good

Re: Modern Malaise

#46

Post by feet »

deltathreetwo wrote: post #33
epgui wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Citation actually not required because the result is trivial. First, I’m not claiming that the disequilibrium point is anywhere specific, just that it exists. Second, all you need to do to understand this is to consider the most extreme scenario: if the king has literally all the wealth in every form (all property, all money, all food, etc), and everyone else have literally nothing, how stable do you think the system…

There are proven instances where systems such as this can remain stable. Slavery is one. There are tons and tons of other systems throughout human history where massive inequality remains stable. In fact inequality is the bedrock of civilization according to our current theories of anthropology. How do self interested parties gather together to fund great infrastructure projects and technology required for the progre…

Isn't a representative government the opposite? When a large number of people work together to decide to funs or accomplish some goal, voting and taxes

Re: Modern Malaise

#47

Post by peyton »

svnpenn wrote: post #9
svnt wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If they do this, won’t they just fracture and drive the larger accounts elsewhere?

If every single user wants to be a soulless robot (pure capitalism), then yes. However if the userbase understands that larger accounts will be subject to larger fees, in order to support smaller accounts , then I would like to think at least some users would support that. Not everything in life has to be decided on a purely selfish basis.

Hang on. Capitalism means private ownership of the means of production. It sounds like you are talking about choices made by consumers.

Communist systems have consumers who make choices, too. Soviet citizens were perfectly free to choose which goods to queue up for.

Re: Modern Malaise

#48

Post by peyton »

feet wrote: post #46
deltathreetwo wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are proven instances where systems such as this can remain stable. Slavery is one. There are tons and tons of other systems throughout human history where massive inequality remains stable. In fact inequality is the bedrock of civilization according to our current theories of anthropology. How do self interested parties gather together to fund great infrastructure projects and technology required for the progre…

Isn't a representative government the opposite? When a large number of people work together to decide to funs or accomplish some goal, voting and taxes

So the liberal western form is not an exercise in working together towards some mutual goal. Rather it is in satisfying some baseline level of acceptance of how society works, property rights, etc. Power comes from the people, not by divine mandate or military might.

Re: Modern Malaise

#49

Post by jamesgreenleaf »

> All meritocratic platforms are winner-take-all, with the top 1% of performers collecting a vastly disproportionate share of rewards.

Even if you simulate an economy where every participant starts out with the same amount of money, and all trades are completely random, over enough trades the participants' wealth will still end up in a power-law distribution.

Re: Modern Malaise

#50

Post by seibelj »

archhn wrote: post #39

Most of us feel it. It's real. Don't let anyone gaslight you. You aren't sick: our culture is sick. (For those alone and struggling). Social alienation is the source of much mental illnesses. Poverty itself isn't the source of most people's misery. Our society is our preservation matrix. If we cannot reproduce or at least contribute to something beyond ourselves that bears the promise of persisting, we are left alone…

I believe in hard work, sacrifice, and family… ideals and virtues that have provided solace and guidance to humanity for our entire existence.

It seems to be the hyper-online types that reject traditional values that are the most depressed and apocalyptic in their mindset. Myself - I look outside and the sun is shining, my kids are playing, everything is good in the world to me.

Post reply on HN