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100 years of whatever this will be

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Re: 100 years of whatever this will be

#531

Post by tinco »

CTmystery wrote: post #411
tinco wrote: post #363

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'd ask you to check your basic assumption about science as an authority. Science is the only and ultimate final authority. It really is not a bad assumption. There literally can not be a higher authority than it by definition. > but is really bad at transmitting information about non-deterministic processes or even processes that are so complex that they appear non-deterministic e.g. human behavior. No it is not,…

> Science is the only and ultimate final authority Junk science led to the American eugenics movement that included forced sterilization of 64k Americans in the early 1900s. I love science, but calling it the only and ultimate authoritity leaves a lot of room to create a world we don't want to live in. This happens because scientists disagree themselves on almost everything. Recognizing the difference in science as a…

That it's the ultimate authority doesn't mean you should always believe it. It's just the best we've got. It's the best thing about science is that it's explicit about the bounds of what we know and don't know.

You don't ask a scientist what you should do, you ask a scientist what they think is true, and what the options are and what their estimated outcomes are. It's always you yourself who make the decision.

Regardless if there was junk science in the early 1900s (don't know much about it but wouldn't be surprised), it was people who decided to sterilize people. Just as it's people who decide to kill people for Jesus Christ or Allah or whatever excuse they come up with.

Even if the science were true, and some subset of Americans is less intelligent or more violent or whatever, it still wouldn't change the fact that now we've decided that eugenics is unethical. We embrace diversity because that's what aligns to our values. Maybe if we're in the middle of famine and war our values will shift again. The authority of science has nothing to do with it.

Re: 100 years of whatever this will be

#532

Post by kkjjkgjjgg »

haxiomic wrote: post #457
kkjjkgjjgg wrote: post #360

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Free market capitalism" does not mean there should be no laws whatsoever. It is a trivial realization that markets have to operate within their given environment, including laws. Nevertheless you can aim for as much freedom as possible. You can make it illegal to shoot people, without having to set prices for goods and labor in law. I don't think regulations is synonymous with basic laws in such discussion. And ther…

A more complicated challenge is climate change, which is like the CFC example taken to the extremes. Since every company uses energy the responsibility is spread among everyone. However, every group, from countries to companies stands to lose competitively from using more expensive but less damaging sources of energy – the market pressures drive towards companies that take advantage of externalities like this So a so…

That is a common trope, supposedly free running capitalism would just waste as much energy as possible without regulation.

It is of course nonsense, even without regulations industries have an incentive to save on energy, as it is a cost factor.

Or think about cars - people would prefer to buy cars that use less energy, so that they have a wider range. Therefore there already is an incentive for car manufacturers to develop more energy efficient cars.

Also people can decide they only want to buy products that adhere to certain production standards, even without centralized government.

Overall, nobody claims externalities should have no price.

Re: 100 years of whatever this will be

#533

Post by MauranKilom »

moffkalast wrote: post #347
soco wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When a store charged me twice for the same item last month I was very happy to be able to reverse the transaction.

Maybe it's just me, but we all place an awful lot of trust giving vendors essentially all credit card details possible AND where we live so that they're capable of skimming a self defined sum off by themselves. It's like an inherently insane system. We're supposed to be the one wiring the cash, not the vendor themselves with our data.

By that notion, the fact that almost all home locks are easily pickable and glass windows breakable is also insane. There's tons of valuables behind almost all of these!

We found meaningful ways of disincentivizing theft, which turns out to be largely sufficient even in face of fallible security. The exact same applies to card data in the hands of merchants.

Re: 100 years of whatever this will be

#534

Post by wyre »

nprz wrote: post #403
gaze wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I half agree. Yes I do think you have a bunch of technologists self-indulgently trying to apply the next shiny thing where bettering the world is second priority. However, I think changing the system from inside is largely a fool’s errand. There are indeed proven methods for political change. Unions, protest, organizing, these things. They’re unsexy and boring and tedious, much like you’ve described, but these do wor…

If you look at wealth inequality over the past 50 years it would seem to indicate that those methods don't actually seem to accomplish much.

Union membership is down drastically over 50 years which is why it isn’t accomplishing much. If you do an image search for ‘union membership wealth inequality’ you’ll find a graph of union membership imposed with a graph of income going to the top 10%. It’s incredibly negatively correlated.

Re: 100 years of whatever this will be

#535

Post by cblconfederate »

colechristensen wrote: post #378
cblconfederate wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

sure but what about inter-kingdom trade (and even, not all cities belonged to an empire)

You taxed and regulated at ports of entry

That's not a regulated market, you can sell elsewhere

Re: 100 years of whatever this will be

#536

Post by bsanr2 »

notpachet wrote: post #49

All of the current histrionics that we hear from DeFi advocates regarding escaping the evil centralized Banks and Regulators and what not -- you know what they remind me of? They remind me of what I hear from junior developers when they're tasked with fixing an antiquated, broken software system. These developers typically lack the experience and the patience necessary to fix the system incrementally from within, so…

>the experience and the patience necessary to fix the system incrementally from within

Occasionally, this doesn't exist. Hence, for example, the American Civil War. You're making the mistake of assuming that software engineering design schema work for all real-world problems (or, rather, that that which would be foolish in approaching the redesign of software is necessarily also foolish in reforming other systems).

In fact, the "incremental change over time" approach is often the comfortable, irresponsible choice, in no small part because it allows bad actors the opportunity to adjust their approach to align with the new rules. This is especially true when the corrupt status quo threatens to collapse not only the system in question, but also many interrelated systems. The last thing you need when approaching a cliff is the car enthusiast in charge of the wheel and the child lock. Sometimes brakes aren't enough; you might need to just jump.

Re: 100 years of whatever this will be

#537

Post by tinco »

padobson wrote: post #431
tinco wrote: post #363

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'd ask you to check your basic assumption about science as an authority. Science is the only and ultimate final authority. It really is not a bad assumption. There literally can not be a higher authority than it by definition. > but is really bad at transmitting information about non-deterministic processes or even processes that are so complex that they appear non-deterministic e.g. human behavior. No it is not,…

Science is the only and ultimate final authority. Indeed, praise be to science. It really is not a bad assumption. More like a leap of faith. There literally can not be a higher authority than it by definition. How [onto]logical. It is just that it is unethical to do so, so we refrain from it. Amen, brother. We've got to repress those urges of curiosity to appease glorious science. Praise be to science! Amen.

Happy you feel that way ;)

> We've got to repress those urges of curiosity to appease glorious science

No, it's to appease our desire to live in a society that aligns with our morality. If you'd read the religious books for what they are and respect them for their interpretation of what it means to be a kind and loving human being, instead of using them as tools to manipulate the minds of the unwashed masses into behaving as a cohesive unit, then maybe you'd understand.

Re: 100 years of whatever this will be

#538

Post by kkjjkgjjgg »

pavel_lishin wrote: post #492
kkjjkgjjgg wrote: post #382

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One person can hit another person over the head without any centralized authority being involved. So I don't think your claim is correct at all. Assuming if somebody breaks an agreement, you just hit them over the head with a stick.

> Assuming if somebody breaks an agreement, you just hit them over the head with a stick. But that's not a society any of us want to live in.

I didn't say you should run society like that. I only provided an example to prove that centralized control is not necessary to enforce rules.

Typically people form groups that enforce certain rules. You can have bigger and smaller groups. Some big countries are very centralized, others less so - I think federalization in the US serves to counteract centralization? Ideally people have some degree of freedom to switch to groups whose rules align with their own preferences.

It is not an all or nothing, there can be degrees of centralization and decentralization.

Of course we can not escape the laws of nature in the end.

Re: 100 years of whatever this will be

#539

Post by handrous »

pjkundert wrote: post #507
beebmam wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition, to wit: There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect" https://www.bradford-delong.com/2018/12/frank-wilhoit-the-tr...

This seems like a bizarre definition. As someone who would accept a label of "conservative", and growing up and living in a world of mostly "conservative" people, I struggle to think of a single such person who wouldn't be appalled to find out they they were living under a single such law, let alone many such laws. Could you be so kind as to identify even a single instance of such a law?

It's possible to craft laws that don't explicitly fail to bind one group, but do in practice. Other times, it's more explicit.

A recent example of the former would be some of the voting security laws that have been popular lately. A recent example of the latter would be disparities in crack vs. cocaine sentencing (I think this is no longer the case? God, I hope not. But was not that long ago) and that's just the de jure part—in all cases, the de facto enforcement is what matters.

Historical examples abound, obviously.

[EDIT] another example is mentioned by someone else in this thread, as abortion laws, but it's worth noting why those are an example: the rich never have trouble obtaining abortions, and there's a history of pro-life advocates doing so when they "need" to, for themselves or for family members (I'm sure their case is different, of course eyeroll). In fact a major factor in the Republican legislature of New York passing early abortion rights laws was precisely this disparity, which was that anti-abortion laws in effect only existed for the poor.

Re: 100 years of whatever this will be

#540

Post by kkjjkgjjgg »

watwut wrote: post #437
kkjjkgjjgg wrote: post #382

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One person can hit another person over the head without any centralized authority being involved. So I don't think your claim is correct at all. Assuming if somebody breaks an agreement, you just hit them over the head with a stick.

>Assuming if somebody breaks an agreement, you just hit them over the head with a stick. If this is possible, then it is equally possible to just hit anyone you please with stick so that they are forced to do what you want. Which means, the most violent eager person gets to rule. Which is what people who prefer court system don't want.

If you just hit people with sticks, they are bound to hit back. I don't understand your example.
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