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Reducing inequality can reverse political polarisation: study

thesaint.scot

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Re: Reducing inequality can reverse political polarisation: study

#61

Post by [deleted] »

civilized wrote: post #23
Barrin92 wrote: post #20

Worth reading Robert Sapolsky on the topic of inequality here[1]. Inequality itself (not poverty, and accounted for the material disadvantages ), causes about half of the difference in health and life expectancy outcomes in developed nations, makes people at a neurological level opportunistic and causes biological stress in populations which results in violence, crime, isolation, mental illness, and so forth. That's…

I don't believe it. I think it's woo. There's no reason for my health to be harmed just because someone has more than me. I'm open to being proven wrong, but I think this is another social science fad, another victim of academia's ideological blinkers and confirmation bias avalanche. It'll be in and out, just like how eggs and wine and chocolate are good for you on Tuesday and bad for you again by Thursday. EDIT: Yes…

[deleted]

Re: Reducing inequality can reverse political polarisation: study

#62

Post by [deleted] »

civilized wrote: post #23
Barrin92 wrote: post #20

Worth reading Robert Sapolsky on the topic of inequality here[1]. Inequality itself (not poverty, and accounted for the material disadvantages ), causes about half of the difference in health and life expectancy outcomes in developed nations, makes people at a neurological level opportunistic and causes biological stress in populations which results in violence, crime, isolation, mental illness, and so forth. That's…

I don't believe it. I think it's woo. There's no reason for my health to be harmed just because someone has more than me. I'm open to being proven wrong, but I think this is another social science fad, another victim of academia's ideological blinkers and confirmation bias avalanche. It'll be in and out, just like how eggs and wine and chocolate are good for you on Tuesday and bad for you again by Thursday. EDIT: Yes…

[deleted]

Re: Reducing inequality can reverse political polarisation: study

#63

Post by rodgerd »

civilized wrote: post #23
Barrin92 wrote: post #20

Worth reading Robert Sapolsky on the topic of inequality here[1]. Inequality itself (not poverty, and accounted for the material disadvantages ), causes about half of the difference in health and life expectancy outcomes in developed nations, makes people at a neurological level opportunistic and causes biological stress in populations which results in violence, crime, isolation, mental illness, and so forth. That's…

I don't believe it. I think it's woo. There's no reason for my health to be harmed just because someone has more than me. I'm open to being proven wrong, but I think this is another social science fad, another victim of academia's ideological blinkers and confirmation bias avalanche. It'll be in and out, just like how eggs and wine and chocolate are good for you on Tuesday and bad for you again by Thursday. EDIT: Yes…

> I don't believe it. I think it's woo. [...] ideological blinkers and confirmation bias

Physician, heal thyself.

Re: Reducing inequality can reverse political polarisation: study

#64

Post by chongli »

civilized wrote: post #53
brewdad wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One obvious example is housing. Those that have more than you can afford to live in safer neighborhoods. Those less well off but still able to afford to own a home will be forced to live in neighborhoods with higher crime, higher levels of pollution, "food deserts", or any other number of negative factors. Sure, you can opt to drive til you qualify and avoid some of those problems but now you spend an hour or more ea…

That's poverty though, not inequality per se.

It’s not poverty though. If you can afford a car, an iPhone, laptop, plenty of food to eat, TV, refrigerator, washer and dryer, and all sorts of other toys and time saving appliances, you’re not in poverty by any global or historical standards.

You may still be unable to afford to own a house in a clean, safe area with access to a decent school. That’s inequality, not poverty.

Re: Reducing inequality can reverse political polarisation: study

#65

Post by scrozart »

civilized wrote: post #23
Barrin92 wrote: post #20

Worth reading Robert Sapolsky on the topic of inequality here[1]. Inequality itself (not poverty, and accounted for the material disadvantages ), causes about half of the difference in health and life expectancy outcomes in developed nations, makes people at a neurological level opportunistic and causes biological stress in populations which results in violence, crime, isolation, mental illness, and so forth. That's…

I don't believe it. I think it's woo. There's no reason for my health to be harmed just because someone has more than me. I'm open to being proven wrong, but I think this is another social science fad, another victim of academia's ideological blinkers and confirmation bias avalanche. It'll be in and out, just like how eggs and wine and chocolate are good for you on Tuesday and bad for you again by Thursday. EDIT: Yes…

Do you have research and data to back you stance, like OP provided?

Re: Reducing inequality can reverse political polarisation: study

#66

Post by hotpotamus »

Natsu wrote: post #37
lifeisstillgood wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not that they have more. It's that you know they have more, that it's not fair they have more because they are not better than you, and the path to get more is blocked / unfairly policed. And that eats you up inside. And that eating up is constantly firing stress hormones and heardening your heart. In short, anger leads to hate, hate leads to the dark side.

The problem is that, no matter what the actual causes are, self interest bias generally makes it so that nobody can accept that another person worked harder or used better strategy or whatever. For example, in games, it's always lag/bad teammates/etc. that keep them in "Elo hell" and they want to 1v1 you despite it being a team game and they ignore game winning objectives to score meaningless kills or whatever. Never…

> Never mind everyone starts with exactly the same resources every time.

In a game sure, but does this seem to reflect lived reality?

Edit: in fact, I don't know what game you're refering to, but imagine a game where your opponent was given an order of magnitude more HP or an hour to level up/prepare before you entered the game. Is this a game you would want to play?

Re: Reducing inequality can reverse political polarisation: study

#67

Post by chongli »

kiba wrote: post #56
brewdad wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One obvious example is housing. Those that have more than you can afford to live in safer neighborhoods. Those less well off but still able to afford to own a home will be forced to live in neighborhoods with higher crime, higher levels of pollution, "food deserts", or any other number of negative factors. Sure, you can opt to drive til you qualify and avoid some of those problems but now you spend an hour or more ea…

This has to do with extremely poor land use policies combined together with bad incentive in the housing market, hence "robust" housing market as if it's something to be celebrated. I note that the San Francisco housing crisis has been ongoing for at least a few years if not longer according to the notes I have been taking.

Those land use policies come from nimbyism and a desire to “pull the ladder up behind you” that we see so often in our society. I think, and it sounds like the research supports, that inequality drives people to act more selfishly and this is the result we see.

Re: Reducing inequality can reverse political polarisation: study

#68

Post by civilized »

chongli wrote: post #64
civilized wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's poverty though, not inequality per se.

It’s not poverty though. If you can afford a car, an iPhone, laptop, plenty of food to eat, TV, refrigerator, washer and dryer, and all sorts of other toys and time saving appliances, you’re not in poverty by any global or historical standards. You may still be unable to afford to own a house in a clean, safe area with access to a decent school. That’s inequality, not poverty.

> You may still be unable to afford to own a house in a clean, safe area with access to a decent school. That’s inequality, not poverty.

But this sentence contains no reference to how X having more than Y caused Y to suffer. It contains a description of how Y could be better off if Y had more.

If inequality was eliminated by making it so no one had access to safe schools, it would not solve the problem at all.

If you don't want to call the problem poverty, whatever, but it's definitely not inequality.

Re: Reducing inequality can reverse political polarisation: study

#69

Post by WalterBright »

Barrin92 wrote: post #20

Worth reading Robert Sapolsky on the topic of inequality here[1]. Inequality itself (not poverty, and accounted for the material disadvantages ), causes about half of the difference in health and life expectancy outcomes in developed nations, makes people at a neurological level opportunistic and causes biological stress in populations which results in violence, crime, isolation, mental illness, and so forth. That's…

Maybe it's crime, violence, and mental illness that causes inequality.

Re: Reducing inequality can reverse political polarisation: study

#70

Post by jl6 »

civilized wrote: post #23
Barrin92 wrote: post #20

Worth reading Robert Sapolsky on the topic of inequality here[1]. Inequality itself (not poverty, and accounted for the material disadvantages ), causes about half of the difference in health and life expectancy outcomes in developed nations, makes people at a neurological level opportunistic and causes biological stress in populations which results in violence, crime, isolation, mental illness, and so forth. That's…

I don't believe it. I think it's woo. There's no reason for my health to be harmed just because someone has more than me. I'm open to being proven wrong, but I think this is another social science fad, another victim of academia's ideological blinkers and confirmation bias avalanche. It'll be in and out, just like how eggs and wine and chocolate are good for you on Tuesday and bad for you again by Thursday. EDIT: Yes…

> There's no reason for my health to be harmed just because someone has more than me.

Being angry all the time can harm your health. Maybe being envious all the time can too.

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