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Journal by khallow
I was trying to put together some musings I had about experimentation at the society level with an eye to eventually making society better, but suffered from serious writer's block. So here's what I have.
First, the observation that we can look at a society as a bunch of humans with infrastructure. This infrastructure appears at many levels: individual biology/psychology, culture, rules and trade, the traditional sort of infrastructure (energy generation, roads, emergency services, telecomms, internet), and education/knowledge.
Today, we bring a lot of interesting tools to the table for improving society. First, we have a better understanding and knowledge of the workings of society. Second, advancing technology allows us to do things that weren't possible before. A key one is things are becoming less scarce. We may even be on the verge of the post-scarcity society where basic human needs are "too cheap to meter".
Second, it seems a fine environmental for experimenting with a variety of possibilities that would be legally and culturally acceptable to a degree.
For example, we're already trying out non-traditional relationships like same sex marriage and internet discourse with considerable success.
I wish society was more open to economic/trade experimentation (like gig economy, high frequency trade (and other automated trade mechanisms), and cryptocurrency).
Finally, not much point to experimenting, if one doesn't pay attention to the results. For example, we have vast improvement in the human condition due to the present economic system (global trade, capitalism, plus widespread democracy), but I still see people pushing old narratives that ignore that. Similarly, the economic experiments I mentioned above all have resistance from sources that usually can't be bothered to find an actual problem (gig workers are "exploited", HFT is stealing pennies from grandma every time she trades, and cryptocurrencies are for tax evasion).
On that last point, it doesn't make sense to do experiments, if you can't perceive what works or not in those experiments.
First, the observation that we can look at a society as a bunch of humans with infrastructure. This infrastructure appears at many levels: individual biology/psychology, culture, rules and trade, the traditional sort of infrastructure (energy generation, roads, emergency services, telecomms, internet), and education/knowledge.
Today, we bring a lot of interesting tools to the table for improving society. First, we have a better understanding and knowledge of the workings of society. Second, advancing technology allows us to do things that weren't possible before. A key one is things are becoming less scarce. We may even be on the verge of the post-scarcity society where basic human needs are "too cheap to meter".
Second, it seems a fine environmental for experimenting with a variety of possibilities that would be legally and culturally acceptable to a degree.
For example, we're already trying out non-traditional relationships like same sex marriage and internet discourse with considerable success.
I wish society was more open to economic/trade experimentation (like gig economy, high frequency trade (and other automated trade mechanisms), and cryptocurrency).
Finally, not much point to experimenting, if one doesn't pay attention to the results. For example, we have vast improvement in the human condition due to the present economic system (global trade, capitalism, plus widespread democracy), but I still see people pushing old narratives that ignore that. Similarly, the economic experiments I mentioned above all have resistance from sources that usually can't be bothered to find an actual problem (gig workers are "exploited", HFT is stealing pennies from grandma every time she trades, and cryptocurrencies are for tax evasion).
On that last point, it doesn't make sense to do experiments, if you can't perceive what works or not in those experiments.
Reply to: Re:Open to experimenting?
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squatcho, n.:
The button at the top of a baseball cap.
-- "Sniglets", Rich Hall & Friends
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday March 24 2022, @05:12PM
I thought about it and dropped that example for two reasons:
1) It's one size fits all - "universal". Experiments are by their nature limited and easily reversed.
2) We already have experiments of a similar nature. For example, US Social Security, which is a genuine Ponzi scheme [soylentnews.org], has been slowly falling apart over the past few decades as tax revenue fails to keep up with growing payouts.
3) A considerable disinterest by UBI advocates in the results of these experiments. For example, the US has had almost 90 years to fix the Ponzi scheme aspect of Social Security (by reducing benefits or increasing taxes), but it has yet to happen. It seems reasonable to expect UBI to have a similar turnaround time when it comes to the problems it generates. I don't see the point to running experiments when we're not paying attention to the results.
And that's my problem with this. Sure, we can run a regional scale UBI for a time. But will we pay attention to the issues it brings up? Or will it simply be a precedent no matter what happens to it?