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People haven't fundamentally changed since 1779. The main drivers of human action remain the same. You might really not like this part: the constitution was ba

People haven't fundamentally changed since 1779. The main drivers of human action remain the same. You might really not like this part: the constitution was based on documents and governments predating it by thousands of years.

nitrogen 11y ago
The main drivers of human action remain the same. Scientific (and to a lesser degree, philosophical) understanding of these drivers has changed significantly, though. Further, the breadth of actions available has increased dramatically with technology, and as such it is reasonable to revisit some of the decisions made 200+ years ago from time to time.
- bcook 11y ago
  I agree, but I think your position excludes the existance of "unknown unknowns". What really drives us?
  - nitrogen 11y ago
    I think it's enough that we have more "known knowns" now than 200 years ago. We have an insane amount of knowledge that wasn't available then. We have neurology, neurochemistry, neuropsychology, etc. to help us understand human motivations and behaviors. We have evolution to explain human origins, and evolutionary psychology, while very much in its early stages, to identify the origins of behaviors. We have physics, materialism, and philosophy to suggest the lack of dualistic free will, which completely alters the way we should view crime and punishment. And for the unknown unknowns, we have modern understandings of statistics and risk analysis coupled with the scientific method. Bayes' theorem was developed before the founding of the USA[0], and yet still, 250 years later, is not well incorporated into law and political strategy. So maybe what really drives people hasn't changed, but our understanding thereof really, really has. A lot. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayes'_theorem#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayes'_theorem#History
    - ameister14 11y ago
      Just on the philosophy point - Materialism as a philosophical subject was developed well before 1779, and was a major argument during the enlightenment so would have been understood by a lot of the constitutional convention.

nitrogen 11y ago

The main drivers of human action remain the same. Scientific (and to a lesser degree, philosophical) understanding of these drivers has changed significantly, though. Further, the breadth of actions available has increased dramatically with technology, and as such it is reasonable to revisit some of the decisions made 200+ years ago from time to time.

bcook 11y ago
I agree, but I think your position excludes the existance of "unknown unknowns". What really drives us?
- nitrogen 11y ago
  I think it's enough that we have more "known knowns" now than 200 years ago. We have an insane amount of knowledge that wasn't available then. We have neurology, neurochemistry, neuropsychology, etc. to help us understand human motivations and behaviors. We have evolution to explain human origins, and evolutionary psychology, while very much in its early stages, to identify the origins of behaviors. We have physics, materialism, and philosophy to suggest the lack of dualistic free will, which completely alters the way we should view crime and punishment. And for the unknown unknowns, we have modern understandings of statistics and risk analysis coupled with the scientific method. Bayes' theorem was developed before the founding of the USA[0], and yet still, 250 years later, is not well incorporated into law and political strategy. So maybe what really drives people hasn't changed, but our understanding thereof really, really has. A lot. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayes'_theorem#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayes'_theorem#History
  - ameister14 11y ago
    Just on the philosophy point - Materialism as a philosophical subject was developed well before 1779, and was a major argument during the enlightenment so would have been understood by a lot of the constitutional convention.