5 ms·

Paradise Possible

47 points by Petiver 9y ago

mswen 9y ago
A well written essay and review. A few musings of my own. Discovery has improved greatly. Even if my set of beliefs, values and preferences are quite rare I can still use the internet and related technology to discover other like-minded people. Outcasts and eccentrics more easily find that they are not quiet as alone in the world as their face-to-face experience would lead them to believe. The outsiders can find those with whom they can be insiders. Social media and all forms of modern communication technology enable a form of community without requiring geographical proximity. But is this sufficient? Dispersed, technologically connected communities of like-mindedness still feel hollow to me compared to villages and communities of people living together in a communal way, face-to-face, sharing tragedies and triumphs and the very human basics of sex, companionship and some form of family. How is the instinct toward Utopia changing? What new forms of Utopian experiments are possible today that were not in previous generations?
- TeMPOraL 9y ago
  Related to your observations is a vision of utopia I particularly like, called "Archipelago", by Scott Alexander[0]. The TL;DR of it, as I understand it, is: - people are free to form and move between physical communities as they like - there's a single central entity that does following: a) enforces and protects the freedom of association and freedom of movement, b) ensures, with overwhelming force, that no community starts a war against another, c) handles various practical details like economic issues of the type "what if someone from community A moves to community B in order to take their free education, and then moves back to A without ever contributing to B's economy?". The gist of the expected outcome is summarized by the last sentence of the linked article: "the end result is that the closer you come to true freedom of association, the closer you get to a world where everyone is a member of more or less the community they deserve". -- [0] - http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/06/07/archipelago-and-atomic-communitarianism/ http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/06/07/archipelago-and-atomic-...
Ygg2 9y ago
Problem with Utopia is simple. One man's Utopia is another man's Dystopia. There doesn't exist a way that will satisfy everyone's wishes.
- TeMPOraL 9y ago
  The problem with utopias we know is that they're... boring. 'Eliezer wrote a lot of interesting things on the topic - [0][1]. > There doesn't exist a way that will satisfy everyone's wishes. I disagree with that in terms of theoretical possibility. In practice, of course it's not possible now (or in nearby future). But in practice, our world is so, so far from a theoretical utopia that we still have a lot of space for improvements without causing too much disagreements. It's also true we can't satisfy everyone, because some people harbour desires inherently incompatible with desires of the rest of humanity - I'm thinking of various sociopathic tendencies - but they form but a very small minority, and frankly, their needs have to be accepted as not irreconcilable and ignored. -- [0] - https://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Fun_theory https://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Fun_theory - a general summary of the post sequence. [1] - https://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/The_Fun_Theory_Sequence https://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/The_Fun_Theory_Sequence - the actual posts.
  - davidivadavid 9y ago
    The fun theory sequence is cool, and I think it's also useful as a mental model to create better products.
  - yourapostasy 9y ago
    > I'm thinking of various sociopathic tendencies... This is a difficult, multi-faceted challenge to address. This behavior is rampant in the world, and IMHO it is only getting worse at the moment. Up until relatively recently, the US and some developed nations tended to express less of this than the rest of the world, so I suspect overall relative wealth, maybe even lower inequality, spread across a tremendous sector of the population can ameliorate the tendency. Concrete examples are the product return policies that in the past I observe tended to be fairly generous and could only be commonly found in the US and some developed nations' marketplaces. These policies are tightening up and in some cases dropped altogether. There is a cultural element at play as well, complicating the picture.
ilaksh 9y ago
I believe we should rethink core technologies of our civilization such as money from base requirements with a high-tech perspective. This does not mean getting rid of money. It means upgrading it and augmenting it with other technologies. We need to integrate into society structures and technologies that not only allow us to measure, analyze, and when necessary, work together, more holistically, but at the same time need systems that are more decentralized, resilient against over-centralization, and evolve more freely. It seems on the surface that these are just opposed, but by taking a ground-up approach, doing enough experimenting and iteration, and leaning on our newer technologies, I do believe we can make dramatic improvements to society.

47 points by Petiver 9y ago

A well written essay and review. A few musings of my own. Discovery has improved greatly. Even if my set of beliefs, values and preferences are quite rare I can still use the internet and related technology to discover other like-minded people. Outcasts and eccentrics more easily find that they are not quiet as alone in the world as their face-to-face experience would lead them to believe. The outsiders can find those with whom they can be insiders. Social media and all forms of modern communication technology enable a form of community without requiring geographical proximity. But is this sufficient? Dispersed, technologically connected communities of like-mindedness still feel hollow to me compared to villages and communities of people living together in a communal way, face-to-face, sharing tragedies and triumphs and the very human basics of sex, companionship and some form of family. How is the instinct toward Utopia changing? What new forms of Utopian experiments are possible today that were not in previous generations?

TeMPOraL 9y ago
Related to your observations is a vision of utopia I particularly like, called "Archipelago", by Scott Alexander[0]. The TL;DR of it, as I understand it, is: - people are free to form and move between physical communities as they like - there's a single central entity that does following: a) enforces and protects the freedom of association and freedom of movement, b) ensures, with overwhelming force, that no community starts a war against another, c) handles various practical details like economic issues of the type "what if someone from community A moves to community B in order to take their free education, and then moves back to A without ever contributing to B's economy?". The gist of the expected outcome is summarized by the last sentence of the linked article: "the end result is that the closer you come to true freedom of association, the closer you get to a world where everyone is a member of more or less the community they deserve". -- [0] - http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/06/07/archipelago-and-atomic-communitarianism/ http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/06/07/archipelago-and-atomic-...

Ygg2 9y ago

Problem with Utopia is simple. One man's Utopia is another man's Dystopia. There doesn't exist a way that will satisfy everyone's wishes.

TeMPOraL 9y ago
The problem with utopias we know is that they're... boring. 'Eliezer wrote a lot of interesting things on the topic - [0][1]. > There doesn't exist a way that will satisfy everyone's wishes. I disagree with that in terms of theoretical possibility. In practice, of course it's not possible now (or in nearby future). But in practice, our world is so, so far from a theoretical utopia that we still have a lot of space for improvements without causing too much disagreements. It's also true we can't satisfy everyone, because some people harbour desires inherently incompatible with desires of the rest of humanity - I'm thinking of various sociopathic tendencies - but they form but a very small minority, and frankly, their needs have to be accepted as not irreconcilable and ignored. -- [0] - https://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Fun_theory https://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Fun_theory - a general summary of the post sequence. [1] - https://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/The_Fun_Theory_Sequence https://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/The_Fun_Theory_Sequence - the actual posts.
- davidivadavid 9y ago
  The fun theory sequence is cool, and I think it's also useful as a mental model to create better products.
- yourapostasy 9y ago
  > I'm thinking of various sociopathic tendencies... This is a difficult, multi-faceted challenge to address. This behavior is rampant in the world, and IMHO it is only getting worse at the moment. Up until relatively recently, the US and some developed nations tended to express less of this than the rest of the world, so I suspect overall relative wealth, maybe even lower inequality, spread across a tremendous sector of the population can ameliorate the tendency. Concrete examples are the product return policies that in the past I observe tended to be fairly generous and could only be commonly found in the US and some developed nations' marketplaces. These policies are tightening up and in some cases dropped altogether. There is a cultural element at play as well, complicating the picture.

ilaksh 9y ago

I believe we should rethink core technologies of our civilization such as money from base requirements with a high-tech perspective. This does not mean getting rid of money. It means upgrading it and augmenting it with other technologies. We need to integrate into society structures and technologies that not only allow us to measure, analyze, and when necessary, work together, more holistically, but at the same time need systems that are more decentralized, resilient against over-centralization, and evolve more freely. It seems on the surface that these are just opposed, but by taking a ground-up approach, doing enough experimenting and iteration, and leaning on our newer technologies, I do believe we can make dramatic improvements to society.