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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.

by Ygg2 9y ago

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.
  - TeMPOraL 9y ago
    To be clear: I'm thinking of individuals and their values. Most people generally don't try to harm others, and most of the bad things they (or should I say, we) do can be explained away by pressures various systems of incentives exert on them (us). The people whose values I suggested to ignore are the few ones who think nothing of hurting others for their own gain, even when the hurt is disproportionally higher than the gains.
yourapostasy 9y ago
> One man's Utopia is another man's Dystopia. I like how the U.S. Founders tried to approximate a solution: a group of federated states, and each state's residents had the power to set up its own idea of what came close to their ideals. We eventually should have ended up with 50 separate, concurrently-running, dynamic experiments competing with each other for residents. Our current federalism prevents this from happening, though.
- gorkonsine 9y ago
  >I like how the U.S. Founders tried to approximate a solution: a group of federated states The Founders didn't design that. The colonies, started by various people or groups for differing purposes, existed long before the Founders were even alive, they just wanted to group them into a confederation for trade and mutual defense purposes. This isn't unique in history at all. >We eventually should have ended up with 50 separate, concurrently-running, dynamic experiments competing with each other for residents. Our current federalism prevents this from happening, though We tried this before, and it didn't work. Go read about the "Articles of Confederation", which governed the US before the Constitution was adopted in 1789. It was a disaster; the central government wasn't strong enough to get anything done because the colonies couldn't agree on anything. Not only was this bad for defense from outside invaders (i.e. the British), it was bad for trade because the colonies got into trade wars with each other. You're not going to have a functioning nation when the different regions are at war with each other; just look at pre-EU Europe for an example of what happens when you have a continent full of very small and diverse nations that get into trade wars with each other. It's not pretty. The other problem with your "competing states" idea is how you handle interstate commerce issues. Without a strong federal government, it's hard enough, but what happens when you have actual cities spanning multiple states, as we have with DC, NYC, Louisville, Philly, etc.? It's bad enough the way we have it now, but in your system it'd be a complete disaster.
  - mac01021 9y ago
    I don't disagree with anything you've said here, but we shouldn't think that the current system and the articles of confederation are the only two possible systems. There may be a way to transfer a significant amount of the federal government's authority to the states without incurring the sort of chaos seen by the confederacy in the 18th century. Or maybe not, but at least it's not obvious. Either way, the current system leaves most of us disenfranchised in a lot of ways that a less centralized system would not.

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.

by 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.
- TeMPOraL 9y ago
  To be clear: I'm thinking of individuals and their values. Most people generally don't try to harm others, and most of the bad things they (or should I say, we) do can be explained away by pressures various systems of incentives exert on them (us). The people whose values I suggested to ignore are the few ones who think nothing of hurting others for their own gain, even when the hurt is disproportionally higher than the gains.

yourapostasy 9y ago

> One man's Utopia is another man's Dystopia. I like how the U.S. Founders tried to approximate a solution: a group of federated states, and each state's residents had the power to set up its own idea of what came close to their ideals. We eventually should have ended up with 50 separate, concurrently-running, dynamic experiments competing with each other for residents. Our current federalism prevents this from happening, though.

gorkonsine 9y ago
>I like how the U.S. Founders tried to approximate a solution: a group of federated states The Founders didn't design that. The colonies, started by various people or groups for differing purposes, existed long before the Founders were even alive, they just wanted to group them into a confederation for trade and mutual defense purposes. This isn't unique in history at all. >We eventually should have ended up with 50 separate, concurrently-running, dynamic experiments competing with each other for residents. Our current federalism prevents this from happening, though We tried this before, and it didn't work. Go read about the "Articles of Confederation", which governed the US before the Constitution was adopted in 1789. It was a disaster; the central government wasn't strong enough to get anything done because the colonies couldn't agree on anything. Not only was this bad for defense from outside invaders (i.e. the British), it was bad for trade because the colonies got into trade wars with each other. You're not going to have a functioning nation when the different regions are at war with each other; just look at pre-EU Europe for an example of what happens when you have a continent full of very small and diverse nations that get into trade wars with each other. It's not pretty. The other problem with your "competing states" idea is how you handle interstate commerce issues. Without a strong federal government, it's hard enough, but what happens when you have actual cities spanning multiple states, as we have with DC, NYC, Louisville, Philly, etc.? It's bad enough the way we have it now, but in your system it'd be a complete disaster.
- mac01021 9y ago
  I don't disagree with anything you've said here, but we shouldn't think that the current system and the articles of confederation are the only two possible systems. There may be a way to transfer a significant amount of the federal government's authority to the states without incurring the sort of chaos seen by the confederacy in the 18th century. Or maybe not, but at least it's not obvious. Either way, the current system leaves most of us disenfranchised in a lot of ways that a less centralized system would not.