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Although I appreciate the thought and attention that goes into articles written for LessWrong, the language is often difficult to unpack. Take the term "Pareto
by Gianteye 16y ago
Although I appreciate the thought and attention that goes into articles written for LessWrong, the language is often difficult to unpack.
Take the term "Pareto-efficient society" used in the first paragraph. This is a term I'm incredibly unfamiliar with. A link to a definition or an article on it would have been useful. After doing my dutiful research on wikipedia, I found that the definition means more or less "a society in which it is impossible to make one person better off without necessarily making someone else worse off." This definition is analogous to "zero sum society." So, the fourth sentence of the first paragraph reads "this bias [thinking that it is impossible to make one person better off without necessarily making someone else worse off] is the major obstacle to a society in which it is impossible to make one person better off without necessarily making someone else worse off."
Buh?
I support a lot of the concepts behind LessWrong, but all of the articles read like Critical Theory midterm essays.
- sprout 16y agoGo back for a moment to Pareto-efficiency. What that means is that you're looking for a move which benefits yourself without harming anyone else. A Pareto-efficient society is a society in which no such moves exist; we have the optimal wealth available. If you want more wealth, you have to take it from someone else. So naturally, if you mistakenly believe we live in a Pareto-efficient society ( I doubt anyone would agree ) it makes it very difficult to actually create a Pareto-efficient society. It's all rather Utopian, but generally I like the sentiment. Though I'd rather believe that Pareto-efficiency is unobtainable and we can always create more wealth.
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]