5 ms·

Ask HN: What's your most controversial or contrarian idea to improve the world?

13 points by gamechangr 8y ago

tonyedgecombe 8y ago
Corporations shouldn't pay tax, people should.
jotjotzzz 8y ago
Design with the earth in mind (environmental sustainability), and that food and products must be thought of from creation, delivery (less carbon footprint), to end-of-life cycle (eco-friendly/green packaging waste) in a way that is good for the earth. This should be law. I often feel bad when I open a package and see extraneous crap that will just be thrown out. Our garbage will outlive us all. There is no need for that!
HiroshiSan 8y ago
Just wanna plug Peter Thiel's book Zero to One as it's based around a similar question.
mindcrime 8y ago
Eliminate governments (as we know them today) and move to a stateless society[1] with an individualist anarchist[2] style of self-government[3]. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stateless_society https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stateless_society [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Individualist_anarchism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Individualist_anarchism [3]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-governance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-governance
- kleer001 8y ago
  Personally I'd love it, but in general most people are essentially spiteful and lazy and won't self govern unless you force them, which defeats the whole purpose. This article gets into it: https://mystudentvoices.com/fyodor-dostoevsky-on-the-irrationality-of-people-and-the-futility-of-utopianism-e7c651a64e5f https://mystudentvoices.com/fyodor-dostoevsky-on-the-irratio...
  - gamechangr 8y ago
    I would like to see a city where there is way less government. I picture a city in the desert like a new Las Vegas that had government backing as an experiment.
arunmp 8y ago
Elect a government for the world through universal adult franchise and make all the countries subservient to the world government.
hindsightbias 8y ago
Take computers out of the classroom. Adopt a classical Greek curriculum until maybe High School.
antoinevg 8y ago
All laws should include the reason for why they were made.
- kleer001 8y ago
  All laws should have fail conditions under which they are considered null and void. Every law should be written in simple language and take up no more than a 10 typed pages, 2,500 words.
- mindcrime 8y ago
  If we're going to continue to have "governments" and "laws" as such, then I'd propose that all (or most) laws should have an expiration date, and should require renewal on some periodic basis. This would limit the impact of bad laws, by making it easier to get them off the books (since now there are two options: explicit repeal, or quiet expiration).
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
DoreenMichele 8y ago
Nutrition and lifestyle should be our first line of defense for health issues. It seems like that shouldn't be controversial, but it apparently is. See, for example, this comment that is downvoted and rebutted: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18270736 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18270736 Expecting a billionaire to pursue a good solution is crazy talk? Because it's too hard for a billionaire?
kleer001 8y ago
Increase foreign exchange student programs by 10,000 times, with subsidies for low income children. Introduce broad city/county/state student exchange programs.
archenemy 8y ago
For any kind of work that takes place in an office (as opposed to manufacturing or services), the default should be remoting instead of commuting to that awful places.
fiedzia 8y ago
Control population to have less people.
piocho 8y ago
Stop using most of the smartthings. Most of them are totally useless.
- buboard 8y ago
  what to do instead? A lot of civil society predicated on keeping crowds occupied.
  - piocho 8y ago
    First, I deeply think that "world" (but first, your family/friends life) will be improved with a real social life and not only with consumer goods. By social life I'm not speaking of sharing the last meal you eat on instagram or sharing your last training you've made with your connected watch :) There are plenty things to do : go outside, meet people, read books (i'm not saying that there are only good books and boring articles on internet, but just disconnect from the phone/computer/smartthings), play with your kids instead of giving them a connected ipad or phone, help others, and so on.
zzo38computer 8y ago
Abolish copyright and patents. Many other laws also can be reduced, to have more freedom. It isn't anarchy, but minarchy, which is minimal law system. Some law is still needed, such as environmental protection, and a few others. But, no world government; instead you can have separate governments but freely to move between them instead of being blocked everywhere by the border.
buboard 8y ago
eliminate barriers to genetic engineering of humans remove all borders and switch to governance that is not based on physical proximity but shared ideas/values through online collaboration.
steven_noble 8y ago
Decriminalise all drugs. Not just on the demand side (purchase/use of drugs) but also on the supply side (manufacture/sale of drugs). The goal would be to decimimate the drug syndicates that hold entire communities to randsom under regimes that are no less brutal than Isis. They use terror to control a lucrative illegal trade. Instead of making these drugs illegal, strongly discourage their use with policies like the successful measures that Australian governments have taken to discourage the use of tobacco and addictive prescription drugs and the successful measures that Portuguese governments have taken to help the users of street drugs to put their lives back together.
Regardsyjc 8y ago
I'm launching a physical consumer product, reusable cloth pads, but I'm going to open source the pattern so people can make it for free too if they'd like. My main goal is to fight period poverty so my thought process is that I didn't want to limit my product to only people that could afford it- and the numbers were not adding up to build a one for one model, so I decided that maybe open sourcing the pattern at the same time might be the easiest and simplest, occam's razor solution. I plan on trying to disrupt by releasing an open source pattern with each product. I think people deserve the right to choose and that the knowledge for basic things like taking care of yourself as a woman or making your own underwear if you want to should be free.
gamechangr 8y ago
Regulate freedom of choice in food like they do drugs. Set a standard of what is accepted. (like maybe it's only legal sell a hamburger that has 500 calories or less). People are literally killing themselves with bad food choices (like diabetes) and then asking society to pay their medical bills.
tomjen3 8y ago
Don't. People who have set out to fix the world in grand terms have resulted in the 20th century regimens of Hitler, Stalin and Mao. Setting out to make our own life a little better through capitalism has resulted in a world that is much, much closer to ending poverty[0], eradicating polio[1] and just outright a better world. [0] https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/poverty/ https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/poverty/ [1] http://www.who.int/features/factfiles/polio/en/ http://www.who.int/features/factfiles/polio/en/

13 points by gamechangr 8y ago

Corporations shouldn't pay tax, people should.

Design with the earth in mind (environmental sustainability), and that food and products must be thought of from creation, delivery (less carbon footprint), to end-of-life cycle (eco-friendly/green packaging waste) in a way that is good for the earth. This should be law. I often feel bad when I open a package and see extraneous crap that will just be thrown out. Our garbage will outlive us all. There is no need for that!

HiroshiSan 8y ago

Just wanna plug Peter Thiel's book Zero to One as it's based around a similar question.

mindcrime 8y ago

Eliminate governments (as we know them today) and move to a stateless society[1] with an individualist anarchist[2] style of self-government[3]. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stateless_society https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stateless_society [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Individualist_anarchism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Individualist_anarchism [3]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-governance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-governance

kleer001 8y ago
Personally I'd love it, but in general most people are essentially spiteful and lazy and won't self govern unless you force them, which defeats the whole purpose. This article gets into it: https://mystudentvoices.com/fyodor-dostoevsky-on-the-irrationality-of-people-and-the-futility-of-utopianism-e7c651a64e5f https://mystudentvoices.com/fyodor-dostoevsky-on-the-irratio...
- gamechangr 8y ago
  I would like to see a city where there is way less government. I picture a city in the desert like a new Las Vegas that had government backing as an experiment.

arunmp 8y ago

Elect a government for the world through universal adult franchise and make all the countries subservient to the world government.

hindsightbias 8y ago

Take computers out of the classroom. Adopt a classical Greek curriculum until maybe High School.

antoinevg 8y ago

All laws should include the reason for why they were made.

kleer001 8y ago
All laws should have fail conditions under which they are considered null and void. Every law should be written in simple language and take up no more than a 10 typed pages, 2,500 words.
mindcrime 8y ago
If we're going to continue to have "governments" and "laws" as such, then I'd propose that all (or most) laws should have an expiration date, and should require renewal on some periodic basis. This would limit the impact of bad laws, by making it easier to get them off the books (since now there are two options: explicit repeal, or quiet expiration).
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]

DoreenMichele 8y ago

Nutrition and lifestyle should be our first line of defense for health issues. It seems like that shouldn't be controversial, but it apparently is. See, for example, this comment that is downvoted and rebutted: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18270736 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18270736 Expecting a billionaire to pursue a good solution is crazy talk? Because it's too hard for a billionaire?

kleer001 8y ago

Increase foreign exchange student programs by 10,000 times, with subsidies for low income children. Introduce broad city/county/state student exchange programs.

archenemy 8y ago

For any kind of work that takes place in an office (as opposed to manufacturing or services), the default should be remoting instead of commuting to that awful places.

fiedzia 8y ago

Control population to have less people.

piocho 8y ago

Stop using most of the smartthings. Most of them are totally useless.

buboard 8y ago
what to do instead? A lot of civil society predicated on keeping crowds occupied.
- piocho 8y ago
  First, I deeply think that "world" (but first, your family/friends life) will be improved with a real social life and not only with consumer goods. By social life I'm not speaking of sharing the last meal you eat on instagram or sharing your last training you've made with your connected watch :) There are plenty things to do : go outside, meet people, read books (i'm not saying that there are only good books and boring articles on internet, but just disconnect from the phone/computer/smartthings), play with your kids instead of giving them a connected ipad or phone, help others, and so on.

zzo38computer 8y ago

Abolish copyright and patents. Many other laws also can be reduced, to have more freedom. It isn't anarchy, but minarchy, which is minimal law system. Some law is still needed, such as environmental protection, and a few others. But, no world government; instead you can have separate governments but freely to move between them instead of being blocked everywhere by the border.

buboard 8y ago

eliminate barriers to genetic engineering of humans remove all borders and switch to governance that is not based on physical proximity but shared ideas/values through online collaboration.

steven_noble 8y ago

Decriminalise all drugs. Not just on the demand side (purchase/use of drugs) but also on the supply side (manufacture/sale of drugs). The goal would be to decimimate the drug syndicates that hold entire communities to randsom under regimes that are no less brutal than Isis. They use terror to control a lucrative illegal trade. Instead of making these drugs illegal, strongly discourage their use with policies like the successful measures that Australian governments have taken to discourage the use of tobacco and addictive prescription drugs and the successful measures that Portuguese governments have taken to help the users of street drugs to put their lives back together.

Regardsyjc 8y ago

I'm launching a physical consumer product, reusable cloth pads, but I'm going to open source the pattern so people can make it for free too if they'd like. My main goal is to fight period poverty so my thought process is that I didn't want to limit my product to only people that could afford it- and the numbers were not adding up to build a one for one model, so I decided that maybe open sourcing the pattern at the same time might be the easiest and simplest, occam's razor solution. I plan on trying to disrupt by releasing an open source pattern with each product. I think people deserve the right to choose and that the knowledge for basic things like taking care of yourself as a woman or making your own underwear if you want to should be free.

gamechangr 8y ago

Regulate freedom of choice in food like they do drugs. Set a standard of what is accepted. (like maybe it's only legal sell a hamburger that has 500 calories or less). People are literally killing themselves with bad food choices (like diabetes) and then asking society to pay their medical bills.

tomjen3 8y ago

Don't. People who have set out to fix the world in grand terms have resulted in the 20th century regimens of Hitler, Stalin and Mao. Setting out to make our own life a little better through capitalism has resulted in a world that is much, much closer to ending poverty[0], eradicating polio[1] and just outright a better world. [0] https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/poverty/ https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/poverty/ [1] http://www.who.int/features/factfiles/polio/en/ http://www.who.int/features/factfiles/polio/en/