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There is a cure that works 100%. Its called diversification of collective stupidity risk. Never let empires grow too large. Whenever you hear / see something i

There is a cure that works 100%. Its called diversification of collective stupidity risk. Never let empires grow too large. Whenever you hear / see something is "scaling" throw a spanner in the works, pull the plug, burn a fuse. No questions asked, no justifications provided, no evaluation of good or evil, just an automatic breaker that is based on "N", the scaling unit. Having lots of little emperunculi running around with no clothes is fun and it doesn't put us all in great, potentially existential, danger

mostertoaster 5y ago
Yeah maybe instead of big nation, we could divide into like 50 sovereign states. Those could be divided up into smaller counties, and those into cities. Then each could democratically decide what is best for themselves. Nah that’s crazy. It’s better to have 49% of a nation be unhappy with things, even in cities where 80% think one way, they must do what the 20% want because at the national level that 20% is the 51%.
- SyzygistSix 5y ago
  Unfortunately in my state, the party of small government does not like cities deciding what to do for themselves and has taken away a lot of our city's power to make rules for itself. I for one am in favor of the kind of division you mention, for precisely the reasons you mention. But some people are not happy just deciding things for themselves. They are only happy when they also can decide for others. Lots of people from all walks of life and government like this.
- streamofdigits 5y ago
  If it wasnt obvious, the pandemic demonstrated beyond any doubt that the distribution of decision making power in society is completely broken. The nation-state in particular is way too dominant and distorting, especially when you have a bunch of self-absorbed "meta-nations" Think about governance as a spectrum, we need it to be more flatly distributed, from the smallest unit (neighborhood dealing with local issues) to the largest (United Nations dealing with collective threats)
  - texuf 5y ago
    “media-nations”
  - dash2 5y ago
    Surely the pandemic showed the advantage of the centralized nation-state. It could take into account externalities, like vaccination benefiting others, and use its power to keep everyone safer. Decentralized decision-making led to e.g. some states in the US deciding not to lockdown and having higher disease rates, which then put the whole country at risk.
    - version_five 5y ago
      You've missed the point entirely of the parable and the parent comments. Even if you like the way something worked out (or pretend to for the reasons discussed) bring subject to large scale collective decisions in a single state leaves one completely vulnerable to bad decisions being made. The solution is to insulate people from the whims of collective thinking though strong protections of individual liberty. You can't have it both ways, where you can force people to act a certain way when you agree with it, but are free to not do things you disagree with. It amazes me how many people ignore this.
      - dash2 5y ago
        I wrote the parable, at least this version of it. I hope I haven't missed its point entirely. We can't avoid being subject to large-scale collective decisions. Humans can't live in hunter-gatherer bands any more. The individualist US, just like collectivist Sweden, spends large amounts on public goods via its government. Even in an anarcho-capitalist utopia, large firms and other collective bodies would emerge, and would have to coordinate upon collective decisions.
        version_five 5y ago
        > I wrote the parable, at least this version of it. I hope I haven't missed its point entirely Haha I obviously didn't catch this. I guess then I missed your point. Between your essay and the parent comments, my takeaway is about the danger of enforcing collective decisions on everyone, because even if everyone says they agree, they can still all be delusional, or at least just too scared to speak out.
- bwanab 5y ago
  It already exists - it’s called Switzerland.
- mkka 5y ago
  This is where I always plug Infomacracy by Malka Older. Micro democracy with all voting blocks the same population size, can switch party/state.
- AlexCoventry 5y ago
  How would that work geopolitically? How would all those tiny nation states defend themselves against behemoths like the Russian Federation and the PRC?
  - xyzzy123 5y ago
    Perhaps they could be united in some way for defense while preserving localised governance.
    - EdwardDiego 5y ago
      You could call it the North American Treaty Organisation, or something.
      - CRConrad 5y ago
        Or if you include nation-states across the sea, North Atlantic Treaty Organisation or something.
version_five 5y ago
I think this is the point of the story of Babel. And I also think that social media had kind of short-circuited the benefits of having our opinions/orthodoxy/norms more localized (I mean geographically, culturally, linguistically, etc) and led to, as you say, much greater danger or the whole world being able to coordinate on delusions.
jollybean 5y ago
Economies of scale are real, this is not even controversial. Stopping things from growing arbitrarily is not a strategy of any kind.
- streamofdigits 5y ago
  economies of scale are "real" until their risks vastly outweigh the benefits - which always happens at some level of concentration. Habitually embedding attenuation in any system we develop (social, political, financial etc) is likely the only generally applicable risk management strategy. The only one that does not require detailed, correct prior knowledge about a system and timely application Detailed knowledge and just-in-time application is great in theory - its just not a real-life strategy of any kind...
hbarka 5y ago
This is why I love the hacker news

mostertoaster 5y ago

Yeah maybe instead of big nation, we could divide into like 50 sovereign states. Those could be divided up into smaller counties, and those into cities. Then each could democratically decide what is best for themselves. Nah that’s crazy. It’s better to have 49% of a nation be unhappy with things, even in cities where 80% think one way, they must do what the 20% want because at the national level that 20% is the 51%.

SyzygistSix 5y ago
Unfortunately in my state, the party of small government does not like cities deciding what to do for themselves and has taken away a lot of our city's power to make rules for itself. I for one am in favor of the kind of division you mention, for precisely the reasons you mention. But some people are not happy just deciding things for themselves. They are only happy when they also can decide for others. Lots of people from all walks of life and government like this.
streamofdigits 5y ago
If it wasnt obvious, the pandemic demonstrated beyond any doubt that the distribution of decision making power in society is completely broken. The nation-state in particular is way too dominant and distorting, especially when you have a bunch of self-absorbed "meta-nations" Think about governance as a spectrum, we need it to be more flatly distributed, from the smallest unit (neighborhood dealing with local issues) to the largest (United Nations dealing with collective threats)
- texuf 5y ago
  “media-nations”
- dash2 5y ago
  Surely the pandemic showed the advantage of the centralized nation-state. It could take into account externalities, like vaccination benefiting others, and use its power to keep everyone safer. Decentralized decision-making led to e.g. some states in the US deciding not to lockdown and having higher disease rates, which then put the whole country at risk.
  - version_five 5y ago
    You've missed the point entirely of the parable and the parent comments. Even if you like the way something worked out (or pretend to for the reasons discussed) bring subject to large scale collective decisions in a single state leaves one completely vulnerable to bad decisions being made. The solution is to insulate people from the whims of collective thinking though strong protections of individual liberty. You can't have it both ways, where you can force people to act a certain way when you agree with it, but are free to not do things you disagree with. It amazes me how many people ignore this.
    - dash2 5y ago
      I wrote the parable, at least this version of it. I hope I haven't missed its point entirely. We can't avoid being subject to large-scale collective decisions. Humans can't live in hunter-gatherer bands any more. The individualist US, just like collectivist Sweden, spends large amounts on public goods via its government. Even in an anarcho-capitalist utopia, large firms and other collective bodies would emerge, and would have to coordinate upon collective decisions.
      - version_five 5y ago
        > I wrote the parable, at least this version of it. I hope I haven't missed its point entirely Haha I obviously didn't catch this. I guess then I missed your point. Between your essay and the parent comments, my takeaway is about the danger of enforcing collective decisions on everyone, because even if everyone says they agree, they can still all be delusional, or at least just too scared to speak out.
bwanab 5y ago
It already exists - it’s called Switzerland.
mkka 5y ago
This is where I always plug Infomacracy by Malka Older. Micro democracy with all voting blocks the same population size, can switch party/state.
AlexCoventry 5y ago
How would that work geopolitically? How would all those tiny nation states defend themselves against behemoths like the Russian Federation and the PRC?
- xyzzy123 5y ago
  Perhaps they could be united in some way for defense while preserving localised governance.
  - EdwardDiego 5y ago
    You could call it the North American Treaty Organisation, or something.
    - CRConrad 5y ago
      Or if you include nation-states across the sea, North Atlantic Treaty Organisation or something.

version_five 5y ago

I think this is the point of the story of Babel. And I also think that social media had kind of short-circuited the benefits of having our opinions/orthodoxy/norms more localized (I mean geographically, culturally, linguistically, etc) and led to, as you say, much greater danger or the whole world being able to coordinate on delusions.

jollybean 5y ago

Economies of scale are real, this is not even controversial. Stopping things from growing arbitrarily is not a strategy of any kind.

streamofdigits 5y ago
economies of scale are "real" until their risks vastly outweigh the benefits - which always happens at some level of concentration. Habitually embedding attenuation in any system we develop (social, political, financial etc) is likely the only generally applicable risk management strategy. The only one that does not require detailed, correct prior knowledge about a system and timely application Detailed knowledge and just-in-time application is great in theory - its just not a real-life strategy of any kind...

hbarka 5y ago

This is why I love the hacker news