5 ms·

Whilst it's true that there are a lot more rules, there are areas that have been largely without them (crypto comes to mind), and outcomes are still often not s

Whilst it's true that there are a lot more rules, there are areas that have been largely without them (crypto comes to mind), and outcomes are still often not so good. With as many people as there are on this Earth, packed as densely as they are, there are increasing amounts of commons, and also increasing numbers of tragedies occurring in these myriad commons as well. I'm not sure getting things done for the sake of it is desirable if it means we have an ocean of copy-pasted apartment buildings like Hong Kong, or unprofitable bullet trains running empty like China, or asbestos products or other things. The notion that we must “move fast and break hearts" on failed ideas is kind of fanciful, because in practice in society we don't often have a clear figure elected to do that; we don't live in a dictatorship where a flick of a finger can end a project after all. Councils and groups of talkers coming together are presumably trying to perform this actual function, and I think we don't necessarily give them credit for that. Fundamentally, some of that articulate class is trying to preserve some kind of life style that they perceive is rapidly evaporating in the face of cheaply built things built purely for profit.

wahern 4y ago
> we don't live in a dictatorship where a flick of a finger can end a project after all. Sure we do: they're called planning, zoning, or environmental review boards. And process by which they operate has been engineered to make it increasingly easier to stop projects. In some states like California, any random person (they don't even need to live in the community!) has the power to stop projects for months, if not years, all but guaranteeing either failure or massive budget expenditures. Your argument is basically a Slippery Slope argument. The flaws in Slippery Slope are well known, but the mentality is so very attractive to the way humans think. See, e.g., Prospect Theory. As a community becomes wealthier, more people have more to lose, and they will predictably become ever more cautious about change--any kind of change, even change that on its face is positive and enriching. In the back of their minds they're thinking, "But what if this, or what if that, later on down the road, causes the loss of what I already have." Everything begins to look like a zero-sum game. Perhaps the only thing worse than this state of affairs is the complete opposite state of affairs, where most people are desperately poor. They have nothing to lose so they're happy to leap from radical project to radical project chasing a parade of cheap promises made by snake oil men. See, e.g., most any poor country.
- superchroma 4y ago
  Potentially, but I think we have actually slipped down a lot of these slopes at one point or another. These negative possibilities are not just hypotheticals, they are informed by actual failures. I'm not going to argue that there aren't people defending their interests selfishly in such arrangements, - there definitely is, as well. Maybe such councils should be filled with non-affiliated neutral parties that are randomly elected?
hackerlight 4y ago
"an ocean of copy-pasted apartment buildings like Hong Kong" That's an incredible way to frame place for people to live. You may find that aesthetically disgusting, that's your right, but I find the legally mandated suburbs of an expensive city to be morally disgusting given the impacts on the environment and poor people.
- superchroma 4y ago
  This isn't a discussion about housing availability. You should make a new submission about that if you want to go into that topic in depth. There are facets to this discussion that your post is glossing over; it's not a binary choice between HK style apartments or suburban sprawl.
  - hackerlight 4y ago
    I don't really accept any discussion of reducing subjective eyesores when it comes to housing. It's always used as a political weapon against housing. Someone's ability to have shelter always beats out the other person's subjective aesthetic tastes that they have no right to impose on anyone.
    - superchroma 4y ago
      I would suggest this speaks to the weight of your experiences coloring your view. It doesn't have to be this way, though, yours are just one set of lived experiences, and the systems you live in are not necessarily objectively the best ones. The issue you're discussing is that aesthetic objections are being used as a hard roadblock to progress. This suggests that aesthetic input needs to be received without them being an opportunity to derail a project if the projects is passing all other measures it has been evaluated on. It could be said that such input should have achievable criteria for success/passability without being significantly at odds with the premise of the exercise. Anyway, I would encourage you to make a new submission about it as this is a pressing and heated american issue, and it's clear that you feel strongly on the matter.

wahern 4y ago

> we don't live in a dictatorship where a flick of a finger can end a project after all. Sure we do: they're called planning, zoning, or environmental review boards. And process by which they operate has been engineered to make it increasingly easier to stop projects. In some states like California, any random person (they don't even need to live in the community!) has the power to stop projects for months, if not years, all but guaranteeing either failure or massive budget expenditures. Your argument is basically a Slippery Slope argument. The flaws in Slippery Slope are well known, but the mentality is so very attractive to the way humans think. See, e.g., Prospect Theory. As a community becomes wealthier, more people have more to lose, and they will predictably become ever more cautious about change--any kind of change, even change that on its face is positive and enriching. In the back of their minds they're thinking, "But what if this, or what if that, later on down the road, causes the loss of what I already have." Everything begins to look like a zero-sum game. Perhaps the only thing worse than this state of affairs is the complete opposite state of affairs, where most people are desperately poor. They have nothing to lose so they're happy to leap from radical project to radical project chasing a parade of cheap promises made by snake oil men. See, e.g., most any poor country.

superchroma 4y ago
Potentially, but I think we have actually slipped down a lot of these slopes at one point or another. These negative possibilities are not just hypotheticals, they are informed by actual failures. I'm not going to argue that there aren't people defending their interests selfishly in such arrangements, - there definitely is, as well. Maybe such councils should be filled with non-affiliated neutral parties that are randomly elected?

hackerlight 4y ago

"an ocean of copy-pasted apartment buildings like Hong Kong" That's an incredible way to frame place for people to live. You may find that aesthetically disgusting, that's your right, but I find the legally mandated suburbs of an expensive city to be morally disgusting given the impacts on the environment and poor people.

superchroma 4y ago
This isn't a discussion about housing availability. You should make a new submission about that if you want to go into that topic in depth. There are facets to this discussion that your post is glossing over; it's not a binary choice between HK style apartments or suburban sprawl.
- hackerlight 4y ago
  I don't really accept any discussion of reducing subjective eyesores when it comes to housing. It's always used as a political weapon against housing. Someone's ability to have shelter always beats out the other person's subjective aesthetic tastes that they have no right to impose on anyone.
  - superchroma 4y ago
    I would suggest this speaks to the weight of your experiences coloring your view. It doesn't have to be this way, though, yours are just one set of lived experiences, and the systems you live in are not necessarily objectively the best ones. The issue you're discussing is that aesthetic objections are being used as a hard roadblock to progress. This suggests that aesthetic input needs to be received without them being an opportunity to derail a project if the projects is passing all other measures it has been evaluated on. It could be said that such input should have achievable criteria for success/passability without being significantly at odds with the premise of the exercise. Anyway, I would encourage you to make a new submission about it as this is a pressing and heated american issue, and it's clear that you feel strongly on the matter.