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It's true, but despite that I think they are plausibly in the ballpark of a useful idea. I'm anti-UBI. I've been open about that for years. I would like to br

It's true, but despite that I think they are plausibly in the ballpark of a useful idea. I'm anti-UBI. I've been open about that for years. I would like to bring back SROs* in walkable, mixed-used neighborhoods and improve public transit and cycling infrastructure, and make food stamps more or less a "You want them? Just ask." kind of thing. I think if we had sufficiently cheap housing where you could comfortably live without a car and you could be guaranteed to eat, that would be a better means to provide the social stability and social mobility that UBI proponents seem to be shooting for with what is, in my opinion, a thoroughly broken mental model for a long list of reasons. There are already programs to grant "geniuses" money. I'm cool with that. Those programs generally seem to have a thorough selection process, something this article very much lacks. If you are picking "the best of the best" from Harvard to give money to, you already know just about anyone at Harvard will do something useful with that money and not spend it on the oft joked about "hookers and cocaine" that some lottery winners more or less actually do spend their money on. We are awash in vast societal wealth. We need to find better ways to put in a floor for "everybody" (while recognizing that no matter what you do, some people will be "problem children" and you will need to find ways to cut them out so as to try to force them to behave) while making sure we aren't destroying society in the process. I do not believe this idea of just passing out cash for supposed "genius" based on IQ tests has any merit at all. The historical examples cited in the article as things that worked well for that place and time were not examples of passing out cash for "smarts." It was passing out cash to smart people who did things. Yes, on the one hand, people gotta eat and yadda. On the other hand, there is the Duke Nukem Forever phenomenon where seemingly endless cash meant that they didn't ship until the company was nearly broke again. Money can be very useful stuff. Lots of problems don't budge merely because you throw money at them. * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_room_occupancy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_room_occupancy Isn't it weird that we complain endlessly about poor results, and yet hardly anyone has strong feelings about doing things differently (if not outright scoff at the very idea)? I've read your posts for many years, please tell me that you can see this phenomenon all around us? I don't actually understand what you are asking. You would need to clarify.

mistermann 4y ago
> I would like to bring back SROs* in walkable, mixed-used neighborhoods and improve public transit and cycling infrastructure, and make food stamps more or less a "You want them? Just ask." kind of thing. I think if we had sufficiently cheap housing where you could comfortably live without a car and you could be guaranteed to eat, that would be a better means to provide the social stability and social mobility that UBI proponents seem to be shooting for with what is, in my opinion, a thoroughly broken mental model for a long list of reasons. Ya, I am a HUGE fan of reconsidering fundamentals. Have you ever noticed that almost no one considers the current way we do things to be immutable, as if it had been passed down from God himself? Like when people are talking about what we should do about homeless people, and how we can't house them because that would cost too much money.....like, might it be possible that there's something in between sleeping on the sidewalk and a condo? If we were to look around the world or even in our own history, might we notice that there is a broad spectrum of forms of housing? This very simple principle applies everywhere - I swear, it seems to me like I live on a planet of walking zombies with a thin layer of personality over top. If people just arrived here on Earth (but with the same computational horsepower), do you think everyone would find things as acceptable and non-batshit-insane as they do now, after slowly simmering in this insane broth for an entire lifetime? > There are already programs to grant "geniuses" money. I'm cool with that. Those programs generally seem to have a thorough selection process, something this article very much lacks. And what do they produce: more of the same, well within the boundaries of the Overton Window. > We are awash in vast societal wealth. We need to find better ways to put in a floor for "everybody" (while recognizing that no matter what you do, some people will be "problem children" and you will need to find ways to cut them out so as to try to force them to behave) while making sure we aren't destroying society in the process. You should come visit Canada - here, we "are" "better" than the Americans with their small-minded selfishness....meanwhile, our super duper "free" medical system is falling apart, people are dying in hallways waiting for treatment, tent cities are now common across the country, and so forth and so on. Simultaneously, 30% or so of the population have become (multi-)millionaires based on being in the right place at the right time: buying real estate. And the kicker: no capital gains tax for one's primary residence - that is considered craaaaaaaazy to both rich and poor, whereas having to kick 40% of your hard earned income into the kitty is "just common sense, thou shalt not question it". > I don't actually understand what you are asking. You would need to clarify. As far as I can tell: not only do humans have near zero self-awareness, they have an extremely strong aversion to the very notion. I believe things are much worse than they appear on the surface - were it not for the boosts we've enjoyed from science, engineering, plentiful commodities (a state of affairs that is not guaranteed), and formerly "ok" leadership, I think we'd be much more fucked than we are....a situation that I believe we are going to see start to seriously manifest in the next few decades, if not sooner. I would not be surprised if things started unravelling even in the next few years.

mistermann 4y ago

> I would like to bring back SROs* in walkable, mixed-used neighborhoods and improve public transit and cycling infrastructure, and make food stamps more or less a "You want them? Just ask." kind of thing. I think if we had sufficiently cheap housing where you could comfortably live without a car and you could be guaranteed to eat, that would be a better means to provide the social stability and social mobility that UBI proponents seem to be shooting for with what is, in my opinion, a thoroughly broken mental model for a long list of reasons. Ya, I am a HUGE fan of reconsidering fundamentals. Have you ever noticed that almost no one considers the current way we do things to be immutable, as if it had been passed down from God himself? Like when people are talking about what we should do about homeless people, and how we can't house them because that would cost too much money.....like, might it be possible that there's something in between sleeping on the sidewalk and a condo? If we were to look around the world or even in our own history, might we notice that there is a broad spectrum of forms of housing? This very simple principle applies everywhere - I swear, it seems to me like I live on a planet of walking zombies with a thin layer of personality over top. If people just arrived here on Earth (but with the same computational horsepower), do you think everyone would find things as acceptable and non-batshit-insane as they do now, after slowly simmering in this insane broth for an entire lifetime? > There are already programs to grant "geniuses" money. I'm cool with that. Those programs generally seem to have a thorough selection process, something this article very much lacks. And what do they produce: more of the same, well within the boundaries of the Overton Window. > We are awash in vast societal wealth. We need to find better ways to put in a floor for "everybody" (while recognizing that no matter what you do, some people will be "problem children" and you will need to find ways to cut them out so as to try to force them to behave) while making sure we aren't destroying society in the process. You should come visit Canada - here, we "are" "better" than the Americans with their small-minded selfishness....meanwhile, our super duper "free" medical system is falling apart, people are dying in hallways waiting for treatment, tent cities are now common across the country, and so forth and so on. Simultaneously, 30% or so of the population have become (multi-)millionaires based on being in the right place at the right time: buying real estate. And the kicker: no capital gains tax for one's primary residence - that is considered craaaaaaaazy to both rich and poor, whereas having to kick 40% of your hard earned income into the kitty is "just common sense, thou shalt not question it". > I don't actually understand what you are asking. You would need to clarify. As far as I can tell: not only do humans have near zero self-awareness, they have an extremely strong aversion to the very notion. I believe things are much worse than they appear on the surface - were it not for the boosts we've enjoyed from science, engineering, plentiful commodities (a state of affairs that is not guaranteed), and formerly "ok" leadership, I think we'd be much more fucked than we are....a situation that I believe we are going to see start to seriously manifest in the next few decades, if not sooner. I would not be surprised if things started unravelling even in the next few years.