4 ms·

If this great science fiction scenario were to come to pass, I’m pretty confident that it wouldn’t be only the FDA that would be pushed to the side. The impact

by com 2y ago

If this great science fiction scenario were to come to pass, I’m pretty confident that it wouldn’t be only the FDA that would be pushed to the side. The impact of a population in an organised, technologically advanced society being one standard deviation of intelligence higher than a strategic rival population … would be immense. Even if just temporarily boosting intelligence, something like a militarised Flowers for Algernon scenario is pretty terrifying.

jiggawatts 2y ago
Someone I know pointed out that there’s a feedback effect: groups where everyone is smarter do better not just because of the first order effect but also because they can cooperate better. There’s a roughly quadratic effect on productivity. Mass enhancement of the general population would have far reaching consequences.
anovikov 2y ago
Why? It will only result in more and harder dictatorship, more direct terror and fear, and even more unhappy society. Democracy works best when people are easy to manipulate through mass media. Smart people will need to be coerced by force. Maybe in fact, to a degree this is what already happening. Superior education in China makes democratic transition next to impossible. Maybe the observation that countries with the best education tend to be authoritarian is not because "dictators are good at educating people" but other way around - because it's a natural selection and if a highly educated country tries to transition to democracy, it either ruins democracy, or education, or country itself. Any model of governance mainly solves the problem of "how to satisfy interests of the stakeholders - i.e. the elite - without ruining things"; there are many ways to ruin things (even elite itself can bring about it's own downfall), but the one everyone fears most is when people get too angry. Democracy is a good way to shift responsibility back to people itself, thus defusing this threat. But it requires people being sufficiently dumb to bite it.
- djeastm 2y ago
  >countries with the best education tend to be authoritarian On what basis are you making this claim?
- kybernetikos 2y ago
  > Democracy works best when people are easy to manipulate through mass media This is a huge statement that seems wrong to me. Democracy works best when the population are engaged and hard to manipulate. Also the "observation that countries with the best education are authoritarian" seems wrong to me too. The data I see has the top 10 entirely filled with democracies, with Singapore as the first nondemocracy coming in at 11th place. Check the economist democracy index, the correlation between democracy and education is imperfect but strong. And those are arguments based on data. There are also arguments based on logic. Authoritarianism and education are fundamentally opposed, because authoritarians hate the teaching of things that disagree with their own specific viewpoint and suppress it.
- ClumsyPilot 2y ago
  > Democracy works best when people are easy to manipulate through mass media. Smart people will need to be coerced by force. Been there done that, it’s called Russia. I don’t agree with your worldview, but if I was presented with the choice is between dumb, fake democracy and clever competent dictatorship, I might as well choose the latter. At least trains will run on time.
  - bobthepanda 2y ago
    The clever, competent dictatorship is quite rare, though.
    - dralley 2y ago
      And short-lived

by com 2y ago

jiggawatts 2y ago

Someone I know pointed out that there’s a feedback effect: groups where everyone is smarter do better not just because of the first order effect but also because they can cooperate better. There’s a roughly quadratic effect on productivity. Mass enhancement of the general population would have far reaching consequences.

anovikov 2y ago

Why? It will only result in more and harder dictatorship, more direct terror and fear, and even more unhappy society. Democracy works best when people are easy to manipulate through mass media. Smart people will need to be coerced by force. Maybe in fact, to a degree this is what already happening. Superior education in China makes democratic transition next to impossible. Maybe the observation that countries with the best education tend to be authoritarian is not because "dictators are good at educating people" but other way around - because it's a natural selection and if a highly educated country tries to transition to democracy, it either ruins democracy, or education, or country itself. Any model of governance mainly solves the problem of "how to satisfy interests of the stakeholders - i.e. the elite - without ruining things"; there are many ways to ruin things (even elite itself can bring about it's own downfall), but the one everyone fears most is when people get too angry. Democracy is a good way to shift responsibility back to people itself, thus defusing this threat. But it requires people being sufficiently dumb to bite it.

djeastm 2y ago
>countries with the best education tend to be authoritarian On what basis are you making this claim?
kybernetikos 2y ago
> Democracy works best when people are easy to manipulate through mass media This is a huge statement that seems wrong to me. Democracy works best when the population are engaged and hard to manipulate. Also the "observation that countries with the best education are authoritarian" seems wrong to me too. The data I see has the top 10 entirely filled with democracies, with Singapore as the first nondemocracy coming in at 11th place. Check the economist democracy index, the correlation between democracy and education is imperfect but strong. And those are arguments based on data. There are also arguments based on logic. Authoritarianism and education are fundamentally opposed, because authoritarians hate the teaching of things that disagree with their own specific viewpoint and suppress it.
ClumsyPilot 2y ago
> Democracy works best when people are easy to manipulate through mass media. Smart people will need to be coerced by force. Been there done that, it’s called Russia. I don’t agree with your worldview, but if I was presented with the choice is between dumb, fake democracy and clever competent dictatorship, I might as well choose the latter. At least trains will run on time.
- bobthepanda 2y ago
  The clever, competent dictatorship is quite rare, though.
  - dralley 2y ago
    And short-lived