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There are definitely tangible predictive differences in the case of, say, Russia vs USA. Things like "If you go to the capital with a bunch of friends carrying

There are definitely tangible predictive differences in the case of, say, Russia vs USA. Things like "If you go to the capital with a bunch of friends carrying placards saying '$LEADER is corrupt and evil and should be replaced by $OPPOSITION' how many of you end up in a jail cell in the next day?". If there is literally no tangible difference then it's just label games and metaphysics and doesn't matter. > Your personal income has absolutely no predictive value on gdp. It actually is correlated (admittedly in most day-to-day cases it's just a lagging indicator, but things like natural disasters hit both). It's not the strongest correlation but it would still be evidential. Definitely under 1.0 bits though... One would need a LOT of such observations and having them not screen each other off to start getting a convincing number of bits. Probably not realistic to have humans manage these sorts of numerous tiny updates though... /nitpicks > Ah, but if either side distrusts the other about whether the observation made is truthfully reported, how do you solve that? It requires some amount of trust and right now there’s a very clear divide there. Yeah, it gets much trickier like that. But I do think two reasonable people from the opposite political sides could agree on some sort of observable to the extent their disagreement is anything other than narrative.

vlovich123 2y ago
> Things like "If you go to the capital with a bunch of friends carrying placards saying '$LEADER is corrupt and evil and should be replaced by $OPPOSITION' how many of you end up in a jail cell in the next day?". If the other side calls it a violent riot does it still count as people getting put in jail? Cause the Jan 6 insurrection and BLM protests occurred at about the same time and are viewed very differently depending on which political lens you put on. > If there is literally no tangible difference then it's just label games and metaphysics and doesn't matter. You’re discounting feelings as if it doesn’t matter. But if people believe or feel like they live in a dictatorship, what quantitative data are you going to use to disprove that. Moreover, why aren’t feelings valid when talking about politics which is fundamentally an emotionally driven human activity and not a data driven one? By the way the left believes they live in an authoritarian dictatorship under Trump while the right believes they lived in an authoritarian dictatorship under Biden. And political power literally is the power to emotionally manipulate others because you individually can’t actually accomplish anything by yourself.

vlovich123 2y ago

> Things like "If you go to the capital with a bunch of friends carrying placards saying '$LEADER is corrupt and evil and should be replaced by $OPPOSITION' how many of you end up in a jail cell in the next day?". If the other side calls it a violent riot does it still count as people getting put in jail? Cause the Jan 6 insurrection and BLM protests occurred at about the same time and are viewed very differently depending on which political lens you put on. > If there is literally no tangible difference then it's just label games and metaphysics and doesn't matter. You’re discounting feelings as if it doesn’t matter. But if people believe or feel like they live in a dictatorship, what quantitative data are you going to use to disprove that. Moreover, why aren’t feelings valid when talking about politics which is fundamentally an emotionally driven human activity and not a data driven one? By the way the left believes they live in an authoritarian dictatorship under Trump while the right believes they lived in an authoritarian dictatorship under Biden. And political power literally is the power to emotionally manipulate others because you individually can’t actually accomplish anything by yourself.