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Doughty does not go into the polemical question of whether or not the elimination of hereditary peers is a good idea (for the record, it isn’t…) If we are prop

Doughty does not go into the polemical question of whether or not the elimination of hereditary peers is a good idea (for the record, it isn’t…) If we are proponents of hereditary roles, why not go full hog, and just have the monarchy control the show?

IncreasePosts 1y ago
Why isn't it a good idea? Whatever qualities or services performed by the original person probably didn't pass to the children
- lurk2 1y ago
  > Why isn't it a good idea? I had the same question. > Whatever qualities or services performed by the original person probably didn't pass to the children Maybe if you subscribe to the hard times theory. There’s plenty of reason to suspect that certain aptitudes can be genetically heritable, and that doesn’t even address the issue of skills transferring by osmosis or deliberate instruction in the household.
  - rgblambda 1y ago
    The aptitude for having one of your daughters be the King's mistress may not be of particular value as a legislator.
    - lurk2 1y ago
      That isn’t what is being discussed here. An inept man could conceivably have a sexually attractive daughter. From a meritocratic perspective, it would be a mistake for a king to install the inept man as an advisor simply to gain access to the man’s daughter. What we are discussing, however, is the existence of a man who has been identified as possessing some competency, and his office passing to his offspring on his death, on the basis that his children may have inherited the competency genetically or via an informal education. Heredity isn’t as simple as that, but at the same time, it isn’t clear that competencies “probably” do not pass between parent and child.
      - wredcoll 1y ago
        > Heredity isn’t as simple as that, but at the same time, it isn’t clear that competencies “probably” do not pass between parent and child. We have several thousand years of history recorded where people tried this and the failures vastly outweigh the successes.
        lurk2 1y ago
        > We have several thousand years of history recorded where people tried this and the failures vastly outweigh the successes. Tried what?
        wredcoll 1y ago
        Selecting children for leadership positions becausr of their parents.
        lurk2 1y ago
        The majority of all successful civilizations on earth have done this and even those that did not have the usual patrilineal inheritance we associate with European cultures usually had a mechanism for the inheritance of land, title, and status. The idea that this would have bad outcomes only really emerges during the Enlightenment Era, and it only became a mainstream cultural attitude in the last hundred years. Even today, after 60 some-odd years of civil rights legislation, meritocracy is more of an idea than a reality. It conflicts with a cultural imperative to build legacy through one’s children, and the institution of private property that facilitates building this legacy. You could theoretically do away with these norms as they are not culturally universal, but then you probably are looking at living in the paleolithic era (which will also not be meritocratic) or utopian ideologies like communism.
        wredcoll 1y ago
        > The majority of all successful civilizations on earth have done this So did the majority of unsuccessful civilizations (whatever successful even means here), whats your point?
- hammock 1y ago
  I always chuckle (or squirm) when someone suggests “picking a random person to be the president” rather than our current broken campaigning system. Far better than that option, would be for a random family to inherit that power forever, than for a different random family be chosen every 4 years. Because at least then the “royal” family has some accountability to govern for long-term success, lest their descendants be dragged into the street and hung by an unhappy mob with pitchforks.
  - thaumasiotes 1y ago
    Well, your way means there's a succession unpredictably every ~20 years instead of predictably every 4. Whether that's a point for or against depends on whether you think policy thrashing every 4 years is a good idea.
    - hammock 1y ago
      The generational succession is VASTLY more predictable than a random one, considering the successor comes from the same house and has literally spent his entire life being groomed and prepared to rule.
      - deleted 1y ago
        [deleted]
      - wredcoll 1y ago
        We, humanity, have literally ALREADY TRIED THIS. This isn't some kind of super hypothetical what-if scenario. We have historical records. It went poorly.
        hammock 1y ago
        We tried the random thing?
        TheCoelacanth 1y ago
- roenxi 1y ago
  Well that is the question, isn't it. What qualities are passed on to their children? It is actually fairly common to see ideological continuity between parent and child (eg, most members of a religion had parents from that religion). So there is a case to be made that if you have a subgroup of society with unusually clear governing principles it makes sense to put them in change and have their children continue to be in charge because it has a chance of preserving the principles. In the optomistic case they can propagate for generations. That does actually appear to be what happens historically in successful countries where a hereditary or semi-hereditary ruling elite form with strong capabilities and shepherd everyone to success for a few generations before their abilities mean revert. That being said it is comparatively a terrible way of doing things vs a more mathematically and psychologically sound system. Electing people really is the way to go, all these "stable" political systems are stable at being worse than just letting people vote for everything. As the saying goes, dead is stable. Stable isn't great if unstable means the capacity to rapidly improve.
- graemep 1y ago
  > Whatever qualities or services performed by the original person probably didn't pass to the children IMO the quality they have is not being career politicians or business people. The same goes for the remaining bishops and other representatives of religious groups. They are also not under the control of party whips as the house of commons is. You could probably do better by appointing a bunch of random people instead, but what we have is better than an elected second chamber that would just replicate the Commons.
andy99 1y ago
Having an apolitical (or unelected) and slow changing second chamber is a useful counterbalance to elected officials running amok. There’s no “great” answer to this that I’m aware of but it has been a viable compromise.
- hammock 1y ago
  Another compromise in the same vein was (until 1913) the U.S. Senate, elected by the state legislature rather than direct election and for terms 2.5x as long as that of a House rep
  - rgblambda 1y ago
    To me (a non-American), that actually makes a kind of sense. Have people in the federal Congress whose job is to speak for their respective state governments. Instead of duplicating the House of Representatives with different electoral boundaries. Quite like the European Council. Well if it was the state governors flying in to DC once a month, so maybe not exactly like it.
  - threemux 1y ago
    A hot take I support is that switching to popular election of Senators was a mistake. We should go back to the state legislature method.
  - gshubert17 1y ago
    3 times as long (6 years for the Senate vs 2 years for the House)
- lostlogin 1y ago
  Apolitical? Hardly. They are literally politicians, just unelected. It’s all the worst aspects of elected officials with added nepotism and no ability to remove them. It’s monarchy-lite.
  - andy99 1y ago
    They are not political appointees, so have a lower chance of being correlated with whatever movement of the moment and so serve as checks and balances. The fact that they can’t be replaced is a feature.
UltraSane 1y ago
Randomly selected peers would be better than hereditary peers.

IncreasePosts 1y ago

Why isn't it a good idea? Whatever qualities or services performed by the original person probably didn't pass to the children

lurk2 1y ago
> Why isn't it a good idea? I had the same question. > Whatever qualities or services performed by the original person probably didn't pass to the children Maybe if you subscribe to the hard times theory. There’s plenty of reason to suspect that certain aptitudes can be genetically heritable, and that doesn’t even address the issue of skills transferring by osmosis or deliberate instruction in the household.
- rgblambda 1y ago
  The aptitude for having one of your daughters be the King's mistress may not be of particular value as a legislator.
  - lurk2 1y ago
    That isn’t what is being discussed here. An inept man could conceivably have a sexually attractive daughter. From a meritocratic perspective, it would be a mistake for a king to install the inept man as an advisor simply to gain access to the man’s daughter. What we are discussing, however, is the existence of a man who has been identified as possessing some competency, and his office passing to his offspring on his death, on the basis that his children may have inherited the competency genetically or via an informal education. Heredity isn’t as simple as that, but at the same time, it isn’t clear that competencies “probably” do not pass between parent and child.
    - wredcoll 1y ago
      > Heredity isn’t as simple as that, but at the same time, it isn’t clear that competencies “probably” do not pass between parent and child. We have several thousand years of history recorded where people tried this and the failures vastly outweigh the successes.
      - lurk2 1y ago
        > We have several thousand years of history recorded where people tried this and the failures vastly outweigh the successes. Tried what?
        wredcoll 1y ago
        Selecting children for leadership positions becausr of their parents.
        lurk2 1y ago
        The majority of all successful civilizations on earth have done this and even those that did not have the usual patrilineal inheritance we associate with European cultures usually had a mechanism for the inheritance of land, title, and status. The idea that this would have bad outcomes only really emerges during the Enlightenment Era, and it only became a mainstream cultural attitude in the last hundred years. Even today, after 60 some-odd years of civil rights legislation, meritocracy is more of an idea than a reality. It conflicts with a cultural imperative to build legacy through one’s children, and the institution of private property that facilitates building this legacy. You could theoretically do away with these norms as they are not culturally universal, but then you probably are looking at living in the paleolithic era (which will also not be meritocratic) or utopian ideologies like communism.
        wredcoll 1y ago
        > The majority of all successful civilizations on earth have done this So did the majority of unsuccessful civilizations (whatever successful even means here), whats your point?
hammock 1y ago
I always chuckle (or squirm) when someone suggests “picking a random person to be the president” rather than our current broken campaigning system. Far better than that option, would be for a random family to inherit that power forever, than for a different random family be chosen every 4 years. Because at least then the “royal” family has some accountability to govern for long-term success, lest their descendants be dragged into the street and hung by an unhappy mob with pitchforks.
- thaumasiotes 1y ago
  Well, your way means there's a succession unpredictably every ~20 years instead of predictably every 4. Whether that's a point for or against depends on whether you think policy thrashing every 4 years is a good idea.
  - hammock 1y ago
    The generational succession is VASTLY more predictable than a random one, considering the successor comes from the same house and has literally spent his entire life being groomed and prepared to rule.
    - deleted 1y ago
      [deleted]
    - wredcoll 1y ago
      We, humanity, have literally ALREADY TRIED THIS. This isn't some kind of super hypothetical what-if scenario. We have historical records. It went poorly.
      - hammock 1y ago
        We tried the random thing?
        TheCoelacanth 1y ago
roenxi 1y ago
Well that is the question, isn't it. What qualities are passed on to their children? It is actually fairly common to see ideological continuity between parent and child (eg, most members of a religion had parents from that religion). So there is a case to be made that if you have a subgroup of society with unusually clear governing principles it makes sense to put them in change and have their children continue to be in charge because it has a chance of preserving the principles. In the optomistic case they can propagate for generations. That does actually appear to be what happens historically in successful countries where a hereditary or semi-hereditary ruling elite form with strong capabilities and shepherd everyone to success for a few generations before their abilities mean revert. That being said it is comparatively a terrible way of doing things vs a more mathematically and psychologically sound system. Electing people really is the way to go, all these "stable" political systems are stable at being worse than just letting people vote for everything. As the saying goes, dead is stable. Stable isn't great if unstable means the capacity to rapidly improve.
graemep 1y ago
> Whatever qualities or services performed by the original person probably didn't pass to the children IMO the quality they have is not being career politicians or business people. The same goes for the remaining bishops and other representatives of religious groups. They are also not under the control of party whips as the house of commons is. You could probably do better by appointing a bunch of random people instead, but what we have is better than an elected second chamber that would just replicate the Commons.

andy99 1y ago

Having an apolitical (or unelected) and slow changing second chamber is a useful counterbalance to elected officials running amok. There’s no “great” answer to this that I’m aware of but it has been a viable compromise.

hammock 1y ago
Another compromise in the same vein was (until 1913) the U.S. Senate, elected by the state legislature rather than direct election and for terms 2.5x as long as that of a House rep
- rgblambda 1y ago
  To me (a non-American), that actually makes a kind of sense. Have people in the federal Congress whose job is to speak for their respective state governments. Instead of duplicating the House of Representatives with different electoral boundaries. Quite like the European Council. Well if it was the state governors flying in to DC once a month, so maybe not exactly like it.
- threemux 1y ago
  A hot take I support is that switching to popular election of Senators was a mistake. We should go back to the state legislature method.
- gshubert17 1y ago
  3 times as long (6 years for the Senate vs 2 years for the House)
lostlogin 1y ago
Apolitical? Hardly. They are literally politicians, just unelected. It’s all the worst aspects of elected officials with added nepotism and no ability to remove them. It’s monarchy-lite.
- andy99 1y ago
  They are not political appointees, so have a lower chance of being correlated with whatever movement of the moment and so serve as checks and balances. The fact that they can’t be replaced is a feature.

UltraSane 1y ago

Randomly selected peers would be better than hereditary peers.