5 ms·

Thirty years ago I was enthusiastic about what we now call liquid democracy. Elders, to whom I spoke that lived through WWII, saw dynamic+direct democracy as ex

by clcaev 8mo ago

Thirty years ago I was enthusiastic about what we now call liquid democracy. Elders, to whom I spoke that lived through WWII, saw dynamic+direct democracy as extremely dangerous. I now share their opinion. To have a healthy world, we need to start with democratic engagement on every block, of every district in every city, in all counties of every province, in all nations across every continent of our shared planet. Critically, it must be completely human mediated, even if it is daily effort for most people everywhere. This is how we must spend our "great AI productivity boost". I am responding to nested comments; this is not meant to diminish the importance of the linked effort.

tracker1 8mo ago
I'm of a similar mindset... pure/liquid democracy is literally rule by mob. It can only amplify choices made by feeling over substance. As an ideal, I've always favored a libertarian mindset... my freedom should extend so far as it doesn't impede on another's rights. Which is a really broad interpretation... I think the further we allow govt to get away from that, the worse things get over time. Freedom is important.
- keybored 8mo ago
  > I'm of a similar mindset... pure/liquid democracy is literally rule by mob. Rule by people is literally rule by derogatory term for people? The “literally” seems to suggest that this is supposed to communicate more than a personal feeling towards a subject. And yet.
  - tracker1 8mo ago
    If the majority of people think it's okay to kill off a specific subset of society, does that actually make it okay/good? Worked up mobs make horrible decisions.
    - keybored 8mo ago
      If some moneyed elites as well as associates that are high up in culture, science and similar decide to make a network based on enslavement, child molestation, human trafficking, rape, and torture, does that make it okay/good? Oh wait, that already actually happened.
      - tracker1 8mo ago
        Are you claiming that was a good thing? Your argument doesn't make any sense in the context given. My entire point is some things are absolutely wrong, even if a majority of people would support it. Your point above does nothing to counter that argument.
        keybored 7mo ago
        The contrast is a between thing that really happened with a (so far) hypothetical.
martin-t 8mo ago
What is the underlying problem and what are the potential solutions? > saw dynamic+direct democracy as extremely dangerous Are you saying that humans, on average, are bad/harmful/evil? Or that they commit to decisions without thinking them through and act on emotions instead of reason? Because if the first, then making democracy indirect or otherwise limited should not help. So I believe it is the second. Then the question becomes either how to get people to vote more rationally or how to weight votes by rationality. The second options is not well explored.
- clcaev 8mo ago
  The principal danger is the concentration of power. We should start by rejuvenating and supporting local communities and institutions, interpersonal human connections with primacy. Bottom up governance seems critical, it is where political discussion (with real examples) might happen without becoming a spectacle of identity.
  - martin-t 8mo ago
    > The principal danger is the concentration of power. Absolutely. Good people can cooperate or reach compromises for mutual benefit. Bad people are each in it for himself - while they do form alliances sometimes, ultimately working together is unnatural for them and often temporary. Requiring any position of power to be always distributed among many people obviously makes it hard for a single person to abuse power but less obviously disadvantages bad people by its very nature on a deeper level. > local communities and institutions I have an idea which I for now call consent-based society. I need to think about it a lot more but for now: People talk about rights and freedoms but can't decide where the rights of one person end and another person's begin. If we focus on consent, it may become simpler. People could then form larger and larger groups based on agreement (consent) to rules - a house, small village, city, state. But only as long as it benefits them - consent can be revoked at any time. But of course, historically, nation states emerged because large hierarchical power structures are advantageous at war and it'll take a long time to get people away from considering them natural, correct or inevitable. --- Anyway, I don't think your post really answers my question though. From what I read, liquid democracy seems like a form of bottom up governance.
JanisErdmanis 8mo ago
In essence liquid democracy makes votes a transferable currency bringing it fairly close to what money already is. It would be really hard to prevent existence of an exchange rate between money and vote transfer making that a capitalist dream (until markets themselves gets monopolized).

by clcaev 8mo ago

tracker1 8mo ago

I'm of a similar mindset... pure/liquid democracy is literally rule by mob. It can only amplify choices made by feeling over substance. As an ideal, I've always favored a libertarian mindset... my freedom should extend so far as it doesn't impede on another's rights. Which is a really broad interpretation... I think the further we allow govt to get away from that, the worse things get over time. Freedom is important.

keybored 8mo ago
> I'm of a similar mindset... pure/liquid democracy is literally rule by mob. Rule by people is literally rule by derogatory term for people? The “literally” seems to suggest that this is supposed to communicate more than a personal feeling towards a subject. And yet.
- tracker1 8mo ago
  If the majority of people think it's okay to kill off a specific subset of society, does that actually make it okay/good? Worked up mobs make horrible decisions.
  - keybored 8mo ago
    If some moneyed elites as well as associates that are high up in culture, science and similar decide to make a network based on enslavement, child molestation, human trafficking, rape, and torture, does that make it okay/good? Oh wait, that already actually happened.
    - tracker1 8mo ago
      Are you claiming that was a good thing? Your argument doesn't make any sense in the context given. My entire point is some things are absolutely wrong, even if a majority of people would support it. Your point above does nothing to counter that argument.
      - keybored 7mo ago
        The contrast is a between thing that really happened with a (so far) hypothetical.

martin-t 8mo ago

What is the underlying problem and what are the potential solutions? > saw dynamic+direct democracy as extremely dangerous Are you saying that humans, on average, are bad/harmful/evil? Or that they commit to decisions without thinking them through and act on emotions instead of reason? Because if the first, then making democracy indirect or otherwise limited should not help. So I believe it is the second. Then the question becomes either how to get people to vote more rationally or how to weight votes by rationality. The second options is not well explored.

clcaev 8mo ago
The principal danger is the concentration of power. We should start by rejuvenating and supporting local communities and institutions, interpersonal human connections with primacy. Bottom up governance seems critical, it is where political discussion (with real examples) might happen without becoming a spectacle of identity.
- martin-t 8mo ago
  > The principal danger is the concentration of power. Absolutely. Good people can cooperate or reach compromises for mutual benefit. Bad people are each in it for himself - while they do form alliances sometimes, ultimately working together is unnatural for them and often temporary. Requiring any position of power to be always distributed among many people obviously makes it hard for a single person to abuse power but less obviously disadvantages bad people by its very nature on a deeper level. > local communities and institutions I have an idea which I for now call consent-based society. I need to think about it a lot more but for now: People talk about rights and freedoms but can't decide where the rights of one person end and another person's begin. If we focus on consent, it may become simpler. People could then form larger and larger groups based on agreement (consent) to rules - a house, small village, city, state. But only as long as it benefits them - consent can be revoked at any time. But of course, historically, nation states emerged because large hierarchical power structures are advantageous at war and it'll take a long time to get people away from considering them natural, correct or inevitable. --- Anyway, I don't think your post really answers my question though. From what I read, liquid democracy seems like a form of bottom up governance.

JanisErdmanis 8mo ago

In essence liquid democracy makes votes a transferable currency bringing it fairly close to what money already is. It would be really hard to prevent existence of an exchange rate between money and vote transfer making that a capitalist dream (until markets themselves gets monopolized).