5 ms·

> draconian social scoring This is a legitimate question: should people have reputations? Should their behavior be made more visible publicly, both good and ba

> draconian social scoring This is a legitimate question: should people have reputations? Should their behavior be made more visible publicly, both good and bad? How? In a small contained society, where consequences are more directly affecting individuals immedately, these questions don't need to be asked, because they're inherantly answered. We now are a society with billions of people, and dire consequences sometimes deferred for a generation, or more. Part of our general failing is the lack of good answers to the above questions. For many people, there are rarely negative consequences for causing harm to others, and the rewards can be very great indeed.

onetokeoverthe 2mo ago
[dead]
ryandrake 2mo ago
"Consequences and reputations stemming from one's actions" isn't necessarily draconian social scoring. Without a structure for imposing consequences on wrongdoers, we're not a society, we're just monkeys flinging poo at each other.
- cindyllm 2mo ago
  [dead]
- blackqueeriroh 2mo ago
  The problem is that everyone imagines some sort of just and fair arbiter of these things, when the reality is all of the social scoring and consequences and reputations rarely actually stem from one’s actions, and far more often stem from how much money someone has put in someone’s pocket, who someone knows, the color of someone’s skin, or what’s between someone’s legs. Until we’re actually serious about treating people equitably, (not equally, as that would simply leave the lopsided power structure we have in place) we aren’t getting out of this.
  - somenameforme 2mo ago
    I don't understand the desire to argue against this in identity politics terms, which I assume you realize is going to be extremely divisive. There's a far more simple argument that people, independent of ideological framing, would tend to agree upon. And that's what is valuable to one person isn't valuable, to the same degree, to another. For things that are completely illegal, like murder, such a system would be pretty useless because we already have systems in place to punish that sort of behavior and defacto social scoring on it as well. So this is going to come down to things that aren't usually illegal or 'that illegal', but otherwise affect society. So for instance one group might want to reasonably punish the directors of a company that causes emissions. Another group might want to reasonable reward the directors of a company that creates a large number of desirable jobs. And even in this one example you immediately end up with a weird scenario. Is it okay to pollute as long as you make enough jobs? Who gets to decide that? There's no need for cartoon villainy for this to be a bad idea. Even completely well intentioned, it just doesn't work out well. And the more diverse a society, the worse it's going to work.
    - knollimar 2mo ago
      How do you combat review bombing or someone just being bigoted?
      - bell-cot 2mo ago
        The same ways that you have to combat fudged scientific data and didn't-write-it authors and lazy reviewers and hate from people who are in the opposite school on the whole Alzheimer's Amyloid issue and shite-quality citatations and etc. etc. etc.? Yes, there can be obvious patterns to money/friends/skin color/gender that should be watched out for. But if you're paying much attention to those, then your science will quickly become a mere side gig to your new Cultural Warrior job.
  - deleted 2mo ago
    [deleted]
  - bell-cot 2mo ago
- csallen 2mo ago
  People react negatively to this, because they fear a dystopian society of the sort we've seen in plenty of movies, and rightfully so. But it's also worth pointing out that "consequences and reputations stemming from one's actions" is already the world we live in and always have lived in. Hell, even Hacker News has karma points, downvoting, shadow banning, and the like. There's no such thing as a society with zero consequences and zero reputations. The only real question is a matter of degree, structure, severity, reach, and various idiosyncrasies that differ across cultures. So it would be nice to have a more nuanced discussion about this instead of treating it like a 0 or 1 decision.
  - unknown_user_84 2mo ago
    this reminds me of an episode of the TV show. the Orville that I recently watched where they stumbled upon a planet that had the social credit scoring system and everybody had little badges with literal upvote and down vote buttons on them. and when your grandma buys you ice cream and you're a little kid you say thank you and you hit the upvote button and she likes you even more because you hit the upvote button then because you said thank you. and so it was obviously portrayed as kind of you know for the story and it worked and I like the episode and everything but it got me thinking in terms of a society like that of people could probably construct something that used that kind of a system but in a more regulated way and a more humane way and I think that's turns into the question of do we want to try and make this new thing or do we want to try and fix the old thing? regardless, it got me thinking about some kind of a potential implementation of a formal social reputation system that essentially mirrors what goes on informally now, but makes it visible and makes the actions of affecting somebody's reputation visible. My basic intuition here and for most things that deal with society or whatever is that Satan lives in the details and infinite potential dystopias and the potential for extreme inhumanity lurks in every crevice and corner. unknown unknowns and shit.
    - cindyllm 2mo ago
      [dead]
    - bob001 2mo ago
- dwattttt 2mo ago
  For a more mathematically rigorous treatment, negative feedback is fundamental to Control Theory; it allows us to stabilise processes that would otherwise go out of control.
- globalnode 2mo ago
  and then you have to ask who defines good and bad behaviour and who determines consequences when power is lop sided.
- Eddy_Viscosity2 2mo ago
  Even monkeys have society and they tend to only throw poo at those who have done wrong by that society. Monkeys have and try to maintain reputations.
  - tough 2mo ago
    Is it reputation or hierarchical standing or just "power" within the society what makes them not throw poo tho
    - Eddy_Viscosity2 2mo ago
      I'm not sure what you mean, but not throwing poo is the default behavior. They only do it when feeling stressed, or zoo settings they might even do it to get a reaction from the crowd. Figuratively speaking, no different than humans.
attila-lendvai 2mo ago
in short: our social sructure has built out so far beyond the Dunbar's number that it has become a haven for psychopaths.
BobbyTables2 2mo ago
Isn’t China doing something like this ? Wonder if it could degrade to something worse than the status quo where reputations are falsely tarnished by competitors purely as a weapon to get ahead…
- nneonneo 2mo ago
  The "Chinese social credit" system is vastly overblown. I'm living here (China, Beijing and Jiangsu) now, and there are exactly two cases in the past eight months where the "social credit" system has had any impact at all: - To open "take first pay after" vending machines. These are vending machines which are basically big locked fridges; if your credit score is high enough, you can open the machines, take whatever drinks/snacks you want, and they'll use (I presume) computer vision to charge you afterwards. If you don't have a high enough credit score, tough, you can't use them. (But there's almost always normal pay-first vending machines nearby). - To borrow mobile charging packs (powerbanks). Some operators will let you "swipe your credit" (check your credit score) to take one without paying a deposit. If your credit score isn't high enough, you first pay e.g. a ¥99 deposit (~$15USD) which gets returned when you return the powerbank, not a big deal. That's...it. My credit score is high enough on only one platform (Alipay), so I get to try what happens with both "high" and "low" credit, and I can confidently say these are the *only* two cases where I have even been asked to show the credit score. I have taken multiple train trips, bought lots of stuff in stores and restaurants, etc. without ever touching the "social credit score". P.S. I literally don't even know how to raise my credit score, and neither do many of the folks who live here - again, not that it matters, because the score is simply not that important.
  - rogerrogerr 2mo ago
    I remember in the west a few years ago we were seeing purported pictures of electronic billboards in China shaming low-social-credit-havers. Was that all a weird psyop?
    - scns 2mo ago
      > electronic billboards in China shaming low-social-credit-havers It is people who did not pay their debts. Dr Jonathan Tam has a video on YT explaining it called: Why the World Fell for China's Fake Dystopia https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ecx45eOuc0E https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ecx45eOuc0E
gspr 2mo ago
There's a huge difference between a completely decentralized reputation system like the interpersonal one that has existed since humans first became sentient, and an artificially built top-down reputation system run by a powerful entity (be it the state like in China or megacorps like in the West).

onetokeoverthe 2mo ago

[dead]

ryandrake 2mo ago

"Consequences and reputations stemming from one's actions" isn't necessarily draconian social scoring. Without a structure for imposing consequences on wrongdoers, we're not a society, we're just monkeys flinging poo at each other.

cindyllm 2mo ago
[dead]
blackqueeriroh 2mo ago
The problem is that everyone imagines some sort of just and fair arbiter of these things, when the reality is all of the social scoring and consequences and reputations rarely actually stem from one’s actions, and far more often stem from how much money someone has put in someone’s pocket, who someone knows, the color of someone’s skin, or what’s between someone’s legs. Until we’re actually serious about treating people equitably, (not equally, as that would simply leave the lopsided power structure we have in place) we aren’t getting out of this.
- somenameforme 2mo ago
  I don't understand the desire to argue against this in identity politics terms, which I assume you realize is going to be extremely divisive. There's a far more simple argument that people, independent of ideological framing, would tend to agree upon. And that's what is valuable to one person isn't valuable, to the same degree, to another. For things that are completely illegal, like murder, such a system would be pretty useless because we already have systems in place to punish that sort of behavior and defacto social scoring on it as well. So this is going to come down to things that aren't usually illegal or 'that illegal', but otherwise affect society. So for instance one group might want to reasonably punish the directors of a company that causes emissions. Another group might want to reasonable reward the directors of a company that creates a large number of desirable jobs. And even in this one example you immediately end up with a weird scenario. Is it okay to pollute as long as you make enough jobs? Who gets to decide that? There's no need for cartoon villainy for this to be a bad idea. Even completely well intentioned, it just doesn't work out well. And the more diverse a society, the worse it's going to work.
  - knollimar 2mo ago
    How do you combat review bombing or someone just being bigoted?
    - bell-cot 2mo ago
      The same ways that you have to combat fudged scientific data and didn't-write-it authors and lazy reviewers and hate from people who are in the opposite school on the whole Alzheimer's Amyloid issue and shite-quality citatations and etc. etc. etc.? Yes, there can be obvious patterns to money/friends/skin color/gender that should be watched out for. But if you're paying much attention to those, then your science will quickly become a mere side gig to your new Cultural Warrior job.
- deleted 2mo ago
  [deleted]
- bell-cot 2mo ago
csallen 2mo ago
People react negatively to this, because they fear a dystopian society of the sort we've seen in plenty of movies, and rightfully so. But it's also worth pointing out that "consequences and reputations stemming from one's actions" is already the world we live in and always have lived in. Hell, even Hacker News has karma points, downvoting, shadow banning, and the like. There's no such thing as a society with zero consequences and zero reputations. The only real question is a matter of degree, structure, severity, reach, and various idiosyncrasies that differ across cultures. So it would be nice to have a more nuanced discussion about this instead of treating it like a 0 or 1 decision.
- unknown_user_84 2mo ago
  this reminds me of an episode of the TV show. the Orville that I recently watched where they stumbled upon a planet that had the social credit scoring system and everybody had little badges with literal upvote and down vote buttons on them. and when your grandma buys you ice cream and you're a little kid you say thank you and you hit the upvote button and she likes you even more because you hit the upvote button then because you said thank you. and so it was obviously portrayed as kind of you know for the story and it worked and I like the episode and everything but it got me thinking in terms of a society like that of people could probably construct something that used that kind of a system but in a more regulated way and a more humane way and I think that's turns into the question of do we want to try and make this new thing or do we want to try and fix the old thing? regardless, it got me thinking about some kind of a potential implementation of a formal social reputation system that essentially mirrors what goes on informally now, but makes it visible and makes the actions of affecting somebody's reputation visible. My basic intuition here and for most things that deal with society or whatever is that Satan lives in the details and infinite potential dystopias and the potential for extreme inhumanity lurks in every crevice and corner. unknown unknowns and shit.
  - cindyllm 2mo ago
    [dead]
  - bob001 2mo ago
dwattttt 2mo ago
For a more mathematically rigorous treatment, negative feedback is fundamental to Control Theory; it allows us to stabilise processes that would otherwise go out of control.
globalnode 2mo ago
and then you have to ask who defines good and bad behaviour and who determines consequences when power is lop sided.
Eddy_Viscosity2 2mo ago
Even monkeys have society and they tend to only throw poo at those who have done wrong by that society. Monkeys have and try to maintain reputations.
- tough 2mo ago
  Is it reputation or hierarchical standing or just "power" within the society what makes them not throw poo tho
  - Eddy_Viscosity2 2mo ago
    I'm not sure what you mean, but not throwing poo is the default behavior. They only do it when feeling stressed, or zoo settings they might even do it to get a reaction from the crowd. Figuratively speaking, no different than humans.

attila-lendvai 2mo ago

in short: our social sructure has built out so far beyond the Dunbar's number that it has become a haven for psychopaths.

BobbyTables2 2mo ago

Isn’t China doing something like this ? Wonder if it could degrade to something worse than the status quo where reputations are falsely tarnished by competitors purely as a weapon to get ahead…

nneonneo 2mo ago
The "Chinese social credit" system is vastly overblown. I'm living here (China, Beijing and Jiangsu) now, and there are exactly two cases in the past eight months where the "social credit" system has had any impact at all: - To open "take first pay after" vending machines. These are vending machines which are basically big locked fridges; if your credit score is high enough, you can open the machines, take whatever drinks/snacks you want, and they'll use (I presume) computer vision to charge you afterwards. If you don't have a high enough credit score, tough, you can't use them. (But there's almost always normal pay-first vending machines nearby). - To borrow mobile charging packs (powerbanks). Some operators will let you "swipe your credit" (check your credit score) to take one without paying a deposit. If your credit score isn't high enough, you first pay e.g. a ¥99 deposit (~$15USD) which gets returned when you return the powerbank, not a big deal. That's...it. My credit score is high enough on only one platform (Alipay), so I get to try what happens with both "high" and "low" credit, and I can confidently say these are the *only* two cases where I have even been asked to show the credit score. I have taken multiple train trips, bought lots of stuff in stores and restaurants, etc. without ever touching the "social credit score". P.S. I literally don't even know how to raise my credit score, and neither do many of the folks who live here - again, not that it matters, because the score is simply not that important.
- rogerrogerr 2mo ago
  I remember in the west a few years ago we were seeing purported pictures of electronic billboards in China shaming low-social-credit-havers. Was that all a weird psyop?
  - scns 2mo ago
    > electronic billboards in China shaming low-social-credit-havers It is people who did not pay their debts. Dr Jonathan Tam has a video on YT explaining it called: Why the World Fell for China's Fake Dystopia https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ecx45eOuc0E https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ecx45eOuc0E

gspr 2mo ago

There's a huge difference between a completely decentralized reputation system like the interpersonal one that has existed since humans first became sentient, and an artificially built top-down reputation system run by a powerful entity (be it the state like in China or megacorps like in the West).