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Trust is a Continuum. I have relatives who grew up in places where you didn't need to lock the door at night and those who have to lock the door at night but th

Trust is a Continuum. I have relatives who grew up in places where you didn't need to lock the door at night and those who have to lock the door at night but that's enough and those for who that is not enough. I am reminded of a story I read lately of a woman who was shocked when her passport and purse were stolen from the beach while she was swimming. Somehow she had the perception that she was in a high trust worthy zone even though she had been doing her doctoral thesis work in a low trust society.

cwmoore 2mo ago
Sounds very binary, I don’t see the continuum. More like a steep cliff of shocking betrayal.
- 9x39 2mo ago
  In the same society, some people personally experience that others are capable of robbery & much worse within days and some learn it within decades, and everything in between. Some may never have to confront this, all within the same city/state/country. We could represent time-to-reality on a number line.
  - bombcar 2mo ago
    You can turn a low trust society into a high one by just having nothing whatsoever worth anything.
    - stirfish 2mo ago
      Maybe. There are a lot of online games where nothing is worth anything, but I don't think those are default high-trust societies. People will log in just to annoy the other players.
      - cwmoore 1mo ago
        Sounds like they trust the game’s anonymity and privacy policies.
    - readthenotes1 2mo ago
      So sayeth Epictetus after his prized lamp was stolen!
    - cwmoore 1mo ago
      Or, live as a solitary hermit and the average person you encounter is almost exactly like you. But how do you know you can trust them after they’ve isolated you from society?
- coaksford 2mo ago
  Whether you mistrusted and were betrayed by that trust is binary, but that's like if someone says "radioactivity is a continuum" and you say "I either got hit by a gamma ray or not" as if that settles the question. Really the question was more like "what's the mean time to betrayal?" or "how big of a payoff can someone be trusted with before they have a 50% chance of betraying trust?" or "am I more or less confident that this person can be trusted in this situation?" or any of a dozen other obvious ways that people who seriously consider the issue of trust do so. If you think the binary states are absolute trust and absolute paranoia and there is no in between (as having any in-between makes it a continuum) then you've got a conception of trust that nobody else in the world finds seriously useful.

cwmoore 2mo ago

Sounds very binary, I don’t see the continuum. More like a steep cliff of shocking betrayal.

9x39 2mo ago
In the same society, some people personally experience that others are capable of robbery & much worse within days and some learn it within decades, and everything in between. Some may never have to confront this, all within the same city/state/country. We could represent time-to-reality on a number line.
- bombcar 2mo ago
  You can turn a low trust society into a high one by just having nothing whatsoever worth anything.
  - stirfish 2mo ago
    Maybe. There are a lot of online games where nothing is worth anything, but I don't think those are default high-trust societies. People will log in just to annoy the other players.
    - cwmoore 1mo ago
      Sounds like they trust the game’s anonymity and privacy policies.
  - readthenotes1 2mo ago
    So sayeth Epictetus after his prized lamp was stolen!
  - cwmoore 1mo ago
    Or, live as a solitary hermit and the average person you encounter is almost exactly like you. But how do you know you can trust them after they’ve isolated you from society?
coaksford 2mo ago
Whether you mistrusted and were betrayed by that trust is binary, but that's like if someone says "radioactivity is a continuum" and you say "I either got hit by a gamma ray or not" as if that settles the question. Really the question was more like "what's the mean time to betrayal?" or "how big of a payoff can someone be trusted with before they have a 50% chance of betraying trust?" or "am I more or less confident that this person can be trusted in this situation?" or any of a dozen other obvious ways that people who seriously consider the issue of trust do so. If you think the binary states are absolute trust and absolute paranoia and there is no in between (as having any in-between makes it a continuum) then you've got a conception of trust that nobody else in the world finds seriously useful.