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PaperclipPerfector  1yr ago (text post)   30623 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of August 14, 2023

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even if we grant that red is the objectively correct option.

I don't say that red is objectively correct, just for the record.

I in fact just think that red is correct from the subjective perspective of a person facing this decision.

There are in fact scenarios where choosing blue is 'objectively' correct. I just don't think anyone has the information necessary to make an objective decision.

I want to save the dummies. I have enough faith in humanity to think it's worth the risk.

I want to save dummies.

I think the fact that there are dummies participating in the game makes the game too risky to take chances on.

So as soon as a single dummy chooses blue, you're not just dealing with that dummy, but also the portion of people willing to sacrifice themselves for an infinitesimally small chance to save another, or just willing to sacrifice themselves to avoid moral culpability for another's death. So now we have 1 dummy plus at least a few thousand of the most stupid/altruistic (depending on your perspective, or maybe both) people around.

Here's my ongoing problem. There's absolutely no way to convince others that you will ACTUALLY pick blue just because you say you will.

So you can't really be sure, at decision time, whether you're going to make the threshold. And this should induce some doubt, fear, and discomfort. Which you can resolve by picking red.

So we've got the following factions:

A) Avowed red-pickers who will pick red in almost all cases.

B) Dummies who pick blue without thinking about/understanding the consequences.

C) Dummies who pick red without thinking about/understanding the consequences.

D) Avowed Altruists who stick with their convictions and pick blue despite the personal risk.

E) "Coward" altruists who think they will pick blue, but have ultimately panic/doubt and pick red.

I suspect that the Combined forces of D) and B) will not end up, in most cases, being sufficient to pass the threshold, and instead we get a mass tragedy where 10-30% of the players die, while trying to save the <5% dummies.

And I'd be very concerned if we consider an additional faction:

F) Evil anti-altruists who are actively trying to maximize death toll and will convince others to pick blue while planning to pick red themselves.

There's one possible faction that might help the blue side:

G) Bleeding-heart red-pickers who have a crisis of conscience and pick blue despite the personal risk.

But I admit I cannot fathom the mindset that would allow one to do this.

For your bet to be sensible, you have to believe that there are enough avowed altruists to take the total of blue over the threshold, likely with only the help of an indeterminate number of dummies who also picked blue.

I can't see how this bet is worth making, when the penalty for miscalculation is making the death toll 3-6 times worse!

In fact, I expect MOST altruists will end up being coward altruists when actual death is on the line.

If you think those altruistic people should die, then sure, red pill it is. Otherwise, I think the strategic decision depends on your estimation of humanity's altruism curve.

ALL of humanity? So every single Sub-saharan African? Every Han Chinese? Every person on the Indian subcontinent, every Ethnic Russian? Every single literal sociopath walking the planet?

Man, I don't know how you get the idea that 50% or more of the global population is going to put their lives on the line for people they don't know.

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/self-reported-trust-attitudes

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/share-agreeing-most-people-can-be-trusted-vs-most-people-would-try-to-take-advantage-of-you

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/share-agreeing-most-people-can-be-trusted-vs-gdp-per-capita

It's a beautiful dream, but the hard-headed reality as I see it is that you should take the pill that avoids having to rely on the altruistic tendencies of strangers.

I'm uneasy granting the government the ability to decide who chooses the government. Every other power we've granted the government has been used against us. Imagine if we created voting intelligence tests, but unless every single different ethnic group performed equally on them, they were deemed racist and had to be rewritten. The only way I can think of to create a "fair" test would be to go the college route, include an essay portion, and then basically grade the essays solely on how many racial markers they include. We'd probably end up with some horrific amalgam counterproductive to everybody except those already in power.

Yes, this is a question that has faced political scientists for centuries now. How to create a government that doesn't overstep the authority it has been assigned, and how to stop it from either being captured by sociopaths and/or destroyed by dummies.

Yeah, those links are pretty compelling. I totally understand why people would choose the red pill. Personally I still hope I'd choose blue, but in the end it's just a thought experiment not really worth devoting more time to.

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