itistoday2
Joined 15 years ago
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Comment · 10 years ago
This is Mike Hearn.
https://lobste.rs/s/82pz7r/curated_links_to_understand_dange...
Comment · 10 years ago
> Oh sure. I didn't expect an immediate answer to the question. I do hope you get back to me on this, though. :)
Sure, I can do that off of HN if you contact me via email or twitter. My contact info can be found on that site I linked you to.
> This gets even more complicated when such a person exercises their option to perform zero-effort secession.
Who said anything about "zero-effort"? No need to interpret my words in the most absurd way to make it easy on yourself. ;)
> I spent an hour or so digging around for those stats in my opening comment. I've spent probably another hour or two reading your comments and typing up all of my comments.
People do not need to be green on the issues they choose to vote on. Having prior knowledge and expertise is what makes an expert an expert.
Liquid democracy, from every indication, appears to be vastly superior at fairly selecting experts to vote on issues than the silliness we're using right now. Since experts can have legitimate philosophical disagreements it's only part of the solution. A mechanism for the establishment of city-states to create a market of legal systems is one of the other important pieces.
Comment · 10 years ago
> To apply the first bullet point at the end of the essay [0] would necessarily mean the end of the US's Federal Republic. Do you disagree?
It totally depends on whether groups/states decide to remain part of it. To the extent that they do it will continue to be, and to the extent they don't it will cease to be.
> Is there a national government on Earth that you feel is well-run and adequately represents its citizens? If there is such a government, what is the representative-to-constituent ratio in that nation?
Heh, believe it or not that is a project I'd already set for myself.
It's not something I can answer for you in five minutes right now, but I will point out that Switzerland tops many charts and it actually employs direct democracy.
> If there is not such a government, what are the top five [1] problems with the way the most reasonable national governments of the world govern?
Ignoring for the moment the (non)existence of such a government, I'll rattle off a couple:
- Group rules do not represent the interests of group members. Most governments instead represent either the interests of the most wealthy (plutocracy) or the most vicious (dictatorships), and few (if any) provide explicit mechanisms for secession.
- Member votes are not properly weighed based on their understanding and knowledge of the issue they are voting on.
That last issue could be addressed by liquid democracy, or a group currency group fund: http://groupcurrency.org/#GroupFund
Comment · 10 years ago
Apologies, reading your comment was like going down a choose-your-own-adventure maze.
For footnote [3] my reply is that representative democracy is one of a vast variety of possible systems you could use. That ratio of yours becomes much less meaningful in say, a liquid democracy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delegative_democracy
These two links should (hopefully) address any further questions: https://fixingtao.com/2016/01/lunatics-terrorists-and-the-th... + this thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10899574
Comment · 10 years ago
> From what I understand, there's a whole raft of really good, reproducible research on how to tease out what people mean from what they say
Having a game of telephone for a government... sounds like it would result in the sort of legislation that can be found in the OP. XD
> Based on this comment, you appear to be proposing that we dramatically increase the number of Federal representatives per citizen.
Not at all. I again invite you to read my other comments.
Comment · 10 years ago
That's a fair point, but from what you've shared it sounds more like an invasion of sorts than an actual secession movement. Do you know how much of a majority they had? If it was on the order of 51% of a tiny town that just doesn't seem sufficient.
As you say, it helps for the place to be self-sufficient.
A good example actually are the Amish. Their towns are almost completely composed of Amish and they're entirely self-sufficient except for the standing army part.
For this they actually pay fewer taxes than most Americans, but they still do pay taxes.
The formation of a country seems to require at least two things then:
1. Self-sufficiency in terms of resources
2. Self-sufficiency in terms of defense
(EDIT2: A friend points out that it's a bit more nuanced than this since many existing countries do not satisfy these criteria given the nature of modern trade. So these requirements can be filled by-proxy.)
On that last point, it doesn't necessarily have to imply a superior military. As long as you have some sort of leverage over neighboring countries (like trade agreements), you can arrange to have a truce or even an alliance between yourselves.
An example would be if Silicon Valley and neighboring farming regions banded together and said, "No more tech unless you give us autonomy."
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EDIT: regarding the question you inserted in your edit, please see if the post I mentioned answers your question: https://fixingtao.com/2016/01/lunatics-terrorists-and-the-th... If it doesn't I invite you to post a comment there to continue the convo.
On Lobsters: moderation is public info, and so is who invited who. Downvotes require reasons, and they are undoable.
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