[extropy-chat] The liberty-responsability pressure on individuals

[JDP]

Samantha Atkins a écrit (12.11.2003/13:43) :
> 
> On Wednesday 12 November 2003 04:25, JDP wrote:
> > Giu1i0 Pri5c0 a écrit (12.11.2003/08:22) :
> > > I definitely do not want to say to the weak "find a way to make yourself
> > > useful or die" because it is a disgusting thing to say to a conscious
> > > being.
> >
> > Yes, this is why I phrased it in that way, to make its disgusting
> > character obvious.
> >
> 
> How much of it is nearly a truism though?  Perhaps it should be rephrased, 
> "Find a way to be useful or find a patron or find a way to coerce or cajole 
> others to support you."    The latter includes making it relatively 
> unthinkable that anyone would choose not to support you or that they would be 
> allowed not to.    I am not in the least a hard-hearted person, if anything I 
> err far too much toward the other end of the scale.


One small remark about this last sentence. It doesn't seem that one
can rationally say one errs far too much in such and such way. If you
do realize you err, you likely will correct that and not err anymore.
Or maybe you meant you erred in the past? Or that you know you have an
irrepressible tendency to do that same mistake often?

Sorry if this sounds like a bait or something, it's not and I would
just like to understand what you really mean and what this general
characterization of your stance means to you.


>   But, it is a legitimate 
> question whether we are willing, should be willing and/or should be coerced 
> into supporting more and more people indefinitely who cannot support 
> themselves.


I take on the opportunity of this question to raise a general issue,
still unsolved to me, on which I would appreciate to get some light
from economists or other list members.

It is obvious to me that, if a population arrives in a new,
unorganized place, with a multitude of basic problems to solve, the
liberty-responsability social organization is a very good one.
Everyone will naturally find which problems one can solve for the
community (as this is how one will sustain oneself in the first
place), and things will organize effectively. Any centralized
organization and distribution of roles is bound to be less effective,
as no enligtened individual or central group can foresee all problems
and all useful things to do.

Now, when things *got* organized, the efficiency of this system may
not be quite as good. Take my neighborood, and suppose one has little
special qualification: how is one going to make oneself useful, and
sustaining oneself in the process? Can you, for example, settle as a
maker/seller of some common good? Hardly. There is a supermarket which
is very effective in doing that, and a better convenience (and with
better prices) for people that what you are likely to offer. The
supermarket *is* lacking in certain things, for example the bread is
not very good. So maybe you could make very good bread and sell it to
the people who can make the difference? You could, but there are
already *four* competing bakeries *only in my street* (one of them
will likely close soon, as it is the least visited). And so on.

So, isn't it possible to imagine that, in some well-organized society,
normal people who can do basic things still cannot make them useful in
a way that will allow them to sustain themselves? Not because people
are evil; but because they already have all what they need.

Another sign of the "liberty-responsability pressure" organization
possibly reaching its limits is advertisment. It's taken an incredible
importance here at least, both in space (it's everywhere) and in
volume of money. If you are a graphic designer, you can find work *in
advertisement*. If you are a translator, you can find work *in
advertisement*. This was easy enough to predict: as the required
providers already exist in most market slot, the need to communicate
and differencitate (albeit superfically) becomes the biggest need.

Now, how much of social worth are all these efforts? What's the real
social benefit (which is what one considers when pondering social
organizations) of so much advertisment? If you ask me, I think most of
it doesn't bring any benefit. Most of it, actually, is detrimental,
and a pollution of the minds.

Hopefully I managed to express this general interrogation I have about
one possible limit of the "liberty-responsability pressure" as
principle of social organization. In any case this is both a general
issue and an answer to what Samantha says, in the sense that it puts
in a particular light the "can't make myself useful" situation.

> If we are to support a possibly growing segment of those who cannot support 
> themselves should there be any limits on the level of that support or on the 
> reproduction of those who are in that segment (assuming some partially 
> genetic aspects of intelligence and so on) or own their franchise?   As the 
> world becomes increasingly technologically complex and its issues become more 
> complex should there be any tests of competence required to exercise the 
> right to vote?  As we become more augmented and divergent from common human 
> stock what should we do for those who choose not to follow this path and 
> become increasingly less able to compete?   Should we offer some level of 
> augmentation to all?     I would tend to that position if it is at all 
> possible without too much restraint on forward progress on both humanitarian 
> grounds and because it is likely to increase the pace of progress.

Samantha, do you (if I may inquire) still expect a full-fledged
Singularity to happen any time soon, and have an impact on everyone on
this planet? I can barely recognize you based on my recollections of
your posts in the past. You sound like my French transhumanist elitist
friends.

Is there some point in your mind when we relax and enjoy what is, or
is it full speed ahead even after the Singularity and until the end of
time. Where do you see yourself going exactly?

> I see very much the point of enabling those born to poorer circumstances a 
> chance to develop, progress and participate fully.   But I am not sure I see 
> the point of forced carrying of dead weight indefinitely and with the 
> individuals in that category able to vote themselves continued increases in 
> largesse and often standing continually in the way of actual human 
> advancement.    

So what you mean is, if we get so sophisticated that we only need very
refined stuff only producable by people extremely educated, then the
ones not educated and unable to produce anything of value to us must
be left alone to face their lack of market worth and die?

Can't we imagine something very different, in which we produce so much
that it is no big deal to sustain whatever form of (non violent and
non destructive) life there is, whether it produces or not, and enjoy
it? Can the non-augmented be like flowers in gardens in which we care
for the watering? Why not?

I think the idea behind taxes is something like that. One considers
that the society offers the opportunity to some people to express
their talents in a productive and financially rewarding way, and that
it is reasonable that they contribute to the sustainment of the ones
who are in no such situation. Or do you think there is no "idea
behind" this at all, except for the envy of the poor, voting laws to
steal from the rich? (These are not rhetorical questions, I'm just
asking. I remember that Ayn Rand would pretty much have answered the
latter.)


> > Not at all what I meant nor advocate. In fact, in the last sentence of
> > my paragraph that you quoted below, I said I found it reasonable to be
> > apalled that anyone should work hard the whole day just to sustain
> > themselves.
> >
> 
> What "whole day"?  In France the law says, if they haven't changed it again, 
> that it is only legal to work 35 hours a week.


First, it's more complicated than this, and many people work more than
that. But more importantly, 35 hours / week does qualify in my opinion
as "the whole day". If they are, 35 hours a week, doing some
uninteresting and sometimes painful work -- for 40 years --, I think that
just considering this lets you know something is wrong.


> > No, what I meant (and I think, said), is that putting the pressure of
> > liberty-responsability on individuals begets collective prosperity.
> > It's as simple as that. So you have to make your choices taking this
> > into account.
> >
> > From an extropian perspective, I think at this point we can still use
> > a lot of that competition-induced creativity. Hopefully when we have
> > extreme life extension we can relax a bit (and we aren't too busy with
> > defense).
> >
> 
> Cooperation also has strong extropian benefits.


But you probably couldn't use the "cooperation" with some uneducated
individual. You might appreciate that person, smile at them, but
paying them? And if you don't, who will?


Jacques