[ExI] government corruption & Transhumanism

[painlord2k at libero.it]

Il 25/02/2009 4.58, G P SINGH ha scritto:

> I want to assert it in light of transhumanism. The measurement of
> corruption is theoretically not possible by statistics because it is a
> crime. And crime is by definition secret.

Not exactly. Only a perfect crime is secret and there is no secret crime.

> So corruption is not measurable.

Not directly. Not easily.

 > In this context role of transhumanist philosophy would be
> twofold (you can suggest three or four or ....)
> 1. How can we measure corruption by means of science and technology ?
> 2. How can we reduce so called corruption by means of S&T?

This is a very complex question.
For one, we need to understand that corruption (when a private offer a 
benefit to obtain something he has no right to have or the public 
official offer to do something it is against his duty) are difficult to 
monitor because people try to hide them and the victims are not the 
corrupter or the corrupter but a third party.

> Answering to second question brings me to rafal, can there be a genetic
> cause of corruption ? If yes then genetic therapy can solve this
> problem. Or can we find innovative use of punishment for example
> assigning a social anti-corruption rank to each node in social network.
> And then reward the least corrupt node. Here i am using the existing
> hierarchy conscious approach of cultures to reduce corruption.

Corruption can be defined as obtaining a benefit from a public official 
that is against his/her duty in exchange of some utilities.
Utilities is not only money, but also help in some other matters.

What could help to reduce / prevent corruption?
Surely a way to reduce corruption is to reduce the power the public 
officials have. If they have no power or not enough power it will reduce 
the instances where other people will try to corrupt them or they will 
try to sell themselves. From another point of view, with less power, the 
public officials will not have the power to get away with their crime 
when discovered with ease.

When power reduction is not wanted or possible, true transparency is 
needed. For example, public officials could be required to wear tamper 
proof recorders of what they say, hear and see, all the time, and the 
records would be publicly available for all to see. And when I say all 
the time, I intend 24h/7d, not a second lost, no privacy, no intimacy.

Another way to reduce corruption is to let recording equipment become so 
small and unobtrusive that people can wear it all the time and record 
continually. It would make dangerous to propose a bribe, or accept one, 
if whatever you say or do can be recorded against your will.

Another way to reduce corruption is to select people so the most 
corruptible are selected against.
This is how, in many cases, not all, work the Catholics Church.
Priests must accept early votes of celibacy (no spouse, no sons or 
daughters) so they have no reasons to accumulate wealth for their 
offspring nor they can leave wealth to illicit offsprings. The prospect 
to become rich and powerful are very, very small. So, many people are 
deterred to become priests or monks. Then from these it is possible to 
start a selection and give them more power.
Eunuchs in China and in other places (India, Turkey) were used in the 
same way. Without children and the ability to reproduce, they were less 
prone to betray their duties).

The problem in genetically selecting people that is incorruptible is 
that they need a very strong determination to respect rules they could 
think are wrong or stupid and to be impervious to personal gains (even 
indirect ones) or the damage they could do following them. What happen 
when incorruptible people are leaded by someone with an agenda, like 
Hitler or Mother Theresa?

You would need people with a lower degree of empathy, lower degree of 
selfishness, higher motivation to follow rules imposed from an higher 
authority even if the motives or consequences of the rules are unknown 
or disliked. I would say that they would be perfect SS soldiers so it 
would be very dangerous to select for these traits only without 
understanding how they will behave in real life and hand them real power.

Mirco