[ExI] the science might be wrong

[Stathis Papaioannou]

On Thu, 21 Jan 2021 at 17:35, Rafal Smigrodzki via extropy-chat <
extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:

>
>
> On Wed, Jan 20, 2021 at 9:00 PM Stathis Papaioannou via extropy-chat <
> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>
>>
>> I don’t want to go into the particulars of the current pandemic. The
>> reason for my question is that I am concerned that you are saying that EVEN
>> IF there is good reason to believe that millions of lives will be saved by
>> compulsory public health measures, these measures should, on principle, not
>> be taken. Is that right, or is there some level of certainty about the
>> efficacy of compulsory public health measures that would lead you to say
>> they should be implemented?
>>
>
> ### I don't know what Spike will say but let me interject my opinion:
>
> I do not recognize any a priori moral principle that would enjoin a
> legitimate government from imposing compulsory public health measures.
> However, it is a trite observation that the government is a very poor way
> of organizing people, and almost everything that governments currently do
> can be achieved much better using alternative methods. So, before you ask
> about the government's right to impose health measures, you should consider
> the government's ability to achieve superior outcomes through such
> measures, better outcomes than achievable using non-coercive means.
>
> So think about it - suppose a government of honest men, who have not
> repeatedly betrayed their constituents and have not squandered public
> trust, tells the nation that going out and meeting people may result in
> being infected with 90% chance of dying and the only sure way of avoiding
> that is to avoid contact with others until it all blows over, in weeks or
> months. Reasonable citizens, truthfully informed by their trustworthy
> government about the number of cases and the case fatality rate, will make
> important tradeoffs. Some, with a food stash will stay home. Some, for
> example those who unfortunately do not have any food left at home, will
> venture out, knowing the risk. Some idiots will go out and be merry. The
> contagion will, for obvious reasons, affect the idiots predominantly, and
> the unfortunates to some extent as well, but it will spare those who
> quarantine themselves. The outcome of such well-informed and
> self-controlled quarantine will be efficient- those who must break
> quarantine will occasionally pay the price but overall they will be doing
> better, for example by avoiding a lonely death of hunger in their
> apartments. Idiots will weed themselves out of the population. The
> well-prepared people will survive just fine.
>
> Contrast that with compulsory quarantine imposed by a corrupt, depraved
> regime, such as the current Chinese government. People who must break
> quarantine to eat would be shot or would die of hunger. Idiots would live
> on to do stupid things. The well-prepared would survive just fine. This is
> a much less efficient outcome.
>
> I know that many of us have that authoritarian impulse, to make a law, to
> make them do what's needed, to smack the idiots down. Aside from certain
> situations pertaining to group violence, it is a generally
> counterproductive impulse. Self-regulation, where possible, is almost
> always superior to top-down control.
>

Suppose there is a situation where some compulsory measure will, beyond
reasonable doubt, mean the difference between returning to normal in a few
months or millions dead and the destruction of the economy due to most
people cowering in their homes for years, because 10% of the population are
stupid, paranoid or don’t care. Should the right of the 10% to destroy
themselves and everything else be respected?

> --
Stathis Papaioannou
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/attachments/20210121/b31c8c56/attachment.htm>