patrick.net

We need better leaders and more people doing service type work (or otherwise in your 3rd category).

TAke money out of politics or at least find a way to put a reasonable cap on it, would be a great start, for this country. We have a system that can work if you just do that.

But the powers that be don't want to allow this to be too much of a true democracy. That's too dangerous.

Another more general solution is if we as a species were to respect education and intelligence above all else.For example if that was the highest priority in mating decisions.

It seems like that in time would solve a lot of problems, but then who knows. Even intelligent humans are great at believing what they want to, especially if it benefits them.

Imarcus says

We need better leaders and more people doing service type work (or otherwise in your 3rd category).

TAke money out of politics or at least find a way to put a reasonable cap on it, would be a great start, for this country. We have a system that can work if you just do that.

But the powers that be don't want to allow this to be too much of a true democracy. That's too dangerous.

I agree, but did you see how many people disliked what you said? Some days it all really gets to me. Honestly, the amount of ignorance, apathy and praised gluttony makes me want to just quit this world. It's so discouraging. How does one maintain hope? I wish I could find an island or planet for all of the people in the third category and let us keep to ourselves. Let the other two categories live in the hell they create. That would be fair. They could grasp, climb and destroy all they want.

I have come to realize that the only people in power should be the ones who do not seek it.

We need to end all campaign financing and we need to stop letting sociopaths control ethical people's lives.

hrhjuliet says

did you see how many people disliked what you said?

There are some people around here with serious issues. They don't like me, and probably didn't even understand what I said.

humanity says

hrhjuliet says

did you see how many people disliked what you said?

There are some people around here with serious issues. They don't like me, and probably didn't even understand what I said.

Marcus I think you just slipped up and forgot which alias you were posting under

errc says

humanity says

hrhjuliet says

did you see how many people disliked what you said?

There are some people around here with serious issues. They don't like me, and probably didn't even understand what I said.

Marcus I think you just slipped up and forgot which alias you were posting under

LOL, Marcus just proved himself to be in the first half of Problem #1: "Sociopaths and people with borderline personality disorders." Too bad he does not have the high intelligence or charisma, so he is reduced to trolling us with multiple personalities.

errc says

humanity says

hrhjuliet says

did you see how many people disliked what you said?

There are some people around here with serious issues. They don't like me, and probably didn't even understand what I said.

Marcus I think you just slipped up and forgot which alias you were posting under

Awesome. I suspected they were one and the same in the HFT thread.

The irony is that he didn't say anything too odd in this thread -- just got slipped up.

hrhjuliet says

Problem #1: Sociopaths and people with borderline personality disorders tend to be our leaders in most aspects of human life. This group is often charismatic and usually has moderate to high intelligence.

Problem #2:The vast majority of people seem to have an unhealthy worship of The Leader. This group seems to have moderate to low intelligence and varying degrees of charisma.

Problem #3: Members of the human race who work for the good of the whole race are a very small minority and are not prone to needing a leader. This group often has low charisma and tends to be highly intelligent.

These are all different facets of the same problem. For some reason, the majority of people find sociopaths charismatic and intellectuals non-charismatic. A person X does not actually possess a property called charisma. Rather, another person Y perceives X as behaving at some level of charisma.

Charisma is not a function of the subject, person X. Charisma is a function f(Y, X) where Y perceives an imaginary aspect of X. The fault, therefore, lies in person Y if he sees sociopaths are charismatic and intellectuals as not.

The solution is not to try to make intellectuals more "charismatic" by sociopath standards, but rather to change all the persons Y into valuing the behavior of the intellectual and into devaluing the behavior of the sociopath.

Sociopaths are only considered charismatic because the common man has poor values. I consider Carl Sagan to be vastly more charismatic than Hitler was. Unfortunately, I am in the minority.

Yeah, it's my work identity.

Formed partly for reasons having to do with login issues a while back.

This comment may self destruct in 5, 4, 3, ....

I'd recommend a psychiatric evaluation for every candidate for office. The ones who don't pass should be kicked off the ballot. Every five years, politicians should also be subject to more psychiatric evaluations and forced to resign if it's found they are past a certain point of sociopathy. It's a sliding scale, and it's possible for people to systematically edit their consciences to exclude certain people or certain groups of people from normal rules. Which explains slavery, how white people abused black people all day and then kissed their babies and were kind to their (white) neighbors. It's all about editing your conscience.
Sociopaths are the biggest problem with civilization, because ethical behavior is completely optional for them. Thus, they break the social contract that enables humans to live together in a state of trust. So countless laws have to be made and enforced and guards must be posted, all because 1% of the population is able to do absolutely anything and not feel the least bit bad about it.

Dan8267 says

These are all different facets of the same problem. For some reason, the majority of people find sociopaths charismatic and intellectuals non-charismatic. A person X does not actually possess a property called charisma. Rather, another person Y perceives X as behaving at some level of charisma.

Charisma is not a function of the subject, person X. Charisma is a function f(Y, X) where Y perceives an imaginary aspect of X. The fault, therefore, lies in person Y if he sees sociopaths are charismatic and intellectuals as not.

The solution is not to try to make intellectuals more "charismatic" by sociopath standards, but rather to change all the persons Y into valuing the behavior of the intellectual and into devaluing the behavior of the sociopath.

Sociopaths are only considered charismatic because the common man has poor values. I consider Carl Sagan to be vastly more charismatic than Hitler was. Unfortunately, I am in the minority.

Yes, but l have long considered you part of the highly intellectual group who I could never imagine being enamored by a sociopath. When I was thinking of the minority I thought SHOULD be in power, you were actually one of the people that came to mind.

You are right, the goal is to change the majority; the people who worship power and leadership qualities and get them to see the value in intelligence, logic, and compassion.

Quigley says

It's a sliding scale, and it's possible for people to systematically edit their consciences to exclude certain people or certain groups of people from normal rules. Which explains slavery, how white people abused black people all day and then kissed their babies and were kind to their (white) neighbors. It's all about editing your conscience.

Sociopaths are the biggest problem with civilization, because ethical behavior is completely optional for them. Thus, they break the social contract that enables humans to live together in a state of trust. So countless laws have to be made and enforced and guards must be posted, all because 1% of the population is able to do absolutely anything and not feel the least bit bad about it.

Yes, I very much agree, and I like your idea of an evaluation, as long as there a plenty of checks to make sure a candidate doesn't game the system.

hrhjuliet says

Yes, but l have long considered you part of the highly intellectual group who I could never imagine being enamored by a sociopath.

The thing is, everyone should be like that. It's not that hard. People only find sociopaths charismatic because other people find sociopaths charismatic, thereby giving sociopaths social power.

hrhjuliet says

When I was thinking of the minority I thought SHOULD be in power, you were actually one of the people that came to mind.

Although a benevolent dictator is probably the best solution to problems in the short term, there are two fundamental problems with benevolent dictators.

The first is that such dictators may become corrupt with power. But even if this is not the case, the second problem is inescapable. Eventually the benevolent dictator dies or becomes unable to lead. At that point, he needs a successor and there is no guarantee that his successor will be benevolent. Even if the benevolent dictator wisely chooses his own successor, gradation eventually leads to a selfish dictator and the good done by the benevolent one is undone.

The solution I propose is to eliminate human beings from government all together. No humans in government means no corruption, no power struggle, no conflicts of interest. Naturally, this is not a quick and easy thing to be done, but it can be done, probably over the course of a century or two.

To remove humans from power, we need to fully automate government. This has to be done from the bottom up; it cannot be done top-down. First, the mundane procedures of local government need to be automated. Then successively more advance decision making needs to be formalized in code and automated. Essentially, this is the same task as creating an A.I. to play chess, except the game being played is running the government.

Once a trial town has been automated, parallel efforts can be started to automate other towns, small cities, and some state/provincial administrative tasks. Eventually, we start doing the same for the federal/national governments.

We proceed slowly, but steadily towards limiting humans to just making value judgements and having the machines carry out the implementation of policies. Finally, policy making is done by software using values from humans. In the last step, we stop taking values from human politicians and start taking values directly from the citizenry.

Given all the jobs that have been automated out of existence, why should politicians be any different?

We already have automated politicians. They automatically do what the highest bidder tells them to.

Dan8267 says

Once a trial town has been automated, parallel efforts can be started to automate other towns, small cities, and some state/provincial administrative tasks. Eventually, we start doing the same for the federal/national governments.

We proceed slowly, but steadily towards limiting humans to just making value judgements and having the machines carry out the implementation of policies. Finally, policy making is done by software using values from humans. In the last step, we stop taking values from human politicians and start taking values directly from the citizenry.

Given all the jobs that have been automated out of existence, why should politicians be any different?

Very interesting concept. We need more practical and innovative solutions like this.