Studies shows that median voter theorem is a better model of the current political situation—in US and other countries with a similar voting system—then Eliezer’s model of politicians colluding with one another. Notice that the median is not the mode, so it is very possible that who gets elected has conformed to views that are quite distant from the majority of his/her electors. That is, MVT shows that usually who gets elected is not the ‘best’, but the ‘less worse’. In light of this, if you find yourself disliking the currently elected politicians, be aware that this is likely because there are many other voters whose views you might find even more aberrant. A ‘nerd’ failure mode observed in the sequence is to notice sub-optimal behaviour and just pointing at it saying “do not do this”. But unless you understand better why the sub-optimal behaviour is in place, it is very unlikely that that suggestion would be helpful/effective. MVT is clearly a case of this.
My attempt at a TL;DR:
Studies shows that median voter theorem is a better model of the current political situation—in US and other countries with a similar voting system—then Eliezer’s model of politicians colluding with one another.
Notice that the median is not the mode, so it is very possible that who gets elected has conformed to views that are quite distant from the majority of his/her electors. That is, MVT shows that usually who gets elected is not the ‘best’, but the ‘less worse’.
In light of this, if you find yourself disliking the currently elected politicians, be aware that this is likely because there are many other voters whose views you might find even more aberrant.
A ‘nerd’ failure mode observed in the sequence is to notice sub-optimal behaviour and just pointing at it saying “do not do this”. But unless you understand better why the sub-optimal behaviour is in place, it is very unlikely that that suggestion would be helpful/effective. MVT is clearly a case of this.