So one should just start fighting and hope others follow? Why not just be a hypocrite, we humans are good at it, that way you can promote the social norm you wish to inspire with a much smaller cost!
If you’re in a population of similar agents, you should expect other people to be doing the same thing, and you’ll be a lot more likely to lose the war than if you actually fight. And if you’re not in a population where you can rely on other people choosing similarly, you want a policy that will effectively force everyone to fight. Any action that “promotes the social norm” but does not really enforce the behavior may be good signaling within the community, but will be useless with respect to not getting killed by barbarians.
Why bother to learn what global warming if it suffices for you to know it is a buzzword that makes the hybrid car you are going to buy more trendy than your neighbours pick up truck or your old Toyota (while ignoring the fact that a car has already left most of its carbon footprint by the time its rolled off the assembly line and delivered to you)?
A person who only believes in the signalling value of green technologies (hybrids are trendy) does not want a social policy mandating green behavior (the behaviors would lose their signaling value.)
A person who only believes in the signalling value of green technologies (hybrids are trendy) does not want a social policy mandating green behavior (the behaviors would lose their signaling value.)
A social policy mandating a behavior that is typical of a subgroup shows that that subgroup wields a lot of political power and thus gives it higher status—those pesky blues will have to learn who’s the boss! Hence headscarves forbidden or compulsory, recycling, “in God we trust” as a motto, etc.
If you’re in a population of similar agents, you should expect other people to be doing the same thing, and you’ll be a lot more likely to lose the war than if you actually fight.
I am familiar with the argument, it just happens to be I don’t this this is so, at least not when it comes to coordination on global warming. I should have made that explicit though.
Any action that “promotes the social norm” but does not really enforce the behavior may be good signaling within the community, but will be useless with respect to not getting killed by barbarians.
I don’t think you grok how hypocrisy works. By promoting the social norms I don’t follow I make life harder for less skilled hypocrites. The harder life gets for them, the more of them should switch to just following the norms, if that happens to be cheaper.
Sufficiently skilled hypocrites are the enforcers of societal norms.
Also where does this strange idea of a norm not being really enforced come from? Of course it is! The idea that anything worthy of the name social norm isn’t really enforced is an idea that’s currently popular but obviously silly, mostly since it allows us to score status points by pretending to be violating long dead taboos.
The mention of hypocrisy seems to have immediately jumped a few lanes and landed in “dosen’t really enforce”. Ever heard of a double standard? No human society ever has worked without a few. It is perfectly possible to be a mean lean norm enforcing machine and not follow them.
A person who only believes in the signalling value of green technologies (hybrids are trendy) does not want a social policy mandating green behavior (the behaviors would lose their signaling value.)
He may not want its universal or near universal adoption (lets leave aside if its legislated or not) but it is unavoidable. That’s just how fashion works, absent material constraints it drifts downwards. And since most past, present and probably most future societies are not middle class dominated societies, one can easily argue that lower classes embracing ecological conspicuousness might do more good. Consuming products based on how they judge it (mass consumption is still what drives the economy) and voting on it (since votes are signalling affiliation in the first approximation).
Also at the end of the day well of people still often cooperate on measures such as mandatory school uniforms.
I don’t believe it’s so either. I think that even assuming they believed global warming was a real threat, much or most of the population would not choose to carry their share of the communal burden. This is the sort of situation where you want an enforced policy ensuring cooperation.
In places where rule of law breaks down, a lot of people engage in actions such as looting, but they still generally prefer to live in societies where rules against that sort of thing are enforced.
In places where people are not much like you, where people don’t know you well (or there are other factors making hypocrisy relatively easy to get away with) you shouldn’t bother promoting costly norms by actually following them.
You probably get more expected utility if you are a hypocrite in such circumstances.
That’s true. But it’s still to your advantage to be in a society where rules promoting the norm are enforced. If you’re in a society which doesn’t have that degree of cohesiveness and is to averse to enforcing cooperation, then you don’t want to fight the barbarians, you want to stay at home and get killed later. This is a society you really don’t want to be in though; things have to be pretty hopeless before it’s no longer in your interest to promote a policy of cooperation.
This is a society you really don’t want to be in though; things have to be pretty hopeless before it’s no longer in your interest to promote a policy of cooperation.
This actually makes more sense if you reverse it! Promoting costly norms by following them yourself regardless of the behavior of others only becomes the best policy when the consequences of that norm not being followed is dire!
When I say “things have to be pretty hopeless,” I mean that the prospects for amelioration are low, not that the consequences are dire. Assuming the consequences are severe, taking costly norms on oneself to prevent it makes sense unless the chances of it working are very low.
To avoid slipping into “arguments as soldiers” mode, I just wanted to state that I do think environmental related tragedy of the commons are a big problem for us (come on the trope namer is basically one!) and we should devote resources to attempt to solve or ameliorate them.
I, on the other hand, find myself among environmentalists thinking that the collective actions they’re promoting mostly have negative individual marginal utility. But I think that acquiring the basic information has positive individual marginal utility (I personally suspect that the most effective solutions to climate change are not ones that hinge on grassroots conservation efforts, but effective solutions will require people to be aware of the problem and take it seriously.)
If you’re in a population of similar agents, you should expect other people to be doing the same thing, and you’ll be a lot more likely to lose the war than if you actually fight. And if you’re not in a population where you can rely on other people choosing similarly, you want a policy that will effectively force everyone to fight. Any action that “promotes the social norm” but does not really enforce the behavior may be good signaling within the community, but will be useless with respect to not getting killed by barbarians.
A person who only believes in the signalling value of green technologies (hybrids are trendy) does not want a social policy mandating green behavior (the behaviors would lose their signaling value.)
A social policy mandating a behavior that is typical of a subgroup shows that that subgroup wields a lot of political power and thus gives it higher status—those pesky blues will have to learn who’s the boss! Hence headscarves forbidden or compulsory, recycling, “in God we trust” as a motto, etc.
Hey! That’s my team. How dare you!
I am familiar with the argument, it just happens to be I don’t this this is so, at least not when it comes to coordination on global warming. I should have made that explicit though.
I don’t think you grok how hypocrisy works. By promoting the social norms I don’t follow I make life harder for less skilled hypocrites. The harder life gets for them, the more of them should switch to just following the norms, if that happens to be cheaper.
Sufficiently skilled hypocrites are the enforcers of societal norms.
Also where does this strange idea of a norm not being really enforced come from? Of course it is! The idea that anything worthy of the name social norm isn’t really enforced is an idea that’s currently popular but obviously silly, mostly since it allows us to score status points by pretending to be violating long dead taboos.
The mention of hypocrisy seems to have immediately jumped a few lanes and landed in “dosen’t really enforce”. Ever heard of a double standard? No human society ever has worked without a few. It is perfectly possible to be a mean lean norm enforcing machine and not follow them.
He may not want its universal or near universal adoption (lets leave aside if its legislated or not) but it is unavoidable. That’s just how fashion works, absent material constraints it drifts downwards. And since most past, present and probably most future societies are not middle class dominated societies, one can easily argue that lower classes embracing ecological conspicuousness might do more good. Consuming products based on how they judge it (mass consumption is still what drives the economy) and voting on it (since votes are signalling affiliation in the first approximation).
Also at the end of the day well of people still often cooperate on measures such as mandatory school uniforms.
I don’t believe it’s so either. I think that even assuming they believed global warming was a real threat, much or most of the population would not choose to carry their share of the communal burden. This is the sort of situation where you want an enforced policy ensuring cooperation.
In places where rule of law breaks down, a lot of people engage in actions such as looting, but they still generally prefer to live in societies where rules against that sort of thing are enforced.
In places where people are not much like you, where people don’t know you well (or there are other factors making hypocrisy relatively easy to get away with) you shouldn’t bother promoting costly norms by actually following them.
You probably get more expected utility if you are a hypocrite in such circumstances.
That’s true. But it’s still to your advantage to be in a society where rules promoting the norm are enforced. If you’re in a society which doesn’t have that degree of cohesiveness and is to averse to enforcing cooperation, then you don’t want to fight the barbarians, you want to stay at home and get killed later. This is a society you really don’t want to be in though; things have to be pretty hopeless before it’s no longer in your interest to promote a policy of cooperation.
This actually makes more sense if you reverse it! Promoting costly norms by following them yourself regardless of the behavior of others only becomes the best policy when the consequences of that norm not being followed is dire!
When I say “things have to be pretty hopeless,” I mean that the prospects for amelioration are low, not that the consequences are dire. Assuming the consequences are severe, taking costly norms on oneself to prevent it makes sense unless the chances of it working are very low.
To avoid slipping into “arguments as soldiers” mode, I just wanted to state that I do think environmental related tragedy of the commons are a big problem for us (come on the trope namer is basically one!) and we should devote resources to attempt to solve or ameliorate them.
I, on the other hand, find myself among environmentalists thinking that the collective actions they’re promoting mostly have negative individual marginal utility. But I think that acquiring the basic information has positive individual marginal utility (I personally suspect that the most effective solutions to climate change are not ones that hinge on grassroots conservation efforts, but effective solutions will require people to be aware of the problem and take it seriously.)