Voting: You would not be in a polity where humans (rather than “lizards”) rule over you unless you would cause yourself to endure the costs of voting despite the slim chance of influencing the outcome.
Ben covered that one here—though he also said that the argument was not convincing enough to make him actually vote.
As a side note, there are more benefits to voting than just winning the current election (as the linked blog post seems to suggest). There’s also influencing the political climate in your direction to win future elections (or convince the usual suspects to change policy in your preferred direction or be voted out).
There are billions of people on the planet, and we can see how many of them actually vote. Doesn’t this evidence count for a lot more than how you actually vote in terms of determining which sort of world you are in?
Also, voting looks like a device for placating the voters, more than anything else.
I’m pretty sure the cited argument is a rather poor reason for voting in national elections.
Ben covered that one here—though he also said that the argument was not convincing enough to make him actually vote.
As a side note, there are more benefits to voting than just winning the current election (as the linked blog post seems to suggest). There’s also influencing the political climate in your direction to win future elections (or convince the usual suspects to change policy in your preferred direction or be voted out).
There are billions of people on the planet, and we can see how many of them actually vote. Doesn’t this evidence count for a lot more than how you actually vote in terms of determining which sort of world you are in?
Also, voting looks like a device for placating the voters, more than anything else.
I’m pretty sure the cited argument is a rather poor reason for voting in national elections.