Maybe I could fix this problem by sneaking into buildings, removing the sofas, and then incinerating them. That way, finding that a sofa has gone missing would then be weaker evidence that it has been stolen and stronger evidence that it has been incinerated. That would make it increasingly difficult to detect sofa robbery, hopefully putting it on par with social trust robbery detection.
In other words, mankind would put more resources into sofa production and detection of any variety of theft, leaving less to put into paperclip production. Do you know how they attach upholstery to couches? Staples.
Robbing any commons has consequences, otherwise it wouldn’t be a commons problem.
Robbing things in general has consequences—but it’s harder to detect the robbery of social trust than the robbery of a sofa.
Maybe I could fix this problem by sneaking into buildings, removing the sofas, and then incinerating them. That way, finding that a sofa has gone missing would then be weaker evidence that it has been stolen and stronger evidence that it has been incinerated. That would make it increasingly difficult to detect sofa robbery, hopefully putting it on par with social trust robbery detection.
That would make things worse, not better.
In other words, mankind would put more resources into sofa production and detection of any variety of theft, leaving less to put into paperclip production. Do you know how they attach upholstery to couches? Staples.
Actually, it would be evidence that your sofa has been stolen and you have no chance of getting it back.