On resource scarcity—I also find it difficult for humans to execute altruism without resources, and may be a privilege to even think about these (financially, educationally, health-wise, and information-wise. Would starting with something important but may or may not be the “most” important help? Sometimes I find the process of finding the “most” a bit less rational than people would expect/theorize.
Bias and self-preservation by human nature, but need correction
To expand from there, that is one thing that I am worried about. Our views/beliefs are by nature limited by our experiences, and if humans do not recognize or acknowledge that self-preserving natures, we will be claiming altruism but not actually doing them. It will also prevent us from establishing a really good system that incentivize people to do so.
To give an example, there was a manifold question (https://manifold.markets/Bayesian/would-you-rather-manifold-chooses?r=enlj), asking if manifold wants to “Push someone in front of a trolley to save 5 others (NO) -OR- Be the person someone else pushes in front of the trolley to save 5 others (YES)”. When I saw the stats before close, it was 92% (I chose YES, and lost, I would say my YES is with 85% confidence). While we propose we value people’s life equally, I see self-preservation persist. Then I see that could radiate to I prefer preservation of my family, friends, people you are more familiar with, etc.
Simple majority vs minority situation
This is similar with majority voting. When the population has 80% of people A, and 20% of people B, assuming equal vote/power for everyone, when there are issues that is in conflict between A and B, especially some sort of historical oppression of A towards B, then B’s concerns would rarely be addressed. (Hope humans nowadays are better than this, and more educated, but who knows).
Power
When power (social and economical) is added into the self-preservation, without a proper social contract, this will be even more messed-up. The decision maker of these problems will always the people with some sort of power.
This is true in reality, where the people who get to choose/plan what is the most important in reality and our society, are either the powerful people, or the population outnumbering others. Worse if both. Therefore, we see less passionate caring on minority issues, on a platform like this practicing rationality. With power, everything can go below it, including other people, policies, and law.
How do we create a world with max. freedom to people, with constraint on people do not harm other people, regardless of they have power or not/regardless if they will get caught or not? What level of “constraint” are historically powerful groups willing to accept? I am not sure of right balance/what is most effective yet; I have seen cases where some men were reluctant to receive education materials on consent, claiming they know, but they don’t. This is a very very small cost, but yet there are people who are not willing to even take that. This makes me frustrated.
Regardless, I do believe in the effectiveness of awareness, continuous education, law, and the need to foster a culture to cultivate humans that truly respect other lives.
Real life examples
I was not very aware of many related women’s suffering issues, until recently, from the Korean pop star group
Relatedly on my first reply to the person’s DM:
On resource scarcity—I also find it difficult for humans to execute altruism without resources, and may be a privilege to even think about these (financially, educationally, health-wise, and information-wise. Would starting with something important but may or may not be the “most” important help? Sometimes I find the process of finding the “most” a bit less rational than people would expect/theorize.
Bias and self-preservation by human nature, but need correction
To expand from there, that is one thing that I am worried about. Our views/beliefs are by nature limited by our experiences, and if humans do not recognize or acknowledge that self-preserving natures, we will be claiming altruism but not actually doing them. It will also prevent us from establishing a really good system that incentivize people to do so.
To give an example, there was a manifold question (https://manifold.markets/Bayesian/would-you-rather-manifold-chooses?r=enlj), asking if manifold wants to “Push someone in front of a trolley to save 5 others (NO) -OR- Be the person someone else pushes in front of the trolley to save 5 others (YES)”. When I saw the stats before close, it was 92% (I chose YES, and lost, I would say my YES is with 85% confidence). While we propose we value people’s life equally, I see self-preservation persist. Then I see that could radiate to I prefer preservation of my family, friends, people you are more familiar with, etc.
Simple majority vs minority situation
This is similar with majority voting. When the population has 80% of people A, and 20% of people B, assuming equal vote/power for everyone, when there are issues that is in conflict between A and B, especially some sort of historical oppression of A towards B, then B’s concerns would rarely be addressed. (Hope humans nowadays are better than this, and more educated, but who knows).
Power
When power (social and economical) is added into the self-preservation, without a proper social contract, this will be even more messed-up. The decision maker of these problems will always the people with some sort of power.
This is true in reality, where the people who get to choose/plan what is the most important in reality and our society, are either the powerful people, or the population outnumbering others. Worse if both. Therefore, we see less passionate caring on minority issues, on a platform like this practicing rationality. With power, everything can go below it, including other people, policies, and law.
How do we create a world with max. freedom to people, with constraint on people do not harm other people, regardless of they have power or not/regardless if they will get caught or not? What level of “constraint” are historically powerful groups willing to accept? I am not sure of right balance/what is most effective yet; I have seen cases where some men were reluctant to receive education materials on consent, claiming they know, but they don’t. This is a very very small cost, but yet there are people who are not willing to even take that. This makes me frustrated.
Regardless, I do believe in the effectiveness of awareness, continuous education, law, and the need to foster a culture to cultivate humans that truly respect other lives.
Real life examples
I was not very aware of many related women’s suffering issues, until recently, from the Korean pop star group
to recent female doctor case (https://www.npr.org/sections/goats-and-soda/2024/08/26/g-s1-18366/rape-murder-doctor-india-sexual-violence-protests). I was believing in 2024, these are things humans should have been able to solve but not yet, but maybe I was in my own bubble. And organizationally, on the country level, I believe you would have seen many news on different wars now.
Thanks for sharing the two pages! Not sure if the above are clear or not, but I try to document all of my thoughts.